Speakers

Brendon Shabani is Founder and Director at Rising Ballers, the biggest Gen Z football media brand in the UK.

Founded as a result of experiencing first-hand the lack of support and representation young rising footballers had, Brendon created Rising Ballers to help tip that balance.

As a former pro player with Leyton Orient, Brendon was around academy players daily and quickly became aware of how there was no digital platform documenting and supporting their journeys. Fast forward to now and the Rising Ballers network has one of the most engaged, authentic communities out there boasting a following of 9M and impressive repertoire of brands partnered with.

Brendon’s impressive career journey, albeit still only being 22 years-old, has gone from strength to strength since leaving the pro scene to pursue Rising Ballers full-time. Alongside growing the following and reach of the Rising Ballers channels, he has been instrumental in securing multiple client projects with household brands like Adidas, PlayStation and Premier League.  

Rising Ballers continues to provide Gen Z and millennial audiences with educational and entertaining content formats, with the representation of young ballers remaining the primary focus for both Brendon and the Rising Ballers network.

Former Lawyer and WSL and Women's Championship football player. Now heads up She's A Baller, the UK's largest independent women's football social media platform and creative agency.

Marketing has been a passion of mine since age 15, when I first realised the potential of this field to shape narratives and create meaningful connections between brands and people. Early on, I started giving career talks to Year 11 and sixth form students around North and East London, sharing the often-unseen creative and strategic avenues that marketing offers. Those experiences showed me the power of mentorship and ignited a lasting desire to inspire others about this dynamic career path. Currently, I develop strategy and ideas for all multi-channel seasonal campaigns and marketing activations at Ann Summers.

Former Professional Footballer, 11 years Nike experience in product and marketing. Skechers for the last 2 years to launch Skechers Football; 1 year product development, insights and strategy development. Building and manage Sports Marketing, Athlete Services, Retail and Social departments. Now Skechers Football is 1 year  in the market; 8 football footwear launches, 2 new price points across 6 new soleplates and 100+ athletes globally.

I guess you need to know how I got here. I have 12+ years of experience <insert big list of brand names here to show off and brag so you might think I’m a big thing>. I'm not a Forbes 30 under 30; I have not been named 'Top Marketing Influencer' by some random agency looking to PR for new business. At Ryanair, I ran its social media. I let my work do the talking (most of the time), and I think I'm doing ok at it. You can call me the Aldi version of Gary Vee. Now it’s time to speak Frankly.

Working at Three since 2021, Nicole leads their Chelsea FC Women's Sponsorship - managing Three's award winning campaign, the #WeSeeYou Network. Alongside her work in Women's Football, Nicole also works on Three's music festival partnerships.

Perla Bloom is a dynamic global marketing strategy leader, passionate about the intersection of tech, creativity, and culture. She builds brands, creates connected experiences for audiences that solve a problem to reach specific objectives. She currently leading comms planning for content, editorial and entertainment at Expedia Group, and before that was at EA Games writing global marketing strategies for iconic games like Battlefield, The Sims, Need for Speed and many more. Before that she was agency side, and has expertise spanning various sectors, from FMCG to fintech, to Luxury.

Award winning marketeer and football enthusiast. Sola Kasali (she/her) joins us at YMS, having worked across the world’s biggest gaming publisher for close to ten years, delivering the newly named EA SPORTS FC gaming franchise.Focused on club, league and football federation relationships, her role bridges the authenticity of football in the real and virtual worlds as we know it.

Tigran is a curious Data Scientist specializing in network science, complex adaptive systems and social network analytics, with a passion for uncovering patterns and insights into human behavior and online interactions. Tigran excels at analyzing social networks, identifying trends, and mapping connections to drive data-informed strategies. His work focuses on understanding the dynamics of social networks, transforming intricate data structures into actionable insights that bridge the gap between technology and society.

Yas (they/them/theirs) looks after all things TikTok at RSPB. In the past year, they've inspired young people to get involved with nature through the use of absolutely unhinged bird memes.