Soccer is pretty much the most popular sport in the world. In many ways, it’s like the movie industry: every country has its own but only a select few are truly successful at it, it has its superstars, and it makes an insane amount of money – the European professional soccer “industry” had revenues of around 29 billion euros (over $33 billion) in the last season unaffected by the global pandemic – 2018-2019 that is.
The number of soccer fans is also insane – around half of the world’s population is a fan of the sport. Perhaps unsurprisingly, English soccer clubs are the best-known and most followed ones around the globe. No matter if you check a South African sports portal or the Bettingnews88 English language website, you will stumble upon news about the Premier League (and a few other national soccer leagues from Europe).
What makes English soccer such a big deal all over the world?
Rock bottom
The popularity – and reputation – of English soccer hit rock bottom in the 1980s. It was – and still is – England’s national game, along with some others like rugby and cricket, with a massive domestic fan base. And this was, in part, the source of its problems.
In the Thatcher era, England had many issues – some of them were political, others, of economic nature. All this, along with the rising unemployment left many locals frustrated – and what better outlet for all the frustration than the football grounds?
Hooliganism was omnipresent in English football and it spilt over to the rest of Europe, too. English clubs were ultimately banned from European competitions for years because of the habits of their fans – “football hooligans” and “ultras”.
Then came the Hillsborough disaster – fatal overcrowding of the Hillsborough stadium in Sheffield in 1989 that killed almost 100 people – that dealt the final blow to English football as it was at the time. Something had to change – and it did.
The shift
Things changed in the early 1990s when the Football Association – England’s highest soccer governing body – decided to reinvent the top-flight domestic league in the country. A new league called The Football Association Premier League was established with the goal to bring more money into the game, and reinvent the clubs in a way similar to how American sports are seen: as an entertainment product.
Marketing and money
The idea was to turn top-level soccer in the country into a money-making machine that would attract massive audiences and with them, sponsors, broadcast deals, and merchandising. The influx of money will, in turn, help clubs attract the best players from all over the globe, improve their performance on the pitch, and generate even more income.
It’s like a snake biting its own tail: the better the Premier League performs, the more money it makes – and the more money it can spend on better players and managers, the more money it can make.
Premier League teams play great soccer, which is enjoyed by masses of fans around the globe. Pretty much every sports network in the world wants to broadcast Premier League games – it always means a boost in its viewership – and, of course, its global fan base.
Soccer is a simple game, with simple rules that are easy to understand. It is also a game that relies on skill, speed, stamina, and precision. Besides, it has the potential to breed superstars like Cristiano Ronaldo or Leo Messi and so many more before them from Puskás to Pelé. All this, along with the quality entertainment it provides, makes soccer – association football – the most followed sport in the world.
And the standout quality of the Premier League makes it the prime entertainment product for soccer fans, one that attracts hundreds of millions of them from all over the globe.