The Greatest Show on Earth ad features some of the biggest names in sport

Sky Sports has launched its star-studded 2023 start of season campaign, developed by Sky Creative.

The ad, called ‘The Greatest Show on Earth’, was directed by Danny Kleinman and features some of the biggest names in sport, including Erling Haaland, Jack Grealish, Ella Toone, Lauren James, Lewis Hamilton, Ben Stokes, Emma Raducanu and Jon Rahm.

Idris Elba plays the role of ringmaster in the circus-themed spot.

The ad takes you through circus acts from the biggest stars of sport, including The Amazing Haalando, scoring an acrobatic back flip penalty, Jon Rahm pulling a golf club from his mouth, then Ben Stokes and Sophia Dunkley smashing flaming cricket balls out of the circus big top.

There are F1 cars going full pelt on a vertical track above the crowd and The Flying Raducanus playing tennis on a flaming court in the air.

The campaign was developed by Sky Creative, Sky’s in-house creative agency, alongside production company Rattling Stick and VFX house Framestore.

It plays out as a TV ad in 10-seconds, 30-seconds, 60-seconds and 90-seconds formats, DRTV, social, digital, DOOH, OOH, print, radio, cinema and an influencer campaign.

Dave Stratton, director of marketing for Sky Sports said: “Sky Sports is home to the greatest entertainment sport has to offer. With this campaign, we want to celebrate that and dramatise the incredible athletes’ abilities with a visually spectacular campaign. This start of season campaign is like no other and we can’t wait for the amazing year of sport ahead for our customers to enjoy”

Robin Garton, group executive creative director – advertising at Sky Creative added: “The idea of a circus enabled us to show the skills of our sports stars in a way that they’ve never been seen before. But it also opened up a wonderful world of design, tone, style and language, that we’ve revelled in right across the TTL campaign. It’s been an amazing playground for creative craft.”