Agnelli and the need to appease the young audience

[justsomebloke]

In an interview today, Agnelli apparently expounded on his view that football needs to change because young people can no longer relate to the format.

Agnelli insisted that new approaches were required for football to stay relevant in a world where change had been accelerated by the coronavirus pandemic. “For anyone who has children of 10, 15, 20 years old, the disaffection is more than palpable,” he argued, pointing out that closed and empty stadiums had only diminished the sport’s appeal.

“We need a competition that is able to counter what [young people] reproduce on digital platforms, transforming the virtual into the real. On [the video game] Fifa you can create your own competition; that competition needs to be brought into the real world. We overlook the effects of the competition of the various Fortnite, Call of Duty etc, authentic catalysts for the attention of the young people of today who are destined to become the spenders of tomorrow.”

I must admit that this made me reflect. I've a son who's in his early teens, plays organised football and supports United, but also spends a lot of his time on the xbox and PC. Quite often, he can't be bothered to sit through a whole United game (and not just when it's a 0-0 against WBA). But on the other hand, he was genuinely shocked by the Super League proposal.

Do you think Agnelli has a point here? If he does, the SL is obviously not the answer, so what is?

 

[luke511]

I think the addictiveness of mobile phones and the internet will have a lasting effect on the younger generation's attention span. That probably has more to do with why your son struggles to sit through a utd game, rather than the format being outdated.

 

[pcaming]

Tbh I don't think shortening the game is the right answer, maybe more intervals to allow fans a break. This will mostly benefit the television viewers yes, but then again that's where the big money is coming from. Also could potentially help with player fitness? They definitely need to update refereeing, I loved the idea of having them explain there decisions, this puts added pressure on them, but it's there job (if need be increase the time allotted for them to make decisions). I don't see why top referees won't be able to rise to that occasion.

Tbh there's a host of things that could be done to make the game more modern, and simply having the best play the best constantly is far from the only thing to save football. Look at the EPL this season, so many teams in with a shot, fans of the big sides now all taking in matches of lesser sides because they know of the impact. If we can increase the talent pools for all and enhance the quality of the football, I don't see how younger generations will lose interest.

 

[Traub]

But how many of us are in the matchday thread during a game - even a big one? Honestly I probably spend half a game refreshing the matchday thread, so I don't even think attention span problems applies to kids only.

 

[Shark]

This is the way most kids have been since the dawn of time. It has nothing to them not relating to it.

 

[africanspur]

Unless you turn matches into convenient 10 minute chunks, a battle royale or somehow have it so that you can pay money to control players, I don't know why the SL would help with this.

 

[owlo]

Posted this earlier in another thread, but feel it's relevant here:

I'm 30 odd, and can relate. I've not been sure if it's just "falling out of love with the club/our boring football", but managing to watch whole matches seems like a huge chore. Especially in lockdown when it's just you, devoid of alcohol and friends. Even when I do manage to watch a match, I'm distracted most of the time. I go to a couple of matches a year, and it's fun, but not something I could do weekly.

This isn't a problem when reading a novel, or rebuilding an old car, or playing a computer game, or even just researching nerdy stuff online. So perhaps it's true that football isn't quite as engrossing to watch as alternatives for the full 90?

Do you 'fix' that by changing the game though? I think not. I don't actually think less money in the game would be a bad thing. The game is still super fun to play. It's the same problem e-sports face when trying to monetise for the big time. People simply aren't generally interested in LONG matches. I think it's why boxing works; a lot of showmanship and other stuff, less actual ring time. F1, Cricket etc have faced the exact same issues. (Unlike others I love T20; I appreciate tests but can't watch 5 days.)

 

[MadMike]

Generally, Agnelli is talking horseshit to cover his arse.

First of all, how will the Super League make it better for anyone other than the 12 clubs? If its a football-wide issue, it would surely just make it worse for everyone else.

Secondly, if young people struggle with sitting through a 90 minute 0-0 then that has more to do with the format of the game rather than the quality of the teams. Two evenly matched top teams can still play a 0-0 result and do so very often (Liverpool vs Real just the other day). They are not proposing format changes to reduce stalemates.

Thirdly, football has been expanding its audience exponentially with the expansion into Asian and US markets in the recent decades. Whatever negative effects from less young people following the sport have been massive offset by more adults following. Revenues, footballer salaries and transfers fees have been exploding. Whatever is happening with youngsters, there hasn't been a decrease in overall audience numbers and revenues that would prompt such a response.

 

[duffer]

Football is not for everyone. Never has been and in my opinion it should never be the goal of Fifa to make it so.

You don't like 0-0s? You don't like 45 minutes without a break? Football is not for you and that's fine.

 

[VP89]

Agnelli probably wants to work in a lab and bring a prime R9 back to life with 96 pace, and plonk him into a real life FUT team "INTER YA NAN FC".

 

[Hectic]

Why even have a 38 game league for each team spread out over a season when we can simply create a giant pitch with 20 goals and have all teams play in a one-off battle royale. That's what the kids really want.

 

[SuperiorXI]

Why even have a 38 game league for each team spread out over a season when we can simply create a giant pitch with 20 goals and have all teams play in a one-off battle royale. That's what the kids really want.

With unlockable skins and dance moves for each club

 

[Revan]

I think he is right, but I don’t think it has to do with the format of the competition. Just that football is a passive entertainment, competing with many active entertainment ways. It was always like this, but the quality of the active entertainment (games, YouTube etc) is higher than ever, much more dynamic than ever, so the kids will gradually shift to that.

And I don’t think there is much that can be done about that.

 

[Phil Osophy]

Nonsense and bad excuses.

 

[Hectic]

With unlockable skins and dance moves for each club

All pre and post match content is made on twitch live streams and the pundits have to respond to donations like Roy Keane having to do the worm for £3.50.

 

[DutchSerb]

I mean I have trouble sitting through most United games as well... I don't think there's anything they can do though? If someone likes it they watch it, if not then they don't. The only way I can think of for football getting more interest is if they can completely restructure the Champions League, maybe fuse the CL and EL together so more "lesser" teams get a slice of the pie and become bigger teams in the future. I always feel like the popularity of the Premier League has grown worldwide because they now give these teams more resources to compete, I'd watch a Leicester vs Everton or a West Ham game now where before I don't think I ever would, maybe on Match of the Day. Other than that your son just prefers to play video games, totally normal. Way more enjoyable than most football games anyways if you ask me.

 

[VP89]

From the interview:
President Agnelli, the Superleague is losing pieces, is the project in danger of sinking?
"Between our clubs there is a blood pact, we are moving forward."

Do you think that the project can still be success?
"Yes, it has a one hundred percent chance of success".

Spoiler: fwd to 1min 25

 

[iHicksy]

What an amazingly stupid human being. So the next step in his head would be FIFA All star teams because herp derp computer games. Does the dumb feck realise kids play FIFA because they like football in real life? Not the other way around.

 

[Hectic]

Stupid fecking kids (including your son OP).

 

[monosierra]

There's the game itself, the financial side of it and how the game is disseminated/sold. The game itself is in good shape generally - it is still entertaining, its rivalries still relevant, and cheap enough for anyone to play. There are niggling things to be ironed out, mostly involving rules but I don't find them bad enough to ruin the entertainment experience. The financial side of things depends on the club and should be remedied with more astute spending by big and indebted clubs. How the game is being marketed/disseminated is the big question mark for me. Outside the stadium experience, how does a 90 min game compete with the hundreds of other entertainment options available on the many screens around us? Cheaper access might be one option but it doesn't solve the core issue of value-for-time. Would greater fan participation/interaction work (Fan contolled football is an experiment in American football and a very small niche at that)? I hope there is more augmented reality-style VR content where audiences can enjoy the game from the players' point of view.

 

[Ixion]

It's just excuses. You'll always find fans 10-20 years old who have difficulty sitting through a 90 minute match, whether its now or 30 years ago.

There was no quest to save Football, it has existed for years successfully and will go on doing. This was a bunch of clubs that have created a nuclear arms race among themselves in terms of how much they spend and they were trying to save themselves before it all blows up by creating a bubble guranteed to give them all a constant stream of cash at the expense of everyone else.

 

[RedDevil@84]

Don't kids sit for hours playing PC games without having any sense of time? So how does that translate to need football to have smaller chunks?

 

[Pogue Mahone]

In an interview today, Agnelli apparently expounded on his view that football needs to change because young people can no longer relate to the format.

Agnelli insisted that new approaches were required for football to stay relevant in a world where change had been accelerated by the coronavirus pandemic. “For anyone who has children of 10, 15, 20 years old, the disaffection is more than palpable,” he argued, pointing out that closed and empty stadiums had only diminished the sport’s appeal.

“We need a competition that is able to counter what [young people] reproduce on digital platforms, transforming the virtual into the real. On [the video game] Fifa you can create your own competition; that competition needs to be brought into the real world. We overlook the effects of the competition of the various Fortnite, Call of Duty etc, authentic catalysts for the attention of the young people of today who are destined to become the spenders of tomorrow.”

I must admit that this made me reflect. I've a son who's in his early teens, plays organised football and supports United, but also spends a lot of his time on the xbox and PC. Quite often, he can't be bothered to sit through a whole United game (and not just when it's a 0-0 against WBA). But on the other hand, he was genuinely shocked by the Super League proposal.

Do you think Agnelli has a point here? If he does, the SL is obviously not the answer, so what is?

My experience (slightly younger son) is similar to yours. As per my posts in this thread. The other parents posting in that thread seemed to have noticed the same phenomenon. The only disagreements seem to be coming from posters who don’t have kids.

Basically, I think Agnelli has a point. Of course, the ESL wouldn’t have solved that problem.

 

[FatTails]

Maybe start by making matches 60 minutes with the clock stopped for throw-ins, corners, players being treated, etc. Won’t make a huge difference to the overall length of a match but psychologically it will feel better.

 

[bosnian_red]

No he doesn't. Kids when they're little will like to play football and like video games but generally grow up liking it more and more. I always liked United but it wasn't until I was probably 10 years old that I properly started obsessing over every game and following regularly, rather than just being a "casual fan". Unless you live around there and have a chance to go to the ground regularly, many kids won't obsess over it. It's nothing new. It's nothing different to 20 years ago. It grows with time for everyone. Even in USA or Canada, most kids before a certain age aren't necessarily die hard fans of watching any sport. They grow into it naturally. Agnelli is just talking out of his ass.

What might be a thing is the age where they obsess over it getting later, but I don't really think it's much different. Everyone is doing everything later in life, whether it's moving out, getting married or having kids. Can speak first hand from when I was in primary school and high school in Canada at least, plenty of kids liked to play football and would half follow the world cup when it came around. I was pretty much the only one in my year who watched club football regularly. Wasn't until late high school or university/college that many of the others gravitated to properly following it as well, and for them it wasn't until late primary school where they started obsessing over whatever American sports they obsessed over (whether it was NHL or the NFL).

 

[Cassidy]

Champions league viewership is steadily declining....

 

[izec]

Was always the case with most children. As someone above mentioned, football cant compete with the new internet and games. Super League wont change that. You have to change the football game and rules completely to be exciting for the kids he wants to reach, and subsequently ruin it.

He cares about the money and status for being the founder of this. A guy like him knows that as well. They created this and are looking for reasons why it may be good and desirable and now he and Perez try to convince everyone

 

[Spiersey]

The biggest issue is probably that kids are priced out of football now from a young age. It is very expensive to attend games at a decent level which will be having an effect on those who take up football. I'm sure lots of people didn't fall in love with football until they attended their first match and unfortunately it is now very hard for a lot of people to do so due to prices.

 

[VorZakone]

How about increasing the possibility of goals? Make the net bigger?

 

[Pogue Mahone]

No he doesn't. Kids when they're little will like to play football and like video games but generally grow up liking it more and more. I always liked United but it wasn't until I was probably 10 years old that I properly started obsessing over every game and following regularly, rather than just being a "casual fan". Unless you live around there and have a chance to go to the ground regularly, many kids won't obsess over it. It's nothing new. It's nothing different to 20 years ago. It grows with time for everyone. Even in USA or Canada, most kids before a certain age aren't necessarily die hard fans of watching any sport. They grow into it naturally. Agnelli is just talking out of his ass.

I think you’re wrong. It is something new. You can’t compare the distractions available to 15-20 year olds now with what was available 20 years ago. And I can tell you for a fact that it’s possible to be absolutely obsessed with United/football in general while having very little interest in watching every game they play (or even most of the games they play) I see this happening in my own house.

 

[lex talionis]

The ESL was a solution in search of a problem. And so it appears these fukks invented a problem.

There’s more than enough global interest in European football to generate more than enough wealth to satisfy the legitimate material needs of the owners of the 12 clubs who signed up for it.

I live in California and can assure everyone on the caf that soccer is wildly popular with youths here. A day never goes by without seeing several kids wearing Chelsea or United gear. Before the pandemic MLS stadiums were full and at least in the Northwest (I’m a Timbers fan and go to quite a few games and am a ST holder for our USL club) the crowd is in full voice with gobs of kids.

Soccer won’t surpass American football or basketball among the youth here, but if kids in California — a land of endless distractions — are fanatically into soccer I can’t imagine there’s a problem in Europe.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

The biggest issue is probably that kids are priced out of football now from a young age. It is very expensive to attend games at a decent level which will be having an effect on those who take up football. I'm sure lots of people didn't fall in love with football until they attended their first match and unfortunately it is now very hard for a lot of people to do so due to prices.

I’m willing to bet that the majority of football fans worldwide fell in love with the game completely independently of attending matches.

 

[SuperiorXI]

All pre and post match content is made on twitch live streams and the pundits have to respond to donations like Roy Keane having to do the worm for £3.50.

 

[SirScholes]

In an interview today, Agnelli apparently expounded on his view that football needs to change because young people can no longer relate to the format.

Agnelli insisted that new approaches were required for football to stay relevant in a world where change had been accelerated by the coronavirus pandemic. “For anyone who has children of 10, 15, 20 years old, the disaffection is more than palpable,” he argued, pointing out that closed and empty stadiums had only diminished the sport’s appeal.

“We need a competition that is able to counter what [young people] reproduce on digital platforms, transforming the virtual into the real. On [the video game] Fifa you can create your own competition; that competition needs to be brought into the real world. We overlook the effects of the competition of the various Fortnite, Call of Duty etc, authentic catalysts for the attention of the young people of today who are destined to become the spenders of tomorrow.”

I must admit that this made me reflect. I've a son who's in his early teens, plays organised football and supports United, but also spends a lot of his time on the xbox and PC. Quite often, he can't be bothered to sit through a whole United game (and not just when it's a 0-0 against WBA). But on the other hand, he was genuinely shocked by the Super League proposal.

Do you think Agnelli has a point here? If he does, the SL is obviously not the answer, so what is?

No
Everyone struggles to watch a boring 0-0
People leave games at times

the best thing about video games is you can create what doesn’t exist, the dream team, the super league.

games are also only 20 minutes long online so is that next?
games make it easy to play, that’s why there is end to end action, real life games are not like this
You’ll get boring games in the super league because it’ll be the same fixtures each season

 

[Spiersey]

I’m willing to bet that the majority of football fans worldwide fell in love with the game completely independently of attending matches.

Of course, but I'm sure a lot of the older generation did. It will definitely be having an impact to some extent.

 

[Cassidy]

Part of it is because the game has changed, become more tactical and a lot more about athleticism than skill. We no longer really have entertainers on the field or magician type players (who would now be called luxury) because they don't rack up stats...

Anyway attention span is also waning, but its not just the younger generation for me, I hear it from most of my peers, football is becoming a bit stale, too much focus on stats and less on the entertainment of the match

 

[bosnian_red]

Football is not for everyone. Never has been and in my opinion it should never be the goal of Fifa to make it so.

You don't like 0-0s? You don't like 45 minutes without a break? Football is not for you and that's fine.

Yup exactly this. People gravitate to it as they age. That age might be getting later, but unless kids go to football grounds regularly as supporters, they never liked it that much to sit and watch it for 90 minutes anyway (until a certain age).

 

[Ixion]

Do you guys not remember being 10-15 years old, trying to watch a full 90 minute game? This is not a new phenomenon. Kids haven't had amazing attention spans for 100 years then in the last 20 it has disappeared.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Of course, but I'm sure a lot of the older generation did. It will definitely be having an impact to some extent.

It will definitely impact gate receipts. Without that first match-day experience as a kid I doubt many of today’s season ticket holders would be around. I just don’t think it’s as important to the fans who only watch games on tv/online.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Do you guys not remember being 10-15 years old, trying to watch a full 90 minute game? This is not a new phenomenon. Kids haven't had amazing attention spans for 100 years then in the last 20 it has disappeared.

I watched 90 minute games all the time as a kid. On a wet Saturday afternoon if a game was on terrestrial telly there’s a good chance of there being literally nothing else to do.

Even now, as a fully grown adult, my ability to concentrate on a game for the full 90 is a lot worse than it used to be. Too many distractions.