Unofficial Partner Podcast
Episodes
558 episodes
UP558 Chat_UP: What The Mythos Shutdown Means For AI in the Sports Business
Host: Richard Gillis (Unofficial Partner) Co-host/analyst: Andy Shora (TFG Labs)Three stories this episode:The Mythos/Fable shutdown — Anthropic ordered by the US government to disable its two most powerf...
UP557 Ed Smith: What Sport Got Wrong About Moneyball
AI commoditises knowledge production and throws judgment into scarcity. In this episode, Ed Smith asks what that means for sport, education and the people building careers in the business — and why the humanities might be the most unde...
UP556 'Serviette Maths': Sky Sports Boss On The Premflix Threat
Jonathan Licht, Chief Sports Officer at Sky Sports, discusses Sky's dominant position in UK sports broadcasting, strategic partnerships, and the future of sports media.Key topics:Sky's portfolio dominance: 225 P...
UP555 The Lord's Question: What Does The MCC Brand Stand For?
The £295million sale of London Spirit franchise was one of the big sports business stories of the last year. Some of Silicon Valley's most successful and famous leaders buying 49% of The Hundred's Lord's based franchise, in partnership with The...
UP554 The Bundle World Cup Special
Richard, Murray Barnett and Yannick Ramcke convene for a World Cup special, using the 2026 tournament as a lens on how sports broadcasting is shifting beneath the surface. The conversation moves from Qatar-to-2026 comparisons (more accelerated ...
UP553 Live: The Business of Horse Racing
A first for Unofficial Partner: six years and 550+ episodes covering every sport going, we'd somehow never devoted an episode to the sport of horse racing. So we fixed that — live, in front of an audience at The Big Belly Comedy Club, Londo...
UP552 Chat_UP: Google's AI pivot and the end of the subsidised era
Chat_UP is Unofficial Partner's AI series created in collaboration with TFG Labs.The brief: cut through the AI firehose, work out what matters, and bring it back to the business of sport. Three stories this week.Story One — Goo...
UP551 Coke's Cole Palmer Problem: When the ambassador misses the party
On 22 April 2026, Coca-Cola unveiled Cole Palmer as its newest football brand ambassador, fronting Premier League and World Cup activations. A month later, Tuchel left him out of the England squad. We use the Palmer story as a way into a wider ...
UP550 Inside Edge: IPL Auctions and the Financialization of Everything
Richard Gillis, Mike Jakeman and invited guests dissect the business of cricket.The IPL auction has become one of the most watched events in world cricket — part financial instrument, part entertainment spectacle. This episode...
UP549 Priced Out: FIFA’s Big Ticket Gamble
The news agenda around this summer's FIFA World Cup in North America has been dominated by the price of tickets. Why are they so expensive? What's it got to do with changes made by FIFA specifically for this tournament?&...
UP548 The Bundle: Gary Neville's Noise Strategy; What World Rugby sees in IMG; Amazon pitches for the Super Bowl
The Bundle is the original and much copied series on the sports media and streaming marketplace with co-hosts Yannick Ramcke, General Manager of OTT at the streaming service OneFootball and Murray Barnett, founder of 26West Sport and formerly o...
UP547 Picks and Shovels: The Ecosystem Investment Thesis
Picks and Shovels: The Sports Investment Thesis That Doesn't Need Media Rights to WorkAltman Solon's seventh annual Global Sports Survey lands with a central argument: sport is maturing into a full-stack asset class. But the more interes...
UP546 NBA Europe: It’s not about basketball
The NBA Europe franchise sale process has moved from speculation to live transaction. Franchise fees of $500m to $1bn. No broadcast deal. Governance terms that European investors have already pushed back on. And a city map — London, Paris, Madr...
UP545 'Normal Idiots': Reddit, Discord and the Value of 1000 True Fans
Louis Theroux's documentary about the manosphere didn't at first seem to have much to do with sports digital strategy?Until you get to the platforms: Kick. Rumble. A whole ecosystem of streaming channels that the sports business c...
UP544 ChatUP: Craig Hepburn on how Agentic AI changes sports consultancy
Craig Hepburn sits at the intersection of enterprise technology and cultural institutions. He spent years as UEFA’s Chief Digital Transformation Officer, overseeing its digital ecosystem, OTT platform build, and Innovation Hub. He moved to Art ...
UP543 Business Moment of the Year: Inside the 25th Sport Industry Award Judging Room
This week we go behind the curtain of the 25th Sport Industry Awards, ahead of the big night at Battersea Evolution on Thursday 30th April. With an illustrious group of people from across the industry, Richard and Sean went to...
UP542 Wedge Issues Live: The Golf Business in 2026
A live podcast recorded at MSQ Sport and Entertainment HQ in London for the launch of Callaway Golf's new brand film 'At Last'. You can see the film by clicking this link. <...
UP541 Addicted To Fake Fan Numbers: When Sport Met The Dead Internet
Digital advertising has a dirty secret: most of what you're paying for never reaches a human being. Dr. Augustine Fou is a world leading expert in digital ad fraud and has spent 20 ye...
UP540 The Bundle: Premier League plus points; Apple's Meh Bundle; FIFA's 10 minute YouTube hook
The latest dissection of the sports media and streaming marketplace from the ever popular, long running series featuring expert analysis from Yannick Ramcke and Murray Barnett. This episode goes deep in to:Why Premier Le...
UP539 Spin Class: PR lessons from Kirsty Coventry, Sir Jim Ratcliffe and Igor Tudor
Three highly experienced communications professionals join Richard to dissect some recent high profile PR gaffes.Guests:Henry Chappell, Founder and CEO of Pitch Marketing GroupNeil Daugherty, Senior Managing Director at Ten...
UP538 Ted Knutson on Brentford, Betting and Benham. And how AI will change football data
Ted Knutson's career tracks a remarkable arc: professional gambler at Pinnacle, architect of Brentford's analytics-driven recruitment model, founder of StatsBomb — built from a blog written during cancer recovery into a global data company sold...
UP537 The Buy Side: Inside Unilever's FIFA World Cup Strategy
Today, we are joined by Ben Curtis, Global Brand Vice President for Rexona—the brand known as Degree in the US, Sure in the UK, and Shield in South Africa. Ben oversees the global strategy for a brand that Unilever i...
UP536 Other People's Money: Bex Smith's thesis for women's football multi club ownership
Bex Smith, is our guest today on Other People’s Money, Unofficial Partner’s sports finance series presented with regular cohost Matt Rogan. Bex Smith was captain of the New Zealand Women’s football team, appearing at World Cups, two...
UP535 Inside Edge - T20's Product-Market fit is 'the biggest delta in global sport'
What T20 Cricket Teaches Every Sport About The Race For The Global Fan.Mike Jakeman joins Richard for Inside Edge, the business of cricket series. Guests: Finn Bradshaw, Head of Digital, ICCEdward Fitzgibbo...
UP534 Barney Francis on Media Rights and Wrongs
Barney Francis offers an insider's view of the sports media economy, drawing on his huge experience as MD of Sky Sports in the UK and EVP, Studios at IMG, the company's production business. The conversation spans new sports formats, piracy, str...