Being the most popular sport worldwide, football is clearly one of adidas’ key strategic priorities. For over 60 years, adidas has led all major developments in boot, ball and apparel technologies. This dedication to the sport and its close relationships with athletes and teams enabled adidas to become an integral part of the history, the present and the future of football.
Building on its success around major sporting events, the brand strives to increase its leadership position in Football by continuously creating the industry’s top products and fully leveraging its outstanding portfolio of sports marketing partners. Partners include leading football associations (e.g. FIFA, UEFA) and their respective events (FIFA World Cup™, UEFA EURO 2012 & 2016, UEFA Champions League), national federations (e.g. reigning FIFA World Cup™ champion Spain, Germany, Argentina, Russia, Mexico, Japan, Denmark, Greece), leagues (e.g. Major League Soccer in the USA), clubs (e.g. Real Madrid, AC Milan, Chelsea FC, FC Bayern Munich) and individual players (e.g. three-time FIFA World Player of the Year Lionel Messi, Xavi, Thomas Müller, David Villa, Nani, Robin van Persie and David Beckham).
The relationship between FIFA and adidas dates back more than 40 years. Since 1970, adidas has been supplying the official match ball for all FIFA World Cup™ matches. It goes without saying that for every FIFA World Cup™, adidas designers and developers aim at devising the perfect ball by combining innovative technology and exciting and unique design to make the Official Match Ball the true icon of every FIFA World Cup™.
Among the adidas line of legendary balls were the Tango (1982), the first ball to successfully combine leather and polyurethane, the Azteca (1986), the first fully synthetic ball, the Questra (1994), the polyurethane foam-based ball, the Tricolore (1998) which introduced a syntactic foam layer and the +Teamgeist (2006) that has set new standards with its innovative and highly iconic design and panel-technology.
Besides the FIFA World Cup™, adidas is also involved in all other FIFA events, for instance the FIFA Confederations Cup Brazil 2013, the FIFA U-20 World Cups for women and men as well as the FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup, to name just a few. At all these events, FIFA officials, referees, volunteers and the entire Youth Programme (player escort, ball crew, flag bearers) wear adidas products from head to toe.
Fully in line with FIFA’s mission 'Develop the game, touch the world, build a better future', adidas is also actively contributing by providing product for numerous development courses and CSR initiatives around the world.
For more information on adidas and its products please visit: www.adidas.com or join the conversation at www.facebook.com/adidasfootball or on Twitter: @adidasfootball
adidas is part of the adidas Group, a global leader in the sporting goods industry offering a wide range of products around the three core segments of adidas, Reebok and TaylorMade-adidas Golf. Headquartered in Herzogenaurach, Germany, the Group has more than 46,000 employees worldwide and generated sales of € 13.3 billion in 2011.