League Championship Side Derby County Sells Pride Park Stadium Naming Rights To IPro

League Championship club Derby County has sold naming rights to its Pride Park stadium to the "new global sports drink company, iPro," according to the PA. The deal, which is believed to be "one of the biggest independent deals by a club in Football League history," will net Derby £7M ($11.3M) over 10 years. It will see "the renaming of Pride Park, which has been the club's home for the past 16 years" since moving from the Baseball Ground, to the iPro Stadium (PA, 11/13). The BBC reported Derby County CEO Sam Rush said, "We are all aiming to take this club to the Premier League and to do that we need significant revenue to invest in the club and playing staff." Rush "defended the change and said supporters had been consulted." Rush: "Over the last 10 months we have talked about this with supporters extensively. We have done a lot of tours and generally people have been supportive" (BBC, 11/13).