JD Sports premiered a Christmas ad – since posted to YouTube – on Nov. 6 during the airing of the Manchester derby on Sky Sports, where Manchester City beat Manchester United 2 to 0. In it, a young man walks down a downtown street – where all the shop names somehow share the initials JD – and encounters a series of celebrities: the rappers Little Simz, Aitch, Young T & Bugsey, ArrDee and Jay 1, the singer-songwriter Ms Banks, the singer Shaybo, the drill artists Central Cee and Russ Millions, the presenters Maya Jama and Joelah Noble, the actor Michael Dapaah, the YouTube stars KSI and Tobi Brown, the Love Island 2019 contestant Joanna Chimonides, and the footballers Jude Bellingham, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Ebe Eze, Kalvin Phillips, Leah Williamson and Jadon Sancho. The ad marks JD’s 40th anniversary and is set in the city of Manchester, where the chain was born and where the company is still based. The first JD Sports store opened in 1981 in the suburb of Bury, where its parent company, JD Sports Fashion, is still based.

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