AGENCY OF THE YEAR
50 Sport
50 Sport is one of the world’s fastest-growing, independently owned creative and social media agencies. Our mission is to help brands, teams, and rights holders reimagine possibilities in football, leveraging creativity and cultural insight to drive growth, deepen connections, and inspire progress.
We believe football can be a force for good and our work reflects our commitment to sustainability, diversity and supporting women in sport. From grassroots initiatives to global campaigns, we focus on creating meaningful, measurable impact.
In the past year, we’ve grown to 120 team members, and opened offices in Dubai and Miami. Highlights include groundbreaking campaigns like the Nike Powerhouse Project, PSG’s Breast Cancer Awareness Campaign, and England Football’s #LetGirlsPlay initiative.
Our esteemed football client list includes FIFA (Men’s World Cup 2026, Club World Cup 2025), Qatar Airways (FIFA, UEFA Champions League, PSG, Inter Milan), UEFA, The FA, England Football & Learning, Real Madrid, Arsenal, Celsius, and MLS.
By fusing deep audience understanding with bold creativity and storytelling, we continue to connect football’s universal appeal with diverse audiences worldwide, ensuring that our work not only entertains but also inspires positive change.
Brothers & Sisters
Founded in 2005, Brothers & Sisters is a specialist sports and entertainment agency. In 2024, we expanded our focus by launching Brothers & Sisters Sports Club, with Robert Tansey, a long-term ex-Sky Sports client, joining as Chairman. At our core, we maximise the value of sports rights and investments, consistently delivering results that go beyond the expected. Through bold creativity, we exert a disproportionate influence on culture, replacing incremental improvements with significant advances in fan engagement, involvement, and overall value.
Over the past 18 years, we’ve transformed over £20 billion worth of sports rights, helping to shape Sky Sports into a dominant force in the sports industry. This has given us unparalleled expertise in creative strategy and execution.
Homeground
Homeground is an agency trading in creative work with a point of view for brands in sport and sport culture.
Founded in 2021, Homeground is a small but mighty collective of specialists creating campaigns that help brands move authentically in and around football culture and create more social currency, not more of the same sports marketing we’re all tired of seeing.
The people originally behind Arsenal’s No More Red anti-knife crime initiative, adidas and Manchester United’s ‘Originals United’ campaign featuring Barry Keoghan, and Aston Villa’s incredible partnership with Black Sabbath, Homeground now works with some of the biggest brands and rights holders in the world, and are behind the most famous creative campaigns in football at the moment.
LoveGunn
LoveGunn is an independent creative agency dedicated to placing fans at the heart of every football brand experience. Our London-based team of strategists, designers, and storytellers believes that true engagement begins with understanding the passions, motivations, and rituals that unite supporters—on terraces and online alike. By blending data-driven insights with authentic community narratives, we craft strategic identities, campaigns, and digital experiences that resonate across all touchpoints.
This fan-first philosophy has guided our collaborations with forward-thinking clubs and businesses seeking to innovate and grow. Working alongside Arsenal and MG Motors, we demonstrated the power of sponsorships rooted in genuine supporter alignment. Meanwhile, our rebrand of Oxford United shifted the spotlight to the club’s transformative impact on local fans, embodying a spirit of unity and empowerment. In partnership with MatchWornShirt, we pushed the boundaries of tech-enabled storytelling through Fabricks, harnessing blockchain to enrich the collector-fan experience.
Whether it’s creating a new crest for a Championship team, uniting an automotive icon with Premier League supporters, or pioneering digital fan collectibles, LoveGunn’s approach is always the same: start with the fan, and build outwards. The result is impactful branding that lives and breathes football’s singular sense of community and belonging.
MatchFit
This was the rocket year for MatchFit, as we doubled down on our specialist ‘earned-first’ sports communications agency positioning for world-class brands and rightsholders in football.
Winning 100% of pitches, we grew revenue by 70% YoY and added iconic clients, including LALIGA, MatchWornShirt and Legends Soccer Group.
We delivered our best client work ever, with campaigns ranging from helping Topps smash sales targets during UEFA Euro 2024 to growing the grassroots of women’s football with The FA.
In tandem, our permanent headcount grew by 30% while we maintained a culture that earned us ‘Great Place to Work Certification’ and launched a second office in Manchester.
This was 12 months in which we helped some of the best clients in football land campaigns which inspired audiences to discover and interact with the beautiful game in so many different ways.
This was the year we became truly MatchFit.
Rising Ballers Group
Rising Ballers Group, encompassing Rising Ballers (RB), She’s A Baller (SAB), and Footballer Fits (FF), is redefining sports media through authentic storytelling and audience-first strategies. Since 2017, we’ve leveraged social platforms to inspire and engage the next generation of football fans. By addressing youth culture in football, championing the women’s game, and connecting football with fashion, Rising Ballers Group has built one of the most engaged football media networks, reaching 140M+ people monthly.
Our audience, primarily Gen Z and millennials, includes players, brands, and influencers. Partnerships with Adidas, EA, Nike, and The FA showcase our ability to deliver culturally relevant campaigns that surpass industry benchmarks. Notable successes include Nike’s Mad Ambition launch, achieving 29M+ organic views, and SAB’s EA Sports WSL campaign, achieving 90% story completion rate. Our editorial podcast series, Perspectives, and high-impact initiatives like the FA Cup Baller of the Round have further cemented our influence.
In 2024, we experienced 70% revenue growth, adding 15 new clients and retaining 75% of existing projects. With investments in team expansion and leadership, we remain committed to delivering impactful, data-driven campaigns. Rising Ballers Group continues to lead in football media, driving results that resonate deeply with fans and brands alike.
WePlay
Football in 2024 has been defined by global spectacle, shifting fan behaviours, and evolving commercial opportunities. The UEFA European Championship captured the world’s attention, breaking records in viewership and hospitality sales, while clubs faced new challenges in digital fan engagement, sponsorship activation, and direct-to-consumer revenue growth. Emerging markets, particularly in the US and Asia, continued to rise as key battlegrounds for football expansion, requiring innovative marketing strategies to connect with new audiences.
WePlay sits at the heart of this evolution. We are an award-winning, performance-driven sports marketing agency working across all levels of the game—from global tournaments and elite clubs to emerging football markets and grassroots initiatives. Our mission is to help football organisations grow audiences, deepen fan relationships, and unlock new revenue opportunities through a combination of creative innovation and data-led performance marketing.
Our global client portfolio includes UEFA, FIFA, ECA, LaLiga, Paris Saint-Germain, AC Milan, and ASEAN Football Federation, among others. Whether driving digital transformation for major competitions, elevating club brands in new markets, or unlocking commercial growth for football stakeholders, WePlay delivers measurable impact at every stage of the football ecosystem.
