It has taken more than four years to get this far.
Not to build a stadium.
Not to sign a player.
Not even to kick a ball.
Four years fighting through trademark systems for the name and badge of a football club we are trying to bring back to life.
Welcome to the return of the Los Angeles Aztecs.
Nothing about it has been easy.
Perhaps that is fitting.
This started in America
The original Los Angeles Aztecs disappeared more than forty years ago.
The name did not disappear with them.
George Best wore it.
Johan Cruyff wore it.
Rinus Michels coached it.
Elton John became part-owner of it.
For a brief, extraordinary period, Los Angeles found itself at the centre of world football.
Then the club vanished.
Years later, I decided the story deserved another chapter.
Not another retro shirt.
Not an old badge turned into a nostalgia business.
A football club.
On 29 May 2022, I filed a United States trademark application for LOS ANGELES AZTECS.
On 11 July 2022, another US application followed for the LOS ANGELES AZTECS 1973 image mark.
Those applications became US Serial Nos. 97433672 and 97496554.
You can see the applications here:
LOS ANGELES AZTECS 1973 — USPTO
Both remain part of our ongoing US trademark programme.
That date matters.
Because our involvement with the Aztecs did not begin with the dispute happening in Britain today.
It began years before it.
Then we waited
Trademark applications take time.
I understand that.
Government departments have procedures.
I understand that too.
But eventually patience becomes paralysis.
Our applications remained pending for years.
I chased.
I asked questions.
I tried to understand what was happening.
I never received an explanation that satisfactorily explained to me why the process had taken so long.
Eventually, I stopped waiting.
I went to federal court
In 2025, I took legal action in the Southern District of New York concerning the delays surrounding my trademark matters and the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
Think about that.
A bloke from Lancashire trying to bring back a lost American soccer club ended up in federal court against one of the biggest intellectual-property institutions in the world.
Football takes you to some strange away grounds.
I was not asking anyone to simply hand me a trademark.
I wanted the applications dealt with.
I wanted movement.
I wanted answers.
The proceedings did not result in a judgment determining the underlying trademark-delay complaint.
That matters.
I am not going to claim a court found the USPTO had acted unlawfully.
It did not.
But I am equally not going to rewrite the years that came before it.
We filed.
We waited.
We complained.
We went public.
Eventually, I went to court.
The fight was already public
Long before the current British dispute, I had publicly complained about delays affecting attempts to revive historic American soccer identities.
I created a Change.org campaign about what I believed had become an unacceptable situation.
Then, in March 2026, I finally published an update with a very different title:
After Four Years of Waiting, Progress at Last.
The trademark process had started moving.
The Los Angeles Aztecs were part of that progress.
Now let me be very precise.
Can I prove that going to court caused the applications to move?
No.
Timing is not proof of causation.
I will not turn chronology into a legal conclusion just because it makes a better headline.
What I can give you are the dates.
We filed in 2022.
We waited for years.
I eventually went to federal court.
The applications progressed.
Make of the sequence what you will.
Progress at last
The LOS ANGELES AZTECS 1973 image application progressed through USPTO examination and reached publication for opposition.
The USPTO material included in our British evidence records it as a live application that had been examined and published, allowing third parties the opportunity to oppose registration.
Our LOS ANGELES AZTECS word application also remains pending.
Pending is not registered.
Words matter in trademark law.
So I am not going to pretend otherwise.
But after the years spent trying to get these applications through the system, progress matters.
A lot.
Then came Britain
Los Angeles is home.
That is not changing.
But the history of the Aztecs has never fitted neatly inside one city.
George Best gives the club an extraordinary connection to Britain and Ireland.
Cruyff connects it to the Netherlands, Barcelona and the development of modern football.
Michels connects it to Total Football itself.
These were global football figures who happened to wear the shirt of a club from Los Angeles.
So yes.
We want to bring the Los Angeles Aztecs to Britain too.
Not move them.
Bring them.
There is a difference.
I want the Aztecs playing football in Southern California.
But I also want to see that badge walk out on a pitch in Britain.
Manchester.
Liverpool.
London.
Belfast.
European clubs have spent decades flying across the Atlantic to sell their football culture to America.
Why shouldn’t a historic American club come the other way?
Los Angeles is home.
Britain can be an away day.
Our British application
On 20 May 2025, Brands United Corp filed an application with the UK Intellectual Property Office for the LOS ANGELES AZTECS 1973 heritage crest.
Trade Mark No. UK00004206336.
And look at what the application covers.
Yes, there are shirts.
Hoodies.
Scarves.
Footwear.
But it also covers:
Sports-club management.
Football coaching.
Football competitions.
Fan clubs.
Soccer games.
Player training.
The organisation of sporting events.
That is deliberate.
Because we are not trying to resurrect an old badge simply to sell merchandise.
We are trying to resurrect a football club.
Then Admiral entered the story
Our British application is now being opposed by Admiral Sportswear Limited.
This is a formal proceeding before the UK Intellectual Property Office.
Admiral has the right to make its case.
We have the right to defend ours.
The UKIPO will decide the legal questions.
But supporters deserve to know the chronology.
Because once again, dates matter.
February 2025
Before our British application was filed, representatives of Admiral were already talking directly to me about the Los Angeles Aztecs.
On 20 February 2025, Theo Hamburger of Admiral emailed following a conversation between us.
He asked me to send across the logos and trademarks so he could pull something together.
I replied asking for a letter of intent.
Five days later, on 25 February, Jonathan Hamburger, Admiral’s Managing Director, contacted me.
He referred specifically to conversations concerning the LA Aztecs and asked to arrange another call.
Companies talk.
Licensing conversations happen.
There is nothing remarkable about that.
Then comes another date.
27 February 2025
Admiral’s later L.A. AZTECS UK trademark registration claims priority from an EUIPO application dated:
27 February 2025.
Two days after Jonathan’s email.
Its UK application was subsequently filed on 21 July 2025 and later registered.
Those are the records.
I am not going to tell readers what Admiral’s motive was.
I cannot know what somebody else was thinking.
I will not call anyone a thief.
I will not claim something was stolen when that has not been legally established.
The chronology is stronger than the accusation anyway.
What I can say is this:
Admiral knew about our Los Angeles Aztecs revival project before its filing.
Our evidence before the UKIPO specifically relies on those earlier commercial discussions.
You don’t need conspiracy theories when you have a calendar.
Their words. Our badge.
There is another important distinction.
Admiral’s mark is:
L.A. AZTECS
A word mark.
Our application is the complete heritage identity:
LOS ANGELES AZTECS
1973
The bird.
The shield.
The badge.
Our written submissions argue that the complete crest creates a materially different visual, structural and conceptual impression from the plain L.A. AZTECS word mark.
Admiral disagrees.
That is why there is an opposition.
We will put forward our evidence.
They will put forward theirs.
The UKIPO will decide.
That is exactly how it should work.
Strip everything else away
This is the chronology.
2022
We file for the Los Angeles Aztecs in America.
2023
The revival is already receiving national media coverage in Britain.
2024
I publicly campaign over the US trademark delays.
February 2025
Admiral discusses the Los Angeles Aztecs with me and asks about our logos and trademarks.
27 February 2025
Admiral’s mark claims its European priority date.
20 May 2025
Our LOS ANGELES AZTECS 1973 British application is filed.
2025
After years of frustration with the American process, I go to federal court.
2025–26
The US applications move forward.
Today
We are defending the Aztecs identity in Britain while continuing to build towards the club’s return in America.
No conspiracy theory required.
The dates are interesting enough.
Why fight this hard?
Because trademarks are boring until the thing behind them matters.
The Los Angeles Aztecs matter.
Not because I say so.
Look at the history.
Best.
Cruyff.
Michels.
Look at Los Angeles.
Look at what football is becoming in America.
Then ask a simple question.
What should happen to football history when the original club disappears?
Should it become merchandise?
Should someone put the badge on a sweatshirt and call that a revival?
I don’t think so.
A football club should play football.
The easy option
The easy option was obvious.
Find an old badge.
Register it.
Print 500 shirts.
Post photographs of George Best.
Tell everyone how cool the NASL was.
Cash a few nostalgia cheques.
Move on.
No stadium.
No players.
No supporters.
No court.
No opposition.
No headaches.
Easy.
But I don’t want to own the memory of the Los Angeles Aztecs.
I want to see them play football again.
That is the entire point.
Los Angeles is home. The world is away.
We want the Aztecs to have a permanent home in Southern California.
That is the foundation.
But I also want this club travelling.
Across America.
Across the Atlantic.
Into Britain.
Into Europe.
Imagine the Los Angeles Aztecs walking out in the country that gave George Best to football.
Not as a tribute act.
Not as a museum exhibition.
As a living football club carrying its history forward.
New players.
New supporters.
New stories.
The same badge.
That is what all this paperwork is ultimately about.
Not trademark numbers.
Not lawyers.
Not bureaucracies.
Not corporations.
Football.
The original Aztecs disappeared.
The NASL disappeared.
Decades passed.
The badge survived.
People remembered.
Then we picked it up again.
Now another opposition stands in front of us.
Fine.
Football has opponents.
You don’t get to choose whether somebody tackles you.
You choose whether you get back up.
We will put our evidence before the UKIPO.
Admiral will put forward theirs.
The tribunal can decide.
Meanwhile, we keep building.
Because the Los Angeles Aztecs cannot spend another forty years trapped inside old photographs.
They need players.
They need supporters.
They need a home.
They need an away end.
They need football.
Los Angeles is home.
The world is away.
And after more than four years fighting to give this club another life, we are not stopping now.