Everton’s Angry Birds Partnership – will we see more of this in an independent A-League?

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After Barclays’ title sponsorship ended with the Premier League in 2016, a new opportunity presented itself for teams to sell lucrative advertising space on the sleeve of the club’s playing shirt.

In a competitive market at the time, Premier League club Everton signed a multi-year deal in 2017 with Finnish video game developer Rovio Entertainment, the creator of popular puzzle game Angry Birds.

Angry Birds was released in 2009 and since then has amassed over 3.7 billion game downloads.

By the beginning of the 2017/18 season only eleven of the Premier League clubs had secured a shirt sleeve sponsor.

“At the end of the Barclays deal with the Premier League it was a competitive market,” head of partnership management at Everton, Mark Rollings.

“Every club was going to market at the same time, but it was really important to find the right brand fit for us, one that we could work with and create a great partnership.”

Everton was one of the teams that started the season without a sponsor, however the Angry Birds logo finally debuted on the sleeve of their jersey in a mid-September clash against Manchester United.

Everton is a club that was established in 1878 and has a rich history, however there is an understanding to move with the times and enter innovative partnerships with companies such as Rovio.

“Throughout the process of securing our first sleeve partner we spoke with many brands. When we met with Rovio at their HQ in Espoo it quickly became apparent how exciting and mutually beneficial this opportunity was going to be,” Rollings stated.

“They’re great to work with. Whenever you partner with a brand from a business sector which is new to you, we take learnings from each other. The creative, flexible and can-do approach is definitely something we felt from day one of the partnership.”

Both sides initially faced a big challenge in launching the partnership.

“The leading character of the Angry Birds series is a red bird and it is ironic that this is both a colour and symbol commonly associated with the club’s city rivals.” Rolling explained.

“True to Rovio’s dynamic, bold nature, rather than skirt around it we decided to hit it head on so, in line with the trend around over exaggerated player signing content at the time, we announced the character Red as a Blue.

“Angry Birds created a great video of Red signing a contract with Everton and that gained positive traction for the launch. It was a fantastic way for a partner to tackle a potential issue and also immediately pledge their support to the club.”

Everton and Rovio continued to discuss more unique possibilities between the two organisations.

Eventually, these creative discussions would lead to Everton players Theo Walcott, Cenk Tosun and Gylfi Sigurdsson being re-imagined as playable Angry Bird’s characters.

This occurred at the start of the 2018/19 Premier League season, with the digitisation of these players into the Angry Birds Evolution game.

“It was a world first, there’d never been football talent in a non-football focused mobile game. And that gained a lot of attention with over one hundred pieces of coverage in newspapers and on back pages. It also achieved over five million views across related social media content.”

The integration of the playable Everton characters led to a 60% increase in downloads for the Angry Birds franchise over a two-week period.

It was also important for Everton that the partnership was well received by its fanbase.

Rollings claimed: “What you see with Angry Birds is if you create good activations that fans can see, enjoy and engage with, then you start to earn your place among the fanbase. Angry Birds’ approach was to bring the partnership to life through stories, content and activations that fans would enjoy. People will engage with quality partnership activation that adds value to their experience and the stats prove that.

“Our data and insights team run a regular partner tracking survey and that showed that in the first year of the partnership the opinion of Angry Birds improved by 22% among our fanbase. Angry Birds has been really received and people have understood the mutual value that it has driven for both brands.

“We also commissioned independent research which not only tracked Everton fans, but also Premier League fans, and in that survey awareness of Angry Birds as a partner of a Premier League club was between 60 and 70%, which for the length of deal they’ve had so far is pretty remarkable. So we’re seeing it’s not just Everton fans that are engaging with the partnership, Premier League fans are too.”

On a local front, will we see more of similar partnerships in the A-League now that rules look to be relaxing on a sponsorship front?

Time will tell.

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GIS Masterclass: Fan Engagement and Marketing with Terry Lynam and Karen Grega

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Image Credit: Global Institute of Sport

The Global Institute of Sport recently hosted a masterclass on Fan Engagement and Marketing, bringing together two industry leaders to tackle the field’s most pressing issues.

The Global Institute of Sport (GIS), which offers a Master’s in Sports Business and Sports Analytics through the University of Newcastle, regularly holds masterclasses with industry leaders as part of its curriculum.

The latest focused on fan engagement and marketing, covering two key themes: the growing tension between live sport and online streaming, and the role of data in shaping the fan experience.

The panelists 

Terry Lynam recently concluded her role as General Manager of Fan Experience and Events at Football Australia, overseeing the AFC Women’s Asian Cup on home soil.

Karen Grega is an experienced sports management consultant with a multi-code background. She currently represents Football Coaches Australia (FCA) and Heartbeat of Football, and has previously worked with Sydney Cricket Ground, Venues NSW and Sydney FC.

Live Sport and social media.

Terry Lynam opened with a pointed statement — one she acknowledged would be controversial. She argued that the sense of community unique to live sport is being eroded by social media and ‘snippet’ consumption.

Central to her concern is how marketing teams are failing to segment their audiences, treating casual online viewers the same as matchday fans.

“If they aren’t spending money on the sport we shouldn’t count them as spectators to the same level as match going fans.”

“What we want to consider as marketeers is how much we want to give away and how much we want our live sport element to remain,” Lynam said.

Grega echoed the sentiment, arguing fan engagement ultimately comes down to human connection. “It’s not rocket science.”

She suggested the industry revisit the concept of sport as a family outing to recapture that communal experience.

Data Driving Decisions

Both panelists highlighted data and analytics as central to modern fan engagement.

Grega recalled the introduction of computerised turnstiles as a turning point, enabling teams to track crowd movements and optimise staffing and entry times.

She also noted the continued value of fan surveys in informing marketing decisions.

Lynam pointed to ticketing technology as a significant data frontier.

Modern platforms like Ticketmaster’s ticket-transfer system now provide detailed customer insights.

“It allows us to have a better understanding of who’s getting the ticket and how they transport themselves there or when they arrive,”

“We can personalise their journey and sell content to them,” Lynam commented. 

The discussion also touched on data sourced from social media and on-field player tracking, as well as interactive stadium technology gaining traction in the US.

This included holographic assistants and player headset interactions that bring a broadcast-style experience to live events.

Activations That Educate

Activations rounded out the masterclass, with Lynam detailing how she created a fan zone on a modest budget for the Women’s Asian Cup.

The activation featured charitable partnerships focused on women’s health, including Heartbeat of Football, Endometriosis Australia and Share the Dignity.

“I’m very hopeful that that type of idea gets pushed through on other sporting events,” Lynam said.

Grega elaborated on the Heartbeat of Football activation, highlighting how a competitive element built around CPR and heart health kept fans engaged while also educating them.

“The whole health hub ticked all the boxes — it was immersive, it was interactive, it was there for all ages, both sexes.”

“That sort of blueprint is one that should be replicated as much as possible,” Explained Karen Grega

The masterclass offered students and industry professionals a valuable window into contemporary sports marketing.

As the competition for fan attention intensifies, the blend of live experience, smart data use, and purposeful activations can help define the next chapters of fan engagement.

More Than One in Five Football Australia Staff to Lose Jobs Amid Growing Financial Losses

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Image Credit: ESPN

Australian football finds itself in a curious position.

From the outside, the game appears to be riding a wave of momentum. Attendances, visibility and public interest have all experienced significant uplift in recent years, while major international tournaments and growing discussion around football’s future continue to place the sport firmly within the national conversation.

Yet behind that momentum, Football Australia is now confronting a far more challenging internal reality.

 

A compounding deficit

Chief Executive Martin Kugeler has reportedly indicated the governing body’s projected financial losses for 2025 are expected to exceed the organisation’s reported $8.5 million deficit from the previous year. Accompanying the financial outlook are substantial organisational changes, with reporting from Tracey Holmes indicating more than one in five Football Australia employees are expected to lose their positions through restructuring measures.

The figures represent more than a difficult balance sheet. They point toward a significant period of recalibration inside the organisation responsible for overseeing the sport nationally.

 

Losing the wisdom of existing staff members

For governing bodies, restructures are often framed as strategic necessities for future sustainability. However, workforce changes on this scale also raise broader questions around the challenges of such a transition.

People are often the carriers of knowledge, relationships and long-term strategic understanding. When organisations undergo significant structural change, the effects can extend beyond immediate financial outcomes.

 

Contradicting timing

The timing is what makes the developments particularly notable.

Football in Australia has spent recent years discussing expansion, growth and long-term opportunity. The conversation surrounding the game has increasingly centred on future potential. Often headlining stronger pathways, larger audiences, infrastructure development and greater visibility.

Against that backdrop, news of deep financial losses and substantial staffing reductions creates a different conversation: one focused not on where the game wants to go, but on what may be required to sustain that journey. Therefore, this announcement points toward stagnancy, rather than growth.

Further detail surrounding Football Australia’s strategy and long-term direction will likely emerge over coming months. For now, the developments serve as a reminder that growth stories are rarely straightforward.

Often, the periods that appear strongest from the outside can also be the moments organisations face their most significant internal tests.

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