At the sound of war drums, a new advertising video featuring Mohamed Salah shows Egyptians replacing Ramadan lanterns with national flags, putting on the team’s t-shirts, gathering around TV screens at coffee shops, and filling up stadiums as they cheer on Egypt from their hearts.
“If you’ve got the legend, you shouldn’t be afraid,” says the voice-over of Essam El-Shawali. This famous Tunisian football commentator narrated the advert co-sponsored by both Vodafone Egypt and Pepsi.
Fueling national sentiment on social media days before Egypt gets to hear its first world games start-whistle in 28 years, the Mohamed Salah advert went viral, generating 6 million views on Facebook and YouTube and more than 22.3K shares in just a few hours.
Vodafone launched an earlier campaign ahead of the football qualifying matches, asking Egyptians to stop talking football for two months to avoid jinxing the national team.
Mohamed Salah is Vodafone Egypt’s brand ambassador for 2018 after signing an agreement with the mobile operator last December.
An icon for youth in the country, Salah fits Vodafone Egypt’s rebranding strategy, which promotes optimism, trust and hope.
Salah won the hearts and minds of Egyptians after scoring the golden goal that qualified Egypt for the upcoming world football matches for the first time in nearly three decades.
Reported by Nermeen Salem, and Ahmed Maher and edited by Sara El-Khalili.
