Euro ‘24 was more than just another tournament for English football. Having lost the final 4 years ago it was a chance to break a 58-year streak without a major championship. adidas wanted to rally the country in support of our sponsored athlete Jude Bellingham, who at age 20 was coming off an MVP season in the Spanish La Liga and has just won the Champions League, a new hope for the Three Lions- a team we weren’t sponsors of. His first major tournament for his country was a moment we couldn’t miss. The Beatles’ “Hey Jude” is one of the best known songs in pop history. But it wasn’t just the song’s enduring popularity or the lyrics match with Jude Bellingham that made it perfect for the moment. The verses, urging Jude to “take a sad song and make it better” captured the hopes that every fan had for Jude during the tournament - to undo 58 years of heartbreak. With the blessing of Sir Paul McCartney (an England fan himself) his vocals from a live performance were isolated and given some tension with new, atmospheric accompaniment, as the film showed England’s decades in the wilderness. As archival footage of young Jude brings us to the present, the swell of the song (without the lyrics) builds up the viewer’s hope: “Better, better, better, better, better, better, yeah!” When we reach the chorus of “nah-nah-nah-nah, Hey Jude” The Beatles vocals have been restored, the ominous chords removed, and the pure joy of celebration is in the music. The film mutes The Beatles for a few bars, to encourage fans to sing the song in stadiums and pubs. It was the right moment for the right song for the right player. The spot aired during Euro ‘24 games, and it foreshadowed what happened during the tournament: Jude saved the team from early elimination, and also in the sense that Hey Jude did become a fan favorite to sing in bars, fan parks and stadiums. Even the Prime Minister was singing our tune in support of Jude Bellingham and the team. It was universally beloved as 92% of English fans who saw the spot online have later searched for it to review, and we reached a third of the UK population organically. And we didn’t just steal English hearts, we also stole the chatter from the team’s sponsors: our spot generated 16 times more mentions online than Nike.