Author: Darren Young
Making Non-League Day Happen Weekly
While much of the focus is on the return of fans to professional clubs right now, they’re all still here (though only just in some cases). However, the damage to non-league clubs was close to fatal. In this article, I want to set out how those precious community assets can not only survive, but thrive, […]
Read more'Ask Not What Your Fans Can Do For You': A Fan Engagement Primer for Cricket
Mark Bradley @fanexperienceco Mark works all over Europe helping associations, leagues and clubs to understand and improve fan engagement and their match day experience. The Fan Experience Company was founded in 2005, and in 2019/20 they oversaw the assessment of over 350 games each season in 13 countries. Of all of things JFK is remembered […]
Read moreOne Hundred and Eighty Degree Turn Leaves Fans Out In The Cold
The Hundred, a brand new form of cricket unique to the English (and Welsh) game, was concluded on Saturday with a spectacular finals day at Lords. It can be viewed as a success so far, not least for the superb marketing campaign that attracted record crowds, especially in the women’s game. A far more family-focussed […]
Read moreThe Euros Vision-Wrong Contest?
Like a few of the UK entries in the annual pan-European singing contest, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Back in 2012, Michel Platini’s original, and rather romantic, vision for Euro 2020 was outlined just ahead of that year’s final when Spain thumped Italy with one of their best, and last, triumphs […]
Read moreThe Model To Keep Football Off Its Knees
Just as the sight of players taking the knee confuses the hell out of some of England’s less emotionally and intellectually developed supporters, the word ‘sustainability’ can often mislead fans too. It’s not – as some believe - about limiting ambition or muzzling clubs but it plays the long game rather than gambling on a […]
Read moreThe Rise of the Sub-Mariners
Most of us agree that football needs a reset. And while more effective solutions to sharing the game’s wealth and improving governance are needed, there is an opportunity to think differently about sustainability in 99% of clubs outside of the super-elite and that is the development of social relevance and its potential to generate revenues. […]
Read moreFan Power Now In A League Of Its Own
Even before the latest shenanigans, there was very little point in a fan-focussed company like us condemning the Seven Four Three Cities Super League breakaway attempt and saying it’s a bad thing for football fans all over the country, continent and maybe the whole world. When the fan groups of the clubs breaking away are […]
Read moreWill The Fan Experience Be Delivered On A Wing(er) and A Prayer?
The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark. Michelangelo He did have a point, that Michelangelo geezer. But then he lived in different times; before we had to contend with social media and […]
Read moreThe Missing Generation Game
In the absence of opportunities to go to the game together, my son and I have found an alternative habit. We never miss an episode of BBC Scotland’s A View from the Terrace. To term it irreverent football chat would demean its talent for honouring football’s great truths. Eschewing the usual north-of-the-border obsession with the […]
Read moreBeing There: Is Sky Now The Limit For The Women’s Game?
With the news that Sky & BBC have agreed a 3-year £7-8 million deal to televise WSL / WC football, there’s a tangible sense of excitement and achievement in the air: perhaps best illustrated by the joyful tone of the tweets of those in the sport as the announcement approached. This feels like a big […]
Read moreGetting to Grips with Loyalty
The word ‘limbs!’ often accompanies a social media post depicting a crowd’s reaction to a moment of pure joy in football. The sight of arms (and sometimes legs) in the air, flailing about in rapture, is one of the things we love most about the game. But with Covid-19 holing football below the waterline and […]
Read morePitch Perfectly Highlights The Cracks In The Experience
Imagine, if you will, a nervous cricket fan contemplating buying a ticket for the third test of the current test series between India and England. There were only tickets available for day three, so they voiced their concern about the game lasting that long, given how English wickets had fallen quickly in the previous test. […]
Read more