The-Shot.Net Writers Club - Continent football scheme running into trouble

Although with the arrival of the Champions League format African club competitions have been able to increase the revenues from marketing, the gap between the rich Europe and the poor Africa has widened dramatically. It is true that a very few African clubs have developed into enterprises with relatively remarkable budget. Still this has not been thanks to globalisation of the competitions (or even 'continentalisation') but to the general progress of football in society (progressing media importance), the ideas of marketing, the technical progress (more TV stations in more interaction with the desires of the consumer), and a globalisation effect often naively referred to as to the benefit of the African clubs (at least clubs like ASEC Abidjan): player (breeding and) trading.

But one has to see this last point as a very short term benefit as it fundaments the rich-poor system between the continents for the following reasons:
- the clubs can only invest the revenue in grooming new players to sale again. They are not in any valuable competition with the 'rich' European clubs they trade the players to. They have little continuity (ASEC Abidjan has become less not more successful in the past 5 years), still they can aim at the African crown.
- the big leagues in Europe gain more and more attractivity. Their TV rights get more and more globally attractive. When for example the best 50 Ivorian players play abroad, who wants to see the Ivorian league on TV? When the 'real' ASEC Abidjan team plays in Belgium under the name of Beveren? (Beveren regularly start with 10 Ivorian players, but have even more on their squad, nearly all from the famous Abidjan academy background. Beveren are part of a resale system from the Côte d'Ivoire via Belgium to Europe)

In the same time domestic football in Africa suffers from that loss of attractivity and the consequences which come with a lack of professionalism like court debates, hooliganism, bad refereeing, confusing league planning.

The focus of all peoples, especially when experiencing football through media, have dramatically turned to Europe and the big 4 to 6 competitions: England, European Champions League, Italy, Spain, Germany, France.

In the same time the progress of pay TV has brought a little more direct revenue into the African football scenes but has a devastating second effect: to be interested in the competitions, to make them attractive beyond the participation of the hometown, one has to see it, get familiar with it, have an appreciation for the other teams. Al Ahly playing Esperance is the real event, not Al Ahly playing somebody unknown.
It has to have a cultural and a sport value, which gets rapidly lost when it is not attractively presented to the consumer in a time which sees a fundamental turn of structure: In the 20th century and before one had less distractions, pleasures, informations than one was able to consume. Today the relation has turned around: there is a competition of loads of contents for the limited time, interest and excitement of the consumer.
A value has to be build or already at the top like the World Cup (and even here it is a shame).

Hidden away in pay TV the African competitions draw little interest, might rather lose than gain attractivity, apart from the regions involved in a final. The fans in South Africa know their teams, they know the English Premier League and the European Champions League. But when Esperance Tunis arrives, the stadium will see an attendance of 1000 when lucky.
At the moment this effect is softened a lot by effects of the general rise of football but it should not be underestimated.

There hardly seems a way out of this circle as long as the actual structures of (football) globalisation deprive the poor areas from their values (the players which have emerged form a cultural context), compensated with a little cash, which quickly flows back the other way to pay the eventual product, the TV rights for the leagues in which those players play. A product that cannot be challenged on a global market anymore, because those values are gone and a protection system does not allow to compete in the same league (African clubs cannot qualify for the European Champions league, which means that the business is globalised, the sports not).

In this context the revised format of the cross continent Arab Champions League (with participants from the gulf states and North Africa) has emerged as an additional relatively attractive TV product and media attention for some Egyptian and Tunisian clubs.
But it collided with the international football calender and conflicts between the Egyptian football association and the clubs over the availability of players led to the withdrawal of Al Ahly Cairo. Meanwhile the EFA has required the clubs not to take part in next years edition, especially because of the World Cup qualifiers, what has led to an imminent protest.
The Arab champions league also puts a light on a problem in the structure of most African domestic leagues. Many domestic leagues are relatively unbalanced, often there are one to three clubs dominating, which is not helpful to becoming more competitive.
The continental competitions on the other hand end in a limited number of matches, except for those who reach the group stage, and demand high expenditures: the infrastructure is worse than in Europe, the budgets smaller, the distances larger.
The Arab champions league is something in between, something quite logical. (Apart from the fact that despite their problems in direct encounters with their Arabian neighbors, the top African clubs should have a higher standard of play)

But when it comes down on sponsor money, TV right sales etc, it is in direct competition with other football competitions, with the domestic leagues, the African continental competitions and even the competitions for National teams.
This might have alarmed the Egyptian federation (and the African confederation) even further than just the looming conflicts over players releases.
And it might open the door for other innovative ideas putting the traditional association-confederation scheme into question, threatening in the same time with a competition inflation that damaged already South American football, where competitions have been played in front of entirely empty stadiums just to gain a few dollars from some TV stations filling their program.

consult theshot for more detailed analysis, research, and innovation programs (see contact)