Manchester United defender, Phil Jones, has become the latest high-profile sportsperson to enter the metaverse, as he partners with Web3 firm, Antourage, to develop an exclusive metaverse members project tagged – Red Lion Sports Club (RLSC).
Red Lion Sports Club will focus on major sports events such as Premier League games, the NBA playoffs, Formula 1’s British Grand Prix and golf’s British Open, with fan-influenced content and mini-games devoted to the various sporting occasions.
The club will function as a kind of gated online community, where holders of special NFTs can congregate to play games and interact, view exclusive content, enter competitions and support worthy causes.
Jones, who has won Premier League, FA Cup and Europa League trophies while making over 100 appearances for Manchester United says:
“Over the past six months I’ve been researching and learning about Web 3.0 and the potential of the metaverse. The idea behind the Red Lion Sports Club is to enable a new way of engaging with fans that promotes a genuine sense of community rooted in mutual respect for other members. RLSC will be a venue for fans of all sports that want to have a say in how a digital community grows and develops, interact with athletes, celebrities and other members, and influence the content that will be created around major events.”
Antourage co-founder – Johan Junker says:
“I am thrilled to have Phil on board as the driving force behind RLSC. This project is at the heart of Antourage’s existence: to connect passion-driven fan communities with authentic content that is distributed across the latest social platforms.”
Manchester in the Metaverse
A significant number of the Old Trafford dressing room occupants are now metaverse enthusiasts, including star player, Jadon Sacho, who recently partnered with Genies to release his own digital avatar.
Cristiano Ronaldo participated in a $100 million funding round for FanCraze, which creates NFTs based on major cricket tournaments last week. Also, Luke Shaw launched his own NFT collection.
At the blue side of Manchester, United’s City rivals teamed up with Sony in February to reproduce their Etihad Stadium in virtual reality. The digitally mapped stadium could ‘host’ live games, allowing fans (or the digital avatars that represent them) to enjoy a matchday experience from the comfort of their own home.
In similar fashion…Snoop Dogg is set to release music as NFTs
American rapper – Snoop Dogg is set to share unreleased music as non-fungible tokens on the Cardano blockchain as part of a collaboration with Cardano-based platform Clay Nation.
In a video promoting an upcoming Twitter Spaces meeting between Snoop Dogg and Cardano founder, Charles Hoskinson, Snoop says he has been “checking out Cardano and this Web3 stuff is exciting to me.”
The meeting is set to occur today at 7 pm WAT, and has been confirmed by both Snoop Dogg and Hoskinson. Details on the upcoming NFT collection, to be released on the Cardano blockchain, are set to be known during the Twitter Spaces meeting.
Technext Newsletter
Get the best of Africa’s daily tech to your inbox – first thing every morning.
Join the community now!
