Opposite Number
Tom Watson, founder of Opposite Number

I'm the founder of Opposite Number. I have spent my career in insight, partnerships and valuation, working inside and alongside rights holders across football, tennis, padel, motorsport, cycling and golf.

I started out in research, then moved into the LTA and Southampton FC, where I led insight teams and worked closely with the commercial and partnerships teams. After that I moved to the consulting side, valuing partnerships at Legends International and managing rights holder clients at GSIQ.

Along the way I saw the same thing again and again. Sponsorship teams are asked to sell a lot with limited time, and the data that could help them sits in a dozen places nobody has joined up. Opposite Number is my answer to that.

Email me →LinkedIn

Where I have worked

Experience

  • 2026 to present

    Founder

    Opposite Number

    Helping sponsorship sales teams do better through better use of data, strategy and AI

  • April 2025 to June 2026

    Associate Director

    GSIQ

    Managed a client portfolio worth over £1m across rights holders including ITF, Premier Padel, LTA, British Cycling, LIV Golf and Sela. My work was mainly audience measurement and end-to-end modelling, alongside running client relationships and line managing a junior analyst.

  • November 2023 to April 2025

    Partnership Valuation and Consulting Manager

    Legends International

    Led the European arm of the partnership valuation team. Clients included Chelsea, Paris Saint-Germain, Inter Milan, Everton, FC Porto, Olympique de Marseille, Sauber (Audi F1), Eredivisie and Bundesliga. The work covered stadium naming rights and sponsorship deals valued at $10m+.

  • May 2021 to October 2023

    Research and Insight Manager

    Southampton FC

    Managed a team of three and turned first-party data into commercial strategy. The focus was moving supporters up the funnel, from fans to ticket buyers to season ticket holders, working from a database of close to 650k people. We hit our ticket sales targets every season.

    I worked with the partnerships team on data, strategy and reporting for partners including Virgin Media and eToro. I also introduced social listening and matchday experience tracking, and ran the Premier League fan engagement survey through to club level.

  • April 2019 to May 2021

    Insight Manager

    Lawn Tennis Association

    Ran research across owned databases, panels and third-party providers, and built audience segmentations that I then sold through the business. The owned database was close to 1m people. I presented audience and commercial insight on major events, including Queen's and Eastbourne, to the Executive Board and CEO.

  • September 2016 to April 2019

    Research Executive

    Ipsos MORI

    Contributed to Formula One's first global audience segmentation and worked with Sky Sports on out-of-home audience measurement.

Rights holders I have worked alongside

Clubs, leagues, federations and events

  • Chelsea
  • Paris Saint-Germain
  • Inter Milan
  • Everton
  • FC Porto
  • Olympique de Marseille
  • Sauber (Audi F1)
  • Eredivisie
  • Bundesliga
  • Southampton FC
  • LTA
  • ITF
  • Premier Padel
  • British Cycling
  • LIV Golf
  • Sela
  • Formula One

Background

The rest

Education: BA (Hons) Social Science, 2:1, University of Manchester

Also: Founding Member of the Leaders Club (Leaders in Sport), and I hold an LTA Level 2 Coach qualification

Tools I work in: Excel modelling, Power BI, Qualtrics, SQL and AI tools such as Claude

Why Opposite Number: at the LTA and Southampton FC I set out to connect with the insight teams at similar organisations, my opposite numbers, and share what we knew. The name stuck. Read the full story.

Let's talk

If you run or support a sponsorship team and want a second pair of eyes, get in touch

Talk to us →LinkedIn