Adidas: Timothée Chalamet campaign creates buzz ahead of the 2026 World Cup

One month ahead of the 2026 World Cup, Adidas has unveiled Backyard Legends, an advertising campaign featuring Timothée Chalamet alongside living football icons. The film highlights the German brand's ambition to bolster its lifestyle image.

Titled Backyard Legends, the Adidas campaign is a five-minute short film. It brings together a celebrity cast including Timothée Chalamet, Lionel Messi, Bad Bunny, Ousmane Dembélé, Lamine Yamal, Jude Bellingham and Trinity Rodman. It also features Zinedine Zidane, David Beckham and Alessandro Del Piero, who have been 'youthified' for the storyline.

The story is set in New York. Timothée Chalamet is looking for a team of three players who could beat the Backyard Legends, a fictional trio that has been undefeated for 30 years.

To do this, he recruits two renowned players, Lamine Yamal (FC Barcelona) and Jude Bellingham (Real de Madrid), along with footballer Trinity Rodman (Washington Spirit).

In the car, he tells them how the Backyard Legends made football history by beating a team that included Zidane and Beckham. This story is fictional. However, Timothée Chalamet is persuasive in his role as a football fan because it is authentic. In real life, he has often spoken of his admiration for the AS Saint-Etienne team.

The final scene takes place at Pier 40, a huge sports and recreational complex in Greenwich Village, Manhattan. Arriving at the asphalt pitch, Chalamet finds Lionel Messi and Bad Bunny among the spectators. In a masterful moment, Messi offers to substitute a player “just in case,” to which Timothée replies, “you are my backup plan.”

'You Got This' campaign: Y2K, urban culture, football legends and merchandising

The message conveyed by this film allows the Adidas brand to move beyond sportswear into a lifestyle dimension. This includes football, of course, but also cinema, with the 90s reconstruction reminiscent of the series Stranger Things. It also features music, with Bad Bunny, and New York street culture.

It also allows the brand to position itself among desirable brands in the US ahead of the World Cup, which is being hosted by the US, Canada and Mexico.

The film also functions as a merchandising tool. Several jerseys are visible on screen, including the Argentinian team's kit with its light blue and white stripes, a nod to Lionel Messi. A vintage USA 94 World Cup jersey also appears. Additionally, a fleeting and possibly fictional “Chalamet 26” jersey is shown, which has reportedly been circulating on social media, according to specialised media.

This article was translated to English using an AI tool.

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