And so AIG's financial situation across the water has ensured that yet another sponsor's name will adorn Manchester United's jerseys from 2011. The current sponsorship deal with the insurance 'giants' nets United 14 milion sterling a year and the ceasing of this particular relationship ensures that another fiscal organisation's involvement with a sports franchise comes to a rather abrupt end. AIG have already ended their involvement with the US Davis Cup tennis team.
Look a little deeper though and shirt sponsorship has long provided a 'quick peep' into distinctive social and cultural norms. If we rewind to the early nineties, it was the world of electronics that had global communities simultaneously agog and companies like JVC, Commodore and Sharp snapped up the big deals with then English First Division sides Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United respectively. Though these clubs had begun to buy into the advent of overseas sponsors (as had, bizarrely enough, Coventry City through their affiliation with Peugeout), strong and traditional British 'ways of life', mostly beverage-related, found their names on the fronts of jerseys - most famously Carlsberg (Liverpool), McEwans (Blackburn and Glasgow Rangers) and Greenalls (Newcastle - who also pin-pointed Newcastle Brown Ale as a key shirt sponsor in the mid-nineties). It was clear that commercialisation was the last thing on club chairman's minds and the provincial town-isms belied what the Premier League would become - Middlesbrough's deal with the Evening Gazette was terribly endearing though somewhat worrysome and West Ham's partnership with Dagenham Motors was a script-writers dream.
Such innocence though existed in more 'exotic' locations too. On the continent, respective countries tended to adopt the same approach to sponsorship though on a more cosmopolitan level as clubs identifed key national treasures as their perfect partner. In Serie A, these tended to be famous national food companies - think Danone (Juventus), Parmalat (Parma) and Barilla (Roma). Memorably, Fiorentina carried the name of ice-cream makers Sammontana on their shirts during the mid-nineties. In the Bundesliga, the heavy-hitters paid tribute to Germany's powerful industrious heritage - Bayern Munich proudly wore Opel's name across the front of their shirts for well over a decade. When Mattias Sammer lifted the 1997 European Cup as captain of Borussia Dortmund meanwhile, it was the name of local insurance company Die Continentale that jumped out from those bright neon shirts.
But, the days of local or even national companies putting their name to a local side are long gone. As the financial malaise continues to eat away at the beautiful game, clubs have spent the last decade tying down lucrative sponsorship deals with whoever can provide them with the most income. Tradition, history, heritage seem to be buzz-words of a lost generation ago but, in fact, it was a generation ago when the process of meaningless affiliation begun. In the mid-nineties, Paris St. Germain maximised their profits by agreeing for two sponsors to adorn their red and blue torsos as the name of French beer-manufacturer Tourtel sat below that of, firstly, US computer company Commodore and the following season, Spanish car giants SEAT. Any trace of French shirt sponsorship with the club was wiped when OPEL came on board in 1995.
The 'lost years' for shirt sponsorship came with the new millennium with clubs attempting to appeal to Generation X+. Arsenal and Manchester United ended 14 and 16 year old deals with JVC and Sharp respectively and signed instead with SEGA and VODAFONE. In Italy meanwhile, the newly crowned Scudetto champions Lazio joined forces with Siemens after previous deals with Italian food company Cirio and the Bank of Rome. Inter's continued Milanese relationship with tyre magnates Pirelli is merely the exception that proves the rule.
Like Inter though, other clubs have taken great pride in the way they deal with shirt sponsorship, not least Catalan giants Barcelona. In September 2006, the infamously traditionally sponsor-less club agreed a five-year 'collaborative agreement' with UNICEF, the terms of which sees Barca carry the UNICEF logo on their jerseys while annually contributing €1.5 million to the organisation's projects. It had been believed Barcelona were ready to sign an agreement with Austrian online betting company 'BetandWin' (BWin) but the deal fell through when the club felt it would be uncomfortable to be associated with such an entity.
Real Madrid didn't seem to mind however - in February 2007, they signed a 75 million euro contract with BWin and with that, the modern-day ruthlessness of shirt sponsorship had been confirmed - the pure, evangelical, vacant strips of the greatest club in the world tarnished with the ugliness of such a morbid and irrelevant partner. The conduct of both Madrid and Barcelona regarding their respective sponsorship deals is striking and in an age when perhaps the relationship between a jersey and the name that's emblazoned across its front may not seem important anymore, it's refreshing to know that some people still care.
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