SA Footy

Sports

Stanford and his companies have established a significant presence in golf, polo, tennis, cricket and sailing, sports which are popular among Stanford’s wealthy clients. Stanford Financial Group is the title sponsor for such sporting events as the Stanford US Open Polo Championship, the Stanford USPA Silver Cup, the Stanford Antigua Sailing Week, the PGA Tour Stanford St. Jude Championship, and the Stanford International Pro-Am. In 2009, the final event of the LPGA season, now known as the ADT Championship, will be renamed the Stanford Financial Tour Championship. Stanford also sponsors professional golfers Vijay Singh, Camilo Villegas and David Toms as well as Morgan Pressel on the LPGA Tour. In tennis, the company is a sponsor of the Sony Ericsson Open. Stanford also sponsors the Champions Series Tennis Tournaments featuring Jim Courier, John McEnroe and Pete Sampras.

Stanford created and funded the Stanford 20/20 cricket tournament in the West Indies, for which he built his own ground in Antigua. The first Stanford 20/20 Cricket Tournament was held in July and August 2006. The second tournament took place in January and February 2008 with a global television audience of 300 million.[6] Trinidad and Tobago took first place in this tournament. This team also took home the US280k Super Series prize after defeating Middlesex on 27 October 2008. [7]

In June 2008 Stanford and the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) signed a deal for five Twenty20 internationals between England and a West Indies all-star XI with a total prize fund of £12.270m (US $20 million) to be awarded to the team that wins the Championship. It was the largest prize ever offered to a team for a single tournament.[8] This was in jeopardy after a row with Digicel, the sponsors of the West Indies cricket team, who were unhappy about sponsorship of the event. Eventually, the dispute was sorted out and the first Championship was won by Stanford Superstars, who defeated the England team by 10 wickets, humiliating them in the Twenty 20 arena. [9]

bayman wrote:if convicted do they take his knighthood away ? serious ? i'm just curious