Sydney Sweeney's Ad Sparks Positive Change for Female Athletes

Karen Duggan has watched the storm around Sydney Sweeney’s betting advert and come to a blunt conclusion: the commercial is “silly”, outdated – and accidentally the spark for something far more powerful.

The former Republic of Ireland international believes the backlash to the Novig campaign has “flipped the script in a positive way”, dragging the spotlight back to where female athletes have wanted it for years: on the grind, the discipline, the sacrifice.

The advert, fronted by Hollywood star Sweeney for US betting firm Novig, shows her wearing little to no clothing, draped in sports equipment. It has been hammered across women’s sport, with leading athletes calling it regressive and damaging.

Four-time Olympic champion swimmer Ariarne Titmus, American gymnast Gracie Kramer and British sprinter Amy Hunt have all spoken out. Hunt, fresh from winning four gold medals at the World Athletics Ultimate Championship in Budapest, warned the ad risked becoming a “barrier” to young girls who might otherwise be drawn into sport.

Duggan, though, sees something else happening.

“In a way, I think we’re nearly over-complicating it as a sports ad. I think it’s silly,” she told RTÉ Radio 1’s Morning Ireland. “I think it uses an outdated formula of, you know, attractive women, sports imagery, and a bit of controversy to sell a product. I don’t think it was ever intended to represent female athletes or women in sport or the reality of that.”

Her biggest issue is not just the imagery, but who shaped it.

“My biggest criticism of it is that I don’t think women were part of that conversation at all,” she said. “Sydney Sweeney doesn’t represent me as a normal woman or as a female athlete in any way. I don’t think it’s an ad made by people trying to understand what it takes to be a female athlete and the discipline and the sacrifice and the competitiveness and the physicality that goes with that.”

Then she repeated it, almost for emphasis: “I think it’s a silly ad. I think it’s so outdated. But the response to me has been really, really interesting.”

Because while the advert chases clicks from a very specific audience, Duggan sees a different kind of engagement taking off.

“I think it’s largely just for men who consume sports through their phones, through social media, rather than even men who go out and engage in sports by going to the games, watching athletes, and appreciating what athletes do, both male and female.”

What has followed, though, is a wave of female athletes using their platforms to define their own image.

“I feel like there’s obviously been something bubbling under the surface where female athletes feel massively underrepresented in advertising, in social media, and under-celebrated,” Duggan said. “And I love how they’ve used this ad as a means to go out there and highlight how the female athlete thinks, how hard they work.”

Her social feeds tell the story.

“My algorithm isn’t coming at me with loads of Sydney Sweeney propaganda. It’s coming at me with the likes of Amy Hunt using her platform after a race to celebrate her competitors. So I think it’s flipped the script a bit in a positive way. I think all the controversy that goes with the ad will dwindle away, but hopefully that this kind of movement to highlight female athletics will continue on for some time.”

Hunt has become one of the central voices in that movement. After her golden weekend in Budapest, she directed a pointed message at Sweeney: “This is what women in sport look like.”

Speaking on ITV’s Good Morning Britain, the sprinter set out the stakes clearly.

“When we’re trying to provide role models for young people and young women in sport, we really want to show that it’s about what your body can do, not so much what it looks like,” she said.

The numbers back up her concern. Hunt referenced statistics showing that 64% of young girls drop out of exercise and sport before they reach 16. Against that backdrop, she argued, the last thing they need is another hurdle.

“We don’t need to place any kind of barrier whatsoever in their way in terms of providing the opportunity and the empowerment for them to still exercise, whatever that looks like, professional or kind of just going to do a park run with your friends,” she said. “So it’s about empowering young girls and young women and young people to show that you really can just get out there and you don’t have to worry what you look like, you don’t have to worry about what you’re wearing.”

Duggan agrees – and wants the reaction to the advert to harden into something more unified and long-lasting.

“You don’t want an advertising campaign to define the conversation around women,” she said. “We want the women to use their platforms now, use their own voices, celebrate each other’s strength, athleticism, humour, ultimately real women. That’s what’s more powerful.”

She also hopes brands are paying close attention to the fury the Novig ad has stirred.

“I’m hoping that other companies are seeing the reaction, the kind of visceral reaction that women and athletes are having to this ad, and it kind of clicks with them, that this is what women want to see,” Duggan said.

She accepts that Novig may be content to target a narrow slice of the market.

“If you’re a company like Novig, and you’re solely focused on a certain cohort of men – like I said, I think it’s just a cohort of men who consume sports through their phones or through betting and in that way – that’s their prerogative.”

But she believes the wider industry has been handed a clear message about what resonates in 2024.

“I think generally what companies should take from this is that we want to see strong, powerful women,” she said. “I would react to Amy Hunt in a Nike ad far more than I’d react to Sydney Sweeney in a betting ad.”

The advert may fade from timelines soon enough. The question now is whether brands choose to chase the old formula, or finally catch up with the athletes who have already moved the game on.