Arsenal players have been involved in some unusual advertising campaigns in the past, but their latest effort could prove to be the most ambitious yet.
Danny Welbeck, Theo Walcott and Petr Cech channel the BBC's cult comedy show The Trip, starring Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, in a series of ads for long-time sponsor Europcar.
The footage shows the three players shooting the breeze during a six-hour drive to a match in a hire car. The first ad features Walcott asking Cech a question from a woman's magazine and then declaring the answer shows the goalkeeper "is Beyonce". [[{"type":"media","view_mode":"content_original","fid":"93086","attributes":{"class":"media-image"}}]]
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.
Join more than 350,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with a selection of The Week’s most interesting, enlightening and entertaining stories - plus daily puzzles.
Latest Videos FromThe Week
The trio display "decent acting skills and comic timing", says the Daily Mirror. "Arsenal employ some very good footballers. But it's beginning to look like they have even more comedy actors on their books.
"If The Gunners squad ever get fed up of the whole 'trying to win the Premier League' thing, we reckon a few of them could get together and star in their own sitcom."
The ad is "ridiculously weird", says Pundit Arena, but website 101 Great Goals is not convinced. Walcott is too wooden and it concludes: "It is pretty much as bad an advert as it sounds."
The second instalment of the Gunners road movie is out on Thursday. Future episodes will see the trio "tackle tyrannosaurs, goat emojis and unrequested drum solos".
It is not the first left-field ad to star Arsenal stars; in 2014, the same company produced a clip featuring "relatives" of some of the Gunners' first team. [[{"type":"media","view_mode":"content_original","fid":"93087","attributes":{"class":"media-image"}}]]
Unlucky players have also been forced to try their hand at ballet in the name of keeping their sponsors happy. [[{"type":"media","view_mode":"content_original","fid":"93088","attributes":{"class":"media-image"}}]]
And in an ad that truly proved the global reach of the Premier League, German defender Per Mertesacker showed off his questionable dancing skills for an Ethiopian beer company. [[{"type":"media","view_mode":"content_original","fid":"93089","attributes":{"class":"media-image"}}]]
