Adidas CEO Rides Samba Craze to Revive Brand After Ye Debacle

No matter how Germany fares during Euro 2024 over the coming three weeks, an era of sorts will end for the host country’s football team and one of its best-known brands: Die Mannschaft will play its last European championship tournament match in Adidas uniforms.

Adidas AG’s loss of such a prominent sponsorship to archrival Nike Inc., announced earlier this year, would’ve been unthinkable not long ago, when the team and the sportswear maker were bound together by what Chief Executive Officer Bjorn Gulden once described as an almost “emotionally inseparable,” seven-decade relationship.

Yet setbacks and stumbles piled ...