Adidas continued to build its new umbrella ‘You Got This’ marketing platform through February and March with a trio of online films featuring a lineup of young Adidas ambassadors – including Anthony Edwards, Mia Fishel, Gabriel Martinelli and Andreas Pereira, plus Francisco Cerundolo and Felix Auger Aliassime – which all explore how they might play if pressure didn’t exist.
The young athlete ambassador led social spot series – created by The Midnight Club, with production outfits PRETTYBIRD UK and Mr+Positive – revolves around the idea ‘what if we played like pressure didn’t exist?’
The campaign centres around a trio of social spots which explore what can happen when the pressure is removed and games become only about having fun. Badged with the tagline #YouGotThis, each film shows young athlete ambassadors from the sportswear giant’s endorser stable experiencing sport in a new way by surprising them with twists on traditional sporting environments.
The trio of spots, all helmed by Director Jess Kohl, began on 17 February when the first film was posted featuring hoops hero Anthony Edwards taking on ‘The 20 Foot Hoop’.
Shot on location in Minneapolis (USA), where Edwards plays for the local NBA franchise the Minnesota Timberwolves, it sees the small forward / shooting guard strike up an easy rapport with a young team of basketball players who give him an insight into the pressures they face on the basketball court.
The tension eases when Edwards takes on and scores in a 20 foot hoop.
This was followed on 18 February by ‘The Football Triangle’: again, the spot’s narrative asks ‘what would happen if adidas changed the game for one night?’ and it sees Gabriel Martinelli, Catarina Macario, Andreas Pereira and Mia Fishel tackle the football triangle challenge.
The players are first shown in their dressing room pre-match, discuss their nerves about playing in front of a crowd and how the pressure gets to them, before playing football like you’ve never experienced it before: a game played out on an unconventional pitch with triangular markings.
Filmed on location at Wasps FC Rugby club, the pitch itself was designed by The Midnight Club creatives Luke & Vanya.
Three local girls teams (Kinetic FC under 16’s, Barking Abbey under 16’s and Tottenham under 16’s) take to the unusual field to play 5v5v5 with three goals and whole new way to play in an effort to remind young female players that there’s more to football than pressure.
The third and final film in the series, ‘The Giant Court Challenge’, is a tennis focused fun film. Released on 4 March, it sees young stars Francisco Cerundolo and Felix Auger Aliassime alongside several young Japanese youth players all tackle the challenge of a huge tennis court.
The multi-round experiment begins with the youngsters taking on a machine on the massive court, before playing triples (like doubles, but with an extra player on each team) and then playing a form of tennis volleyball with the professionals.
“The overall creative concept was to reimagine the spaces where people play sports, with the intention of taking the pressure off and creating environments for players to just have fun, and remember why they fell in love with the sport in the first place. I was excited about the brief because it was an opportunity to create graphic, surreal spaces in different cities around the world – a triangular football pitch in London, double-size tennis court in Japan, and 20ft high basketball hoop in Minneapolis. We then invited pro players to join local kids on the courts and captured the organized chaos that ensued.”
Director Jess Kohl
The campaign was created for an Adidas team led by Marketing Manager Erik Troedsson, Brand Manager Margo Camus and Producers Laura Leland and Dawn Martin by a group at creative agency The Midnight Club which included Creative Directors Vanya Beloborodov and Luke Bartley, plus Producer Alex Anderson, Account Director Sophie Farmery and Strategy Director Kitty Pemberton-Platt.
Production was handled by Prettybird UK with Director Jess Kohl, Executive Producer Juliette Larthe, Head Of Production Fiona Bamford-Phillips, Producer Ted Thornton, Production Manager Enrique Soares Da Silva, Production Assistant Lottie Lindsay-Beavan and Director Of Photography Matthew Ballard.
While production in Japan was handled by Tokyo based Mr+Positive.
This work is an expansion of Adidas umbrella, global #YouGotThis brand platform which launched at the start of February and will run through the year including at UEFA Euro 2024 and the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
London based Director Jess Kohl’s background is in photographer: she originally graduated from Central Saint Martins in photography and then completed a Masters in Cinematography at Goldsmiths. Her work has featured in renowned publications such as Dazed, Another Magazine, British Journal of Photography, Nowness, The Face, Vogue and i-D, and her commercial work for global brands includes working with Google, Carhartt and WhatsApp, as well as with a growing group of sports-centric brands such as Nike, Speedo and On Running.