Paddy Power Gives Details About Controversial Campaign Featuring Notorious Suarez

Paddy Power, massive Irish bookmaker, publicized more information about another one of its controversial campaigns, which would have featured the provocative Uruguayan football player Luis Suarez, currently playing for FC Liverpool.

According to Irish gambling news, the bookmaker had signed a deal with Suarez to wear a special Paddy Power branded mouth guard, during an important game of the elimination stage of the World Cup 2014, which is taking place in Brazil at the moment.

The arrangement was that Suarez would disclose the mouth guard during the national anthems before the game between Uruguay and Colombia in the tournament’s last-16 elimination round.

Idea that never comes true

Paddy Power was planning to advertise at the World Cup through notorious Suarez

• The deal was that Suarez would show his branded mouth guard before the game between Uruguay and Colombia

• The brilliant marketing idea never happened as the player was punished for biting Italian player in the previous game

• This is not the first time Paddy Power has approached Suarez with advertising offer

Paddy Power explained that it finalized the contract after Suarez was accused of biting Giorgio Chiellini, Italian defender, during a World Cup Group D game between Italy and Uruguay. It seems that this is definitely his trademark, as he was accused of biting an opponent for the third time.

This brilliant idea to advertise, according to Paddy Power, which follows all Irish gambling laws, never turned into reality as Suarez was found guilty for biting by the responsible FIFA authorities and was banned from playing for four months, therefore he didn’t take part in the game against Colombia.

Informed sources from the bookmaker’s side admitted that Suarez was approached by Paddy Power with various advertising proposals even before this World Cup offer.

The sources said:“Last summer we had several exchanges with Joel Borras Garcia from Pere Guardiola’s management company.”

More details about previous offers

Additionally: “The discussions were around sponsoring Suarez’s gum shield for his return match to the Premier League after his last biting ban (on Chelsea defender Branislav Ivanovic). Negotiations broke down over cost but in theory, he was up for it.”

Moreover: “We reconnected with Garcia immediately after his latest World Cup biting ‘incident’ and in principle we had a deal in place whereby Suarez would reveal a Paddy Power branded mouth guard during the national anthems before the Uruguay vs. Columbia match.”

Also: “Unfortunately FIFA had other ideas and when the four-month ban was announcement, the deal fell apart. I guess you could say it was the best ambush marketing campaign that never was.”

Other notorious campaigns

Paddy Power is definitely one of the most provocative operators when it comes to marketing and this is visible not only by their attempt to advertise through Suarez.

This gambling operator knows how to attract attention and another very good example comes from its campaign during the Euro 2012 tournament when in a match between Denmark and Portugal, Nicklas Bendtner, Danish forward, showed a pair of Paddy Power underpants when celebrating his second goal and lowering his shorts.

The national team’s sponsor Ladbrokes, competitive gambling operator, was naturally horrified and so was UEFA, which fined him with a EUR 100,000 fine. Naturally, Paddy Power covered the fine, which seemed nothing in comparison to the advertising, which was exposed to millions of people and in order to make its customers even happier, it gave away thousands of replica underwear through its Facebook page.