I don't have much time for Mike Ashley. or for that matter the deluded twats that support the club he owns. He might be a lot of things, but he (or his advisors) pulled a master stroke renaming the ground. Just in time for the Olympics, and his brand dotcom website is beamed around the World. Clever. (I'll acknowledge that the boy Pardew has done a good job. None of his players got raped this season did they ?)
Pardew has to be PL manager of the season.. the move to naming rights on stadiums is becoming the norm.. Liverpool will do it soon, so too here where I live where Lyon will move from the 42k Stade de Gerland to a new 60k one and it will be given a sponsor's name for the price of around â¬300m (I've been told) Do you live near Long Riston BTW??
Except that for the Olympics the stadia have to be branding free unless it's official Olympic sponsors. They're even going as far as being twats and stopping people taking in Pepsi bottles because Coca-Cola is one of the sponsors.
