The Hindu Business Line : A mean game

Celebration of Gutsy Cricket is the new theme Nike is adopting in India to unleash its first cricket-centric campaign on the eve of the World Cup. Using local insights, its agency, JWT's Bangalore office, has captured the changing profile of the game as it is played over the years. "The core of the film is about celebration of gutsy cricket - cricket that is daring and breathtaking,'' states Dhunji Wadia, Managing Partner, JWT, Bangalore.

JWT's brief was to create a commercial to inspire cricket-crazy kids by showcasing gutsy cricket. Research and local insights have shown that cricket has gotten `gutsy' over the years. The commercial, which has scenes of kids playing the game atop buses and under street lights, highlights the evolution in the game as it is locally played.

Adds Sanjay Gangopadhyay, Marketing Manager, Nike India, Inc, "The commercial is a tribute to the passion of the game shown through the cricket-crazy kids who can play the game anywhere and everywhere with no stopping them.'' One such situation is a traffic jam where children start playing the game with celebrity cricketers who are looking on. As Wadia says, "We Indians look at the game of cricket in a particular fashion. It is a celebration of the way we play the game.''

Capturing the way cricket is played on Indian streets, the 15-17-year-olds bring out the `unplugged' reality of the game. "It's a hard, tough game played by the teenagers who can swing a mean ball or drive a bludgeoning bat on the maidans and gullies of India. Playing the same game in a traffic jam adds daredevilry to this unplugged version of the game,'' claims Wadia.

With this commercial, Nike is also re-enforcing its baseline of `Just Do It' in an Indian context. "The commercial urges you to do what you want, go ahead and Just Do It," says Wadia. At the same time, the commercial establishes Nike's connect with cricket and the Indian masses. "Through the commercial we want to convey the message that Nike as a brand understands cricket from an Indian perspective. We are trying to connect the game with the emotional side of our consumers,'' claims Gangopadhyay.

Staying away from the predictable ads based on the World Cup, which are likely to depict the Indian team winning the cup, Nike believes it has a different take on the event. "Unlike a predictable ad showing Team India doing the country proud, we have a different take on the World Cup. Our commercial is about looking deeper to find out what the game means to us,'' says Gangopadhyay. The commercial features Sreesanth and Zaheer Khan, adding a dash of celebrity.

But cricket is not going to be the mainstay of the brand in the country. "We would look at sports holistically. While cricket is big, we would be looking at all kinds of sports including football,'' states Gangopadhyay. Being appointed as the official apparel brand during the World Cup and taking on a five-year contract with the BCCI for the future matches, Nike is all out to bring out its `cricketing' connection in a cricket-crazy nation with the hope of becoming a `dominant' brand in the country.

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