Delo Group renews EHF Champions League title sponsorship for 2021/22

The European Handball Federation and its marketing arm, EHF Marketing GmbH, together with its exclusive media and marketing partners, Infront and DAZN Group, are delighted to announce the extension of the title sponsorship agreement with the Delo Group for the EHF Champions League Women 2021/22 season.

The Russian transportation and logistics company has been the title partner of the DELO EHF Champions League and the corresponding DELO EHF FINAL4 since 2019.

The new agreement, which was signed in the presence of EHF President Michael Wiederer, Delo Group President Sergey Shishkarev and EHF Marketing Managing Director David Szlezak on Saturday in Budapest, includes the naming rights for the EHF Champions League Women in the 2021/22 season as well as for the EHF FINAL4 Women 2022.

Next year’s DELO EHF FINAL4 will be the first set to take place in Budapest’s new 20,000-capacity arena which is currently being built for the Men’s EHF EURO 2022 in January.

Besides extensive broadcast exposure through perimeter and on-court advertising, logo presence on media backdrops and corporate hospitality, the new agreement also includes plenty of off-court activities.

For example, the successful ‘DELO Superfan’ programme, which gives clubs the opportunity to honour special fans for their support, will continue in the EHF Champions League while more activations are already planned.

The contract extension chimes in with a strong performance of the competition this season, as despite all challenges the DELO EHF Champions League proved to be massive hit, recording impressive digital engagement and broadcast figures.

Including the quarter-finals, almost 250 million fans were reached on digital platforms; 45 million alone via women’s clubs’ and players’ accounts. The engagement figures were achieved thanks to the 16 competing teams using Socialie, a platform which enabled them to receive and publish high-quality, tailor-made clips to their own social media channels.

The campaigns were driven by DAZN Group and Infront through its media and marketing partnership with the EHF and EHF Marketing to grow handball’s competitions worldwide.

Furthermore, this weekend’s DELO EHF FINAL4 – broadcast by 28 broadcast partners with coverage stretching far beyond Europe as it includes Central & South America as well as Africa – will be the first major European handball event in more than a year to be played with spectators, as up to 4,000 fans can be present at Papp László Budapest Sportaréna this weekend.

Commenting on the agreement, EHF President Michael Wiederer said: "Prolonging the partnership in these special and still challenging times for European handball is a great sign for our sport. It underlines the strong development of women’s handball and the attractiveness and the huge potential that companies see in our competitions."

David Szlezak, Managing Director of EHF Marketing, said: "Since 2019 we have been working very closely with the Delo Group in this partnership, and we are happy that the mutual trust which developed has now led to the extension of our agreement. With the Delo Group as title partner, the development of the DELO EHF Champions League as one of the leading sports competitions on the European market is set to continue."

Igor Yakovenko, Chief Executive Officer of DeloPorts and Member of Delo Group Board of Directors, said: "The Delo Group, as a socially responsible company, has invested in the development of handball in Russia and Europe for over six years now, and is delighted to see the positive growth in the sport's popularity. We welcome the new agreement and are grateful to our partners at the EHF and the EHF Marketing for the collaboration over the past two years. We hope that our partnership helps further promote and develop handball, as well as the professional level of players."

DAZN Group’s VP Global Rights Partnerships, James Chubb said: "Continuing to build the EHF Champions League Women in partnership with Delo Group shows again how DAZN Group and Infront’s partnership with EHFM is working to elevate the EHF club competitions and further grow and develop the sport."

Julien Ternisien, Senior Vice President Summer Sports at Infront, said: "Delo Group’s renewal of this agreement underlines its belief in the future of handball and its expansion into new markets. The sport’s growing audience continues to be complemented with fresh and innovative sponsorship activations allowing brands to engage with fans across Europe."