The DataPOWA view on the most important talking points in the worlds of sport sponsorship and digital.
WILL THE HUNDRED HELP OR HINDER CRICKET?
Is a newly-conceived form of cricket a threat to the sport, or the lifeline it needs to survive?
In the Financial Times, Murad Ahmed weighs the pros and cons of The Hundred, a new and shorter take on the game in which each innings last just 100 balls.
The idea was proposed at a 2017 meeting attended by England and Wales Cricket Board chief executive Tom Harrison. Here, the sport’s current troubles were outlined as stats made it clear that the current fan demographic is aging and too few younger fans are emerging.
Indeed, young audiences and their need for fast entertainment are one of the driving forces behind The Hundred. “Beneath the surface lies a more subversive design. Millennial audiences have ever-narrowing attention spans, but have ever-greater ways to be entertained,” writes Ahmed.
Harrison was immediately sold on the concept.”My instantaneous reaction was: I love it. I absolutely love it. I can actually feel the hairs on my neck just thinking about that moment, that sense of, ‘Wow, this is powerful.’”
However, there is some resistance to the change. Ahmed adds: “One top English cricket executive, who declines to be named fearing the wrath of the ECB, says it is like inventing Gaelic football, a game beloved in Ireland, but incomprehensible outside those shores.
“‘To add a fourth format that won’t be played anywhere else, that has no international relevance, is a real dichotomy for the game,’” the executive says.
The Hundred will begin in July 2020, with eight city-based teams facing off against one another.
For more on this story, please visit the Financial Times
MADRID SIGN ADIDAS DEAL
Real Madrid and Adidas have signed the most lucrative kit deal in football history after putting pen to paper on a contract extension.
The two have worked together since 1998 and have enjoyed monumental success as the Spanish club has ruled both domestically and in the Champions League.
Their current agreement was set to expire in 2020, but this new deal will run until the end of the 2027/28 season and will reportedly make Real a total of €1.1 billion (US$1.2 billion) – around €152 million (US$169 million) a year.
Adidas chief executive Kasper Rørsted said: “This agreement will help us to achieve our mission to be the best sports company in the world. It also underpins Adidas’ leadership in the football category.”
The deal means Real’s kit sponsorship is now worth more than that of Barcelona, who are with Nike.
For more on this story, please visit Sports Pro Media
LA LIGA REVENUES SOAR
Sponsorships have helped drive record revenues at La Liga, new figures have revealed.
The Spanish league made over €4.48bn during the 2017/18 season, increasing by more than a fifth on the 2016/17 term.
The impressive results are down to Spanish clubs’ strong showing in European competitions, and they put the league broadly in line with the German Bundelsiga, which is the second richest football league in the world after the English Premier League.
“Without a doubt, the success of Spanish clubs on the pitch has been a positive factor,” said Javier Tebas, president of La Liga. “In the last 10 years, Spanish sides have won 70 per cent of the 30 Uefa competitions that were contested.
“The growth we are seeing helps us to create the best quality audiovisual product for broadcasters, which has led to a large and growing international audience for La Liga matches, which prompts sponsors to increase their investment in Spanish clubs.”
For more on this story, please visit the Financial Times
F1 STILL LUCRATIVE, DESPITE CURRENT PROBLEMS
New figures covering the last 15 years underline Formula 1’s position as one of the world’s most lucrative sports, despite some recent causes for concern.
Sponsorship is one of the biggest drivers of funds, with 44.7% of F1’s total earnings last year coming from deals with brands. These deals are one of four main sources of revenue for the sport, the others being team owner payments, series partnerships and trackside advertising.
However, the sport has undoubtedly taken a knock in recent years. F1 team sponsorships are declining and in 2018 totalled just $779.2m; in 2013, they surpassed $1m.
Chase Carey, who oversees F1 for its owners Liberty Media, has said that sponsorship is proving more difficult than anticipated. “The challenge in the sponsorship world is probably tougher than it was a few years ago,” he said. “For anybody who is not Google or Facebook, the broader advertising world is more challenging.
“I think it is fair to say that the sponsorship world has probably been more challenging than we would have expected it to be a couple of years ago.”
For more on this story, please visit Forbes
GOOD SHOUT
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