A player retreats: Fred’s £200m splurge on sporting celebs is over
February 23rd, 2009
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In a press release unveiling a multi-million sponsorship deal with Indian cricketing legend Sachin Tendulkar, dated September 18th, 2008, the Royal Bank of Scotland did not spare the superlatives.
John McCormick, who ran the bank’s investment banking activities in Asia, was quoted as saying: “Every now and again, a player appears on the scene who will change the way the game is played…”
Around the same time the already near-bankrupt institution launched an expensively-produced television commercial featuring Tendulkar, made by ad agency M&C Saatchi (see above). The advert uses exactly the same line as McCormick.
For me this commercial epitomises everything that was wrong with RBS under the leadership of Sir Fred Goodwin — the place had become phoney, self-reverential and hubristic.
A similarly self-aggrandizing tone was evident in those nauseating video films that became a fixture at the bank’s AGMs – complete with the soundtrack by Enya (“Now We Are Free”, also used in the movie Gladiator).
One of Goodwin’s motivations for blowing a reported £200 million on sponsoring sports celebrities such as Tendulkar was so that he and his cronies (surely “favoured customers”? Ed) could socialise, and perhaps even play the odd 18 holes with, golfing legends such as Jack Nicklaus.
The bank’s other “global ambassadors” included the horse-riding Royal, Zara Phillips, foul-mouthed tennis player Andy Murray and superannuated racing driver Sir Jackie Stewart. So presumably a spot of equestrianism, tennis and Formula One driving was also made available to Goodwin, his cronies and/or favoured customers of RBS?
One suspects that such people — RBS’s “global ambassadors” and cherished clients — were also allowed to make use of RBS’s £17.5 million Dassault Falcon EX private jet, assuming of course that Sir Fred’s wife Lady Joyce wasn’t using it for a shopping trip to Paris or anything like that (Stephen Hester, the bank’s new chief executive, is now sensibly “disposing of” the airplane ).
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Posted by Ian Fraser
on Feb 23 2009. Filed under Blog.
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Doubtless the passenger list of the private jet may prove an interesting revelation or two … but it only goes to show just what can be done by an autocratic administration on other people’s money …
It would be nice to have a full listing from the Bank of who exactly got what. I wouldn’t be surprised if a few politicians were in there somewhere … after all, one does have to wonder which banks are involved the most in the Holyrood ‘mortgage payment’ racket or alleged ‘debt write offs’ to some …
The wording on the Enya tracks will presumably now be changed to “Now we are broke” ?