Paddy Power ‘apologises’ To The Benchwarmers
With fans fed up of watching players collect millions for sitting on the bench, last week bookmaker Paddy Power launched a poster campaign called “2nd jobs for subs” with sites across the country outside of five Premiership football clubs.
In ‘We Hear You’ style, which also saw the bookmaker shortlisted for two BT Sport Industry Awards this year, Paddy Power suggested some ways they could earn their keep, in the form of billboard ads, included Arsenal’s Andrei Arshavin getting to work on cleaning the toilets at the Emirates, misfiring Fernando Torres to man the Chelsea burger van, and want-away Peter Odemwingie to drive the team bus for West Brom.
The hashtag #2ndjobsforsubs was used to collect other suggestions from fans on twitter.
However, following on from press coverage of the campaign there was significant speculation that the clubs and players involved were unhappy with the ads and, according to the company press release, in some cases were trying to get them taken down.
In response to this speculation Paddy Power ran ‘apology’ adverts in two national papers this weekend targeted at the five players in the original campaign. The ad saw a tongue in cheek apology to ‘Mr.Torres, Mr.Arshavin, Mr.Bent, Mr.Odemwingie, and Mr.Bosingwa’ which also offers them all a free bet with the bookmaker.
A Paddy Power spokesman said: ‘Despite having had a great response from fans, it seems that some of the players have had their rather expensive feathers ruffled by our billboard suggestions. We now realise the error of our ways and hope that our offer of a free bet will give them an excuse to take a five minute break from all that exhausting, top-level bench-warming and have a punt on when they might next get into a starting line-up.’
The apology read:
Dear Mr Torres, Mr Ashavin, Mr Bent, Mr Bosingwa and Mr Odemwingie,
It has come to our attention that our recent billboard ads suggesting possible 2nd job opportunities may have caused you considerable upset. After all, who else is going to keep those racing style seats at their perfect 34 degree temperature? And who else is going to cover their mouth whilst slating their manager? Not many people, that’s who! And that’s why they pay you guys the big bucks.
So with this in mind, we’d like to offer you a formal apology for our insensitive 2nd job suggestions and to make up for it we’re offering you all a free £5 bet.
We wish you all the best with your future benchwarming endeavours.
Yours sincerely,
Paddy Power
