Burger King has offered a Russian soccer club $7.6 million to rename itself after the fast food restaurant.
Yahoo Sports reports that Burger King offered Zenit St. Petersburg — one of the most prominent teams in Russia’s top soccer league — 500 million roubles to rename the team “Zenit Burger King.”
Burger King has offered around 500M roubles to rename Zenit to Zenit-Burger King. That's crazy! pic.twitter.com/0MkSD1cOTG
— Stefano Conforti (@confortistefano) September 2, 2016
According to The Independent, Zenit St. Petersburg have rejected Burger King’s offer and will not change it’s name.
The team’s official Twitter account issued a strong response to the offer.
Who's the king?! pic.twitter.com/DMI9rKoHxz
— ФК «Зенит» (@zenit_spb) September 2, 2016
If the club were to take Burger King’s offer, it wouldn’t be the first time a team in a top-flight soccer league agreed to sell its nickname. In 2006, energy drink Red Bull purchased the New York/New Jersey MetroStars of the MLS. The team has been known as the New York Red Bulls ever since.
Alex Hider is a writer for the E.W. Scripps National Desk. Follow him on Twitter @alexhider.
