AON TO UNVEIL NEW MANCHESTER UNITED SHIRT IN HANOI

Hanoi’s Manchester United supporter’s football club, which was established in 2004, have 15,000 members.

United and Aon took just three weeks to thrash out the lucrative partnership, which will commence at the start of the 2010-11 season.

But with shirt manufacturers Nike already having produced United’s new strip for next season with the AIG logo, the Premier League champions will be forced to carry the AIG branding for the final 12 months of the £14 million-a-year contract.

With the US government bailing out the financially-crippled AIG to the tune of £125 billion, senior political figures in America had called for the final £14-million instalment to United to be withheld to avoid taxpayer money funding the club.

United have received assurances that they will receive the £14 million, but AIG’s announcement earlier this year that they would not be renewing their sponsorship prompted United to launch the global search for a new shirt sponsor that has culminated in the deal with Aon.

United’s success in pulling off football’s biggest shirt deal in the depth of an economic downturn was largely a result of the club’s ability to offer Aon a route into the burgeoning Asian market.

The club claim to have 330 million supporters worldwide, with six times as many supporters in India as in the UK.

Nike produce six million shirts a year, all with the club’s sponsor on the front, and United’s television channel, MUTV, has subscribers in 220 countries worldwide.

In the meantime, a licensing exam for international football agents in Vietnam will be held on 30 September this year – the Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) announced.

The successful examinees, sanctioned by the world football governing body FIFA, will be granted Players’ Agent Licenses.

Four years ago, Mae Mua, a Vietnamese-English woman, became the first FIFA agent in Vietnam as the only candidate to pass the exam in HCM City.