Are fans being priced out of football?

euronews (in English)

Football’s popularity continues to increase, but so too has the cost of following a team. And it’s not just match-going fans who are affected.

Transcript

00:00Football's popularity is continuing to boom worldwide, but at the same time so

00:05have the costs of following a team. With more games being forever added to the

00:10calendar and the cost of merchandise at an all-time high, is the average fan

00:14being priced out of football?

00:21Hello and welcome to Football Now. It's safe to say that football is still the

00:27world's most popular sport. Just under two years ago, over 80,000 spectators

00:32packed this very stadium in La Salle for the final of the 2022 Qatar World Cup

00:37and over 1.5 billion people tuned in to watch the game worldwide. As the

00:42popularity of football continues to increase, so do the extortionate player

00:46transfer fees and salaries, let alone the amount of money it takes to build a

00:51multi-purpose stadium such as this one. Those costs are ultimately being passed

00:55forward to the fans in the form of increased ticket prices. For example, back

01:00when the Premier League began in 1992, it cost just 20 euros for a single match

01:05ticket to Tottenham Hotspur, 13 euros at Manchester City and 8 euros at Liverpool.

01:10Last season, the equivalent ticket cost 95 euros at Tottenham, 89 euros at

01:16Manchester City and 46 euros at Liverpool, with fans of those clubs paying

01:21around five times as much as they did 32 years ago. While the cost of competing at

01:25the highest level has increased, including the wages of players, it is

01:29fair to say the wages of the wider community haven't. So, is it appropriate

01:33for the clubs to pass on these costs to the match-going fan?

01:37It does feel like it's not a club-specific problem, I think, across the

01:42Premier League, across European football. The fans who have been the lifeblood of

01:46these teams for decades and decades and decades. Unfortunately, I don't

01:50think they're the priority anymore and probably haven't been for quite some

01:54time. You know, clubs, of course, do have rising costs, the same as everyone, and

01:58that's why they feel like they need to bump up prices. I think we're in

02:01quite a sad situation where, you know, a lot of working-class

02:05fans simply, in a couple of years' time, might not be able to go to the game week-in, week-out.

02:10And it's not just for Premier League games where fans are seeing

02:14extraordinary increases. Aston Villa have been criticised for charging upwards of

02:19for tickets as they made their long-awaited return to the UEFA

02:23Champions League this season. It's a huge blow for their most loyal fans, who are

02:27following their club in this competition for the first time since 1983.

02:32However, President of Business Operations, Chris Heck, has defended the prices.

02:36We recognise and understand the depth of passion felt amongst fans and their

02:40recent frustration around ticket pricing. Financial fair play rules prohibit

02:44owners from covering shortfalls to finance this ambition, so we need to

02:48generate as much revenue as possible through sponsorship, merchandise and

02:52ticket sales to ensure that we can keep the club where it rightfully belongs,

02:56competing and winning at the top of English and European football.

03:00Villa have great owners. I know that they have been speaking very well, and I think

03:05very fairly, about PSR and restrictions that puts on clubs like Aston Villa. But I know that

03:11taking advantage of fans who have been there with you through thick and thin

03:15isn't the way it's going to fix it. I know that four matches in the Champions League

03:19isn't the way it's going to fix it by hiking up prices that much. I really don't

03:22get the thinking behind seeing four games here and deciding this is a way to make

03:28inroads into getting more revenue, because it's not. The way to do it is to

03:31continue to progress, and the way to do that is to keep everybody together.

03:35Now, at the moment, ticket prices in Europe aren't quite as steep,

03:39but there are signs that that could soon change.

03:42Two clubs in Spain, Valencia and Celta Vigo, have both recently implemented a new dynamic

03:47pricing strategy for their home-match tickets. It means that prices for more popular games

03:52and tickets bought closer to kick-off could automatically increase.

03:56It's a move which has been met with huge backlash from their fans.

04:01It's true that there are two clubs now that are developing this in La Liga. I control

04:06more about Valencia, which is they are doing it since the start of the season. But it was

04:11La Liga, the competition itself, who gave the possibility to the club.

04:16But it's true that now in Valencia, it wasn't well received. Normally here, at least in Valencia,

04:22there is a huge amount of fans that has tickets for all the season. The people who buy a ticket

04:27just for one match, normally they wait until the last second, and normally now this price

04:31is higher than before. Valencia are just one of many

04:35La Liga teams who have played competitive games outside of Spain in recent years.

04:39Since 2020, the Supercopa de España has been played in Saudi Arabia,

04:44in an effort to generate more revenue for Spanish football. While the clubs have benefited

04:48financially, is it realistic to expect fans to travel over 6,500km just to watch their teams?

04:56Yeah, so I can tell you that the Supercopa in Arabia, it was successful in terms of money,

05:01because Valencia when played had more incomes, but in terms of fan base, it was at all. Nobody

05:06made a trip there, but not only from Valencia, or Osasuna, or Atlético, but even from Barcelona

05:12or Real Madrid. So you have to do it very carefully, because if you have lots of money,

05:16but you lose your fan base, the money also will go lower. The day that the fans stop thinking

05:22in the club about something that belongs to them and feel like something that is for them,

05:27they won't watch the matches on TV, they won't watch the stadiums, and if you don't do it,

05:31it's going to be something that won't work. An expensive time to be a lover of football,

05:37as prices of tickets and merchandise continue to rise. Let us know if you think following

05:42your club is too expensive, using the hashtag FootballNowCostInflation. That's all we've

05:48got time for here from the La Salle Stadium in Qatar, we'll see you next time. Bye for now.

Category

Transcript

Recommended