David Owen Archives - Inside World Football

David Owen: EA Sports ‘review’ puts new question-mark over FIFA’s expansionist agenda

By David Owen

I can well imagine how much FIFA boss Gianni Infantino looks forward to my words of advice, dispensed periodically via this website. So let me dredge up another pearl: Mr president, perhaps you should consider focusing a little less on developing grandiose new revenue surges geared to ever bigger and more frequent competitions, and a little more on nurturing the revenue streams FIFA already has.

David Owen

£2.2bn – is this the cost of coronavirus for Premier League clubs?

June 5 – Brace yourselves, Premier League bosses. Extrapolating the forecast in yesterday’s Tottenham statement to gauge the possible league-wide revenue loss attributable to Covid 19, does not make pretty reading.

David Owen

David Owen: Premier League profits; the bubble has burst

June 1 – The bubble has burst. Covid-19 will not stop some Premier League clubs from turning a profit for the current season, even though it now looks set to be played out behind closed doors.

David Owen

Football club finances in the age of coronavirus

In April 1967, in an era when sports rights-holders were apt to worry about the impact of television on attendance figures, Football League chairmen in England took less than half an hour to turn down a BBC live television proposal worth a then highly respectable £781,000.

David Owen

David Owen: It’s time to accept the FA Cup for what it is, not what it once was

By David Owen

One line in Watford’s recent annual accounts jumped out at me. Explaining a near 15% increase in turnover, the strategic report said this was “mainly due to an increase in Media & Broadcasting revenue because of a higher finishing position consequently attracting increased centralised distributions from the Premier League”.

David Owen

David Owen: City Football Group – Can Snow White and the seven dwarfs become a football fairy story?

City Football Group (CFG)’s business strategy always seemed rather baffling. Yes, OK, assemble a collection of similar businesses – in this case football clubs – inside the same tent and you can shave back-office costs. You might be able to engineer a less wasteful talent development pipeline than one-legged rivals. And if the real aim is soft power, well, the Abu Dhabi flag has been well and truly planted in outposts of the beautiful game from Melbourne to Mumbai.

David Owen

Women’s World Cup viewing: chronicle of the long, lingering death of TV foretold?

FIFA TV camera

By David Owen

October 21 – Women’s football is on a roll – and more power to its elbow for that. Nonetheless, the viewing figures for this summer’s Women’s World Cup, released at the end of last week to some fanfare, deserve to be treated with a certain amount of caution.

David Owen

David Owen: Don’t bury Bury

Alistair Burt, a former Minister of the Crown, is one of those increasingly rare Conservative MPs who don’t make you feel like you have been transported to the Planet Zog when you talk or, more recently, listen to them.

David Owen

FIFA cashed-in on its problem-plagued cycle, but missed the big money opportunity

fifa

So, how were the last four years for the FIFA business? With the governing body’s 2018 financial report finally published in the wake of the Miami Council meeting, a proper analysis can now be attempted.

David Owen

The true story of World Cup viewing

FIFA TV camera

By David Owen

If there is one message to FIFA from the TV viewing figures for Russia 2018, it is that, if it wants to attract even bigger audiences, it must hope for, or somehow engineer, greater diversity in its crown jewel’s final stages.

David Owen

David Owen: Premier League club boards should enjoy the good times while they can

money flying

The good news for Premier League club owners: top-tier English football has never been more profitable. The bad news: this is probably as good as it is going to get for at least the next five years – an age in terms of media technology.

David Owen

David Owen – The 50+1 debate and why it may hold the key to the Bundesliga’s future

The Bundesliga is the top football league in Western Europe’s most populous country. Based purely on these two facts, you might expect it to generate more revenue than any other rival league worldwide.

David Owen

David Owen: European football – a cash magnet, but is the pyramid’s base starting to erode?

Rich list money

How many 19th century industries can say they have more than tripled revenues over the first 16 years of this millennium? My hunch would be only one: European club football which, according to the latest UEFA Club Licensing Benchmarking Report, generated revenues of €18.5 billion in 2016, up from €6 billion in 2000.

David Owen

How Catalonian independence might hit Barça in the pocket

It was interesting to read my colleague Andrew Warshaw’s piece this week recounting Catalán sports minister Gerard Figueras’s thoughts on where the region’s top football clubs might play should the region achieve independence.

David Owen

David Owen: Transformed bidding climate gives Garcia report the air of a relic

FIFA shadows

From the vantage-point of today, the Garcia report has something of the air of the Dead Sea Scrolls – an important relic offering vital clues about how life was lived in a bygone era.