Why is Sydney Sweeney’s topless sports ad facing backlash from athletes and angering women?

Dubai: Hollywood actress Sydney Sweeney has become the centre of a debate about how women’s sport is represented in advertising after appearing in a new campaign for US sports prediction platform Novig.

The campaign features Sweeney posing nude or nearly nude while using sporting equipment, including balls and rackets, to cover herself. The images reference different sports, including basketball and football.

What has made the campaign particularly contentious is that the criticism has come from professional athletes themselves. Several women from the sporting world have argued that the campaign reduces women’s sport to appearance and sexuality rather than highlighting the training, skill and physical effort involved.

Here is what the controversy is about.

What is Sydney Sweeney’s Novig campaign?

Sweeney stars in a series of advertisements for Novig, a US-based sports prediction platform.

The campaign uses her body and sporting equipment to create deliberately provocative images. Rather than showing Sweeney participating in sport in conventional athletic clothing, the advertisements use the visual language of different sports while leaving her largely nude.

The campaign is also more than a conventional celebrity endorsement. Novig has described Sweeney as a strategic partner in the company, with an equity stake. That means she has a financial interest in the business beyond simply appearing in its advertising.

Why are athletes objecting?

The central criticism is not simply that Sweeney appears nude. Instead, several athletes have questioned why women's sport is being represented through sexualised imagery when the campaign could have focused on the athleticism and physical achievement associated with sport.

For athletes who spend years training, competing and dealing with injuries, the imagery has raised questions about whether women's bodies are still being treated as marketing tools even when the subject is supposed to be sport.

Four-time Olympic gold medallist Ariarne Titmus was among the athletes to speak out.

Titmus said she was angered by the campaign and argued that it was insulting to women who have devoted their careers to mastering their sports. She also questioned why sexualising women's bodies continues to be considered acceptable advertising in a sporting context.

What did sprinter Amy Hunt say?

British sprinter Amy Hunt also criticised the campaign.

After competing at the Ultimate Championships, Hunt addressed Sweeney directly while talking about the reality of elite sport.

Her point was that women's sport is not necessarily glamorous. It involves training, sweat, repetition, competition and years of work to achieve results.

For Hunt and other athletes, that distinction matters because the campaign uses the visual identity of sport without necessarily showing the realities of being an athlete.

Other athletes joined the conversation

The criticism soon extended beyond Titmus and Hunt.

Swimmer Lani Pallister shared footage of herself training and competing, while sprinter Bree Rizzo posted highlights from her athletics career.

Their posts effectively offered an alternative picture of what women in sport look like: athletes training, competing, sweating, celebrating victories and dealing with the physical demands of their professions.

The Australian Institute of Sport also joined the wider conversation by sharing footage covering sports including archery, gymnastics, boxing and softball, alongside material highlighting the science and preparation behind elite performance.

Water polo player and Olympic silver medallist Tilly Kearns was among those who took a more direct approach in criticising the campaign.

World champion boxer Skye Nicolson, meanwhile, focused on the distinction between attractiveness and sexualisation.

Her argument was that there is a difference between an athlete looking attractive as a natural consequence of being fit and confident, and deliberately using sex appeal as the primary way of selling something associated with sport.

Is the criticism about Sydney Sweeney herself?

Not necessarily. Much of the criticism has focused on the concept of the campaign and how women's sport is being used as a visual device, rather than on Sweeney simply choosing to appear nude.

That distinction is important. Women can choose to be sexual, pose nude or use their appearance commercially. The debate surrounding this campaign is about whether those choices become problematic when they are presented as a representation of women's sport.

The athletes criticising the campaign are essentially asking: What message does it send when sport is used as the backdrop for sexualised imagery rather than as a celebration of athletic achievement?

Why does this debate matter?

Women's sport has spent years trying to gain greater visibility, investment and recognition.

That has included efforts to shift attention towards athletic performance, sporting achievements, competition and the personalities of female athletes rather than focusing primarily on their appearance.

The Novig campaign has therefore touched a much larger nerve.

For its critics, the issue is not whether women can be photographed in a sexy way. It is whether women's sport should be marketed through that lens when there are so many other aspects of elite sport that could be celebrated.

For others, the campaign can be viewed as provocative advertising that uses celebrity, humour and sexuality to attract attention in a crowded sports-betting market.

That tension is at the heart of the backlash: where does creative advertising end and the sexualisation of women's sport begin?

What has Novig said?

Novig has positioned Sweeney as a strategic partner rather than simply a celebrity appearing in an advertisement. The company has not only used her as the face of the campaign but has linked her involvement to an equity stake in the business.

That arrangement makes the campaign particularly notable because Sweeney's commercial interest is directly connected to the company she is promoting.

The controversy, however, has largely centred on the advertising concept itself and what it communicates about women and sport.

At its core, the debate is a familiar one: women have greater freedom than ever to control how they present themselves, but audiences and athletes are still questioning whether commercial campaigns continue to rely on the sexualisation of women's bodies when selling products associated with their achievements

What is Novig?

Novig is a US-based sports prediction platform founded in 2021 by Jacob Fortinsky and Kelechi Ukah, who met while studying at Harvard University. Fortinsky is the company’s co-founder and CEO, while Ukah is co-founder and chief technology officer.

The company describes its platform as a prediction market, allowing users to trade on the outcomes of sporting events rather than using a conventional sportsbook model. Novig has raised funding from investors including Y Combinator, Forerunner Ventures, NFX and Perceptive Ventures, with former NFL quarterback Joe Montana also among its investors.

In 2026, Novig raised $75 million in a Series B funding round. The company has since positioned itself as a sports-focused prediction market, with federal registration from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

Sydney Sweeney is allegedly not merely a celebrity ambassador for Novig. She is allegedly a strategic partner with an equity stake in the company, giving her a direct financial interest in its success.