Adidas enters the summer of football with a cinematic street campaign, a €250m World Cup product revenue forecast and the knowledge that its rival Nike has arrived at the tournament in almost identical boots.
Adidas has unveiled Backyard Legends, a five-minute film campaign built around the FIFA World Cup 2026, led by a cast that stretches from the Ballon d’Or cabinet to Hollywood.
Released May 7, the spot marks adidas’ central marketing push for a tournament that carries its own layer of nostalgia: the FIFA World Cup returns to North American soil for the first time since the US hosted it in 1994 – the summer that, for many fans, is inseparable from the era the film evokes. The Wall Street Journal has reported adidas expects the tournament to generate around €250 million in product revenue. Part of those expected revenues has been invested in a Hollywood-style mini-movie.
An A‑list cast built for global reach
The campaign centers on Academy Award-nominated actor Timothée Chalamet, who assembles a team of football stars to challenge a trio of unbeatable street players. The roster includes current stars Lionel Messi, Lamine Yamal, Jude Bellingham and Trinity Rodman, alongside legends Zinedine Zidane, David Beckham and Alessandro Del Piero. Cameos from Ousmane Dembélé, Raphinha, Pedri, Florian Wirtz and Santiago Gimenez expand the supporting cast. Puerto Rican artist Bad Bunny also appears. It’s a lot for a five-minute film.
’90s nostalgia, street culture, and an elegy for self-belief
Directed by Mark Molloy and created by LOLA USA – a newly formed Omnicom agency assembled from adam&eveDDB New York and 180 US – the film was produced by SMUGGLER. Set against a backdrop of urban pitches, 1990s street style and analog aesthetics, the spot deploys de-aging technology to bring Zidane, Beckham and Del Piero back to their playing-era selves alongside the current generation.
The campaign’s core message is adidas’ brand platform “You Got This” – an articulation of freedom and self-belief on and off the pitch. The storyline is simple: who, if anyone, can beat these backyard heroes – not even the sport’s biggest names are guaranteed an answer.
Within that premise there is room for humor, street reality and local characters, as well as something like sweet nostalgia for the 1990s – the decade in which New York’s metropolitan landscape propelled hip-hop, graffiti and street art onto the global stage, and cemented the crossover between sportswear and lifestyle culture. The photography and soundtrack both lean hard into that era.
Meanwhile, in products…
The campaign arrives as competition at the product level takes on an unexpected dimension. According to several media inclined to do product leaks, both adidas and Nike have independently selected nearly identical colorways for their 2026 World Cup boot collections – a dominant pink and red palette finished with white and black logo detailing. Both collections are expected to reach retail in late May or early June. The color convergence is not the first of its kind; the two brands similarly aligned on bright orange and coral tones across their final collections of 2025.
Beyond the campaign film and the boots discussion, adidas enters this summer as Official Match Ball provider for the FIFA World Cup 2026 and as kit supplier to 14 competing federations. The tournament takes place across North America.
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