Zomato delivers a mural to hockey ace PR Sreejesh

The Indian hockey team won a bronze medal at the recently concluded Paris Olympics.

After winning a bronze medal with the Indian hockey team at the recently concluded Paris Olympics, Zomato delivered ace goalie PR Sreejesh a mural celebrating his sporting career.

“It is like a dream,” remarked Sreejesh after seeing the mural in Kochi.

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Dubbed ‘The Great Wall of Indian Hockey’, it was his last game for the national team making the medal even more special. India won a bronze medal at the 2020 Tokyo Games as well; this feat of consecutive medals last happened 52 years ago for India.

A couple of weeks ago, Zomato published a print ad in The Times of India and the ad’s copy read, “Some bites mean more.”

Unlike Zomato’s celebration of Sreejesh, Apollo Tyres ran afoul of the goalie’s talent management agency Baseline Venture over misuse of his image.

Tuhin Mishra, managing director and co-founder of Baseline Ventures, expressed his anger in a LinkedIn post: “Dear Apollo Tyres Ltd, we expected that a firm of your stature would follow the rules. You will go and pay crores of money to the legend of Indian cricket (Sachin Tendulkar) and to Manchester United, but guess you don’t even think for a second to use the imagery & name of probably one of the greatest hockey players of India without paying a single rupee.”

The MD and co-founder also announced a personal boycott of Apollo Tyres. “Please don’t think he’s alone. We will take all necessary action against this. But I also want to state that as a mark of respect for Sreejesh, I’m throwing away all of the Apollo Tyres that my cars unfortunately have! It’s astonishing how corporate India like yours is going to treat our Living Legend of Hockey!”