Department of Business Administration

School of Business and Social Science

Aarhus University

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Different brand strategies for football clubs - an international analysis

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Master Thesis

Author: Thomas Lind Thomsen

Academic Supervisor: Stephan Zielke
MSc International Business
March 2013

Abstract:
This paper will investigate different branding strategies that football clubs are using today, the main
focus in this report will be on the strategies that football brand are using today to succeed in their
business. The study will focus on the differences between the football clubs today in the different
branding strategies. The factors mentioned before and the factors that football is a leisure industry
which is often in the public mind forgotten as a business and something more emotional, therefore it
was very important to see if they clubs was being emotional invested and gambling short time on
getting the results on the field or if they were willing to work on a long strategy to get succeed in
the future both of and on the field.

Introduction: ................................................................................................................................................................. 1
Thesis questions: ..................................................................................................................................................... 1
Research focus: ........................................................................................................................................................ 2
Research methods: .................................................................................................................................................. 3
Theory ........................................................................................................................................................................... 3
General branding strategies for football clubs: ..................................................................................................... 3
Extending the sports brand: ................................................................................................................................... 4
The games quality is divided in to three different fan types: ............................................................................... 5
1.1 Figure: ............................................................................................................................................................ 6
The internationalisation of a sports team brand model: ............................................................................................ 7
Figure 1.2 ............................................................................................................................................................. 9
Methodology: ................................................................................................................................................................. 9
Web based analysis of football clubs: .......................................................................................................................... 10
Bundesliga:.............................................................................................................................................................. 10
Bayern Mnchen: ............................................................................................................................................... 10
Borussia Dortmund: ........................................................................................................................................... 11
Schalke 04: ......................................................................................................................................................... 11
Bayer Leverkusen: .............................................................................................................................................. 11
Borussia Mnchengladbach: .............................................................................................................................. 12
VFL Wolfsburg: ................................................................................................................................................. 12
Mainz 05:............................................................................................................................................................ 12
Hertha Berlin ...................................................................................................................................................... 13
FC Augsburg: ..................................................................................................................................................... 13
Hannover 96: ...................................................................................................................................................... 13
TSG 1899 Hoffenheim: ...................................................................................................................................... 14
Werder Bremen: ................................................................................................................................................. 14
VFB Stuttgart: .................................................................................................................................................... 14
Eintracht Frankfurt: ............................................................................................................................................ 15
SC Freiburg: ....................................................................................................................................................... 15
FC Nrnberg: ...................................................................................................................................................... 15
HSV: ................................................................................................................................................................... 16
Eintracht Braunschweig: .................................................................................................................................... 16
Sum up of the Bundesliga: ...................................................................................................................................... 17
Chelsea FC: ........................................................................................................................................................ 17
Arsenal FC: ........................................................................................................................................................ 17
Manchester United: ............................................................................................................................................ 18
Manchester City ................................................................................................................................................. 18

Tottenham Hotspurs ........................................................................................................................................... 19

Everton FC: ........................................................................................................................................................ 19
Liverpool FC: ..................................................................................................................................................... 20
Southampton FC: ................................................................................................................................................ 20
Newcastle United: .............................................................................................................................................. 21
West Bromwich Albion: ..................................................................................................................................... 21
Aston Villa: ......................................................................................................................................................... 21
Hull City AFC: ..................................................................................................................................................... 22
Swansea Football Club: ..................................................................................................................................... 22
Cardiff City: ........................................................................................................................................................ 22
West Ham FC:..................................................................................................................................................... 23
Stoke City: .......................................................................................................................................................... 24
Fulham FC: ......................................................................................................................................................... 24
Sunderland AFC: ................................................................................................................................................ 24
Crystal Palace Football Club: ............................................................................................................................ 25
The Danish Superliga .............................................................................................................................................. 25
FC Copenhagen: ................................................................................................................................................. 25
FCM: .................................................................................................................................................................. 26
AAB: .................................................................................................................................................................. 26
Brndby IF: ........................................................................................................................................................ 26
Randers FC: ........................................................................................................................................................ 27
FC Nordsjlland (FCN) ..................................................................................................................................... 27
OB: ..................................................................................................................................................................... 27
AGF: ................................................................................................................................................................... 27
Viborg FF: .......................................................................................................................................................... 28
FC Vestsjlland (FCV) ...................................................................................................................................... 28
Esbjerg FB: ......................................................................................................................................................... 28
Snderjyske Football Club: ................................................................................................................................ 29
Sum up: .............................................................................................................................................................. 29
In-depth analysis of selected strategies of three international clubs ................................................................ 29
Arsenal FC: ......................................................................................................................................................... 30
Figure 1.3 ........................................................................................................................................................... 33
Sum up Arsenal: ................................................................................................................................................. 35
HSV: ................................................................................................................................................................... 36
Discussion: ............................................................................................................................................................. 47
Conclusion: .................................................................................................................................................................. 50
Bibliography ................................................................................................................................................................ 52

Appendix A: The Bundesliga ........................................................................................................................................ A

Appendix B: Premier League: ........................................................................................................................................ F
Appendix C: The Danish Superliga .............................................................................................................................. N
Appendix D: .................................................................................................................................................................. Q
Appendix E: .................................................................................................................................................................. R
Appendix F: ...................................................................................................................................................................T

Introduction:

The thesis will look at the different branding strategies which the football clubs are using today to
become successful. The definition of a brand is a name, a word, a sign, a symbol, a drawing, or a
combination of these, which aims at identifying the goods and services of a company and
differentiates them from the competitors (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008, p. 30). I thought
that the subject of looking if football clubs are differanting their strategies from other clubs could be
very interesting as the internationalization of football has increased very much during the last
couple of years because of television deals that make it possible for people all around the world to
watch different football clubs. The impact of the new television deals is that the clubs have some
options in making new strategies to target many more people all around the world. I think its very
relevant to look how different branding strategies can affect the clubs and how much the clubs can
affect the brand without success within the field of play.
Football today is the most watched sport in the world which can be proved by the numbers of
viewers to the 2010 Champions Final which had more viewers than the Superbowl (BBC, 2010). I
think that football today is the biggest industry within the sporting industry and it is very important
to find out how you can affect your brand positively. I think there are still very many markets which
have not been penetrated yet and therefore it will be very important to look if the different clubs can
affect their brand and the differences between themselves.
Thesis questions:

The aim with writing this thesis is to get a deeper knowledge about how football clubs are using
different brand strategies. I think it will be very important to find out if there are big differences in
the different strategies in the market today.
The main points I will focus on in this report will be:

Which factors are affecting brand strategies?

Which different brand strategies are international football clubs using?

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How is the different strategy type related to the success in a club?

How do brand strategies differ between international and local clubs?

Are there international differences in branding strategies between football clubs?

Do the branding strategies in a football club affect the club more than the results on the
field?

Research focus:

I will in this study I will focus on football clubs in 3 different countries which will be Denmark,
Germany and Great Britain. At the first part the focus will be on all the clubs in the best divisions in
the three leagues. The main focus will in the deeper analysis be on three different clubs which will
be one from each league. I will focus on selecting clubs with different perspective according to the
internationalisation of a sports team brand model.
The brands of football clubs today are very important to protect and improves because of the
increase in wealth and dependency of sponsors and other stakeholders to compete today. The brand
value today of nr 1 and 2 is 569m Bayern Mnchen and 554m Manchester United (The
Telegraph, 2013), but compared to the worlds leading brands like Apple and Google there is still a
long way to go (Schweizer, 2013). My opinion is that in a sport which is developing its very
important to look on how you can improve the brand by which the clubs can increase the brand
value by getting more fans and more acknowledge around the world.
The findings in this thesis should improve the knowledge about what football clubs actually are
doing today and find out if the differences between the clubs are high or if they are more
standardized. I think these items will be important to know if you want to succeed because if there
are big differences from competitors on the same level it will probably be adaptable by other clubs
so then can succeed.

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Research methods:

The research methods I will use in thesis will be a more qualitative approach where I will focus on
improving the knowledge and knowhow about branding strategies in the football clubs. The
research methods in this thesis will be a blend of brand theories used by firms outside of the culture
industry and besides that I will focus very much on branding theories developed especially for
football clubs to succeed. The research methods in this thesis will be by implementing theory from
both normal branding strategies and more general sport branding strategies, the focus will also be
on trying to build the two different sets of theories together.

Theory

General branding strategies for football clubs:

The definition of a brand is a name, a word, a sign, a symbol, a drawing, or a combination of

these, which aims at identifying the goods and services of a company and differentiates them from
the competitors (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008, p. 30)

In the late 1990s Sports Managers from the various football clubs started to see the clubs as a
businesses which has today changed the focus for football clubs to also look on how to
strengthening their brands. The branding strategies for football clubs today are more modern with
similarly focus as normal cooperations. In more general terms the clubs are looking on how to
strengthen their brand today with developing and extending their brands into new lines, because the
focus need to be more deep if you want to be successful as a business (Beech & Chadwick, 2007, p.
186-187). A term which often is used in branding is the brand equity. The brand equity is how
considerably the brand name adds of value, for instance this could be how much added value does

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FC Barcelona give when you try doing branding all around the world. The four components which
are playing an essential role in strengthen your brand is:
1. Perceived quality: This are referring to the consumers opinion of the brand
2. Brand awareness: The consumers ability to remember a brand in the competitive scene the
brand is in.
3. Brand associations: The emotions and thoughts the consumer is having about the brand.
4. Brand loyalty: Brands ability to attract and keep the consumers.
188 sports brand management (Aaker, 1991)
The brand development is also being increasingly important for football clubs. As their way of
building brand equity most football clubs will do this through a model very similarly to Kellers
three steeps:
1. Choosing the elements of the brand: The sports brand will focus on how to develop the
brand, if the focus should being on changing the name, logo, colors or other marks, slogan
mascot and etc.
2. Creating marketing programs: Sports organisations can use different measures like ticket
differenation, merchandise stores in strategical important locations, sales promotions to
attract even more fans.
3. Exploiting relationships: This will be in general terms for sports brand through celebrity
spokespersons or being in tournaments like the Champions League and promote you self by
using that.
(Keller, 2003)
Extending the sports brand:

The pressure today in sports clubs to increase their turnaround and profits are pressuring the
football clubs to look towards brand extensions. The clubs are brooding their brand with a wide
selection of new products and other new services. This a way for sports clubs to enter existing or
new markets and create new profit opportunities. The football clubs are realizing their options in a
financial standpoint on how to increase their profit through branding strategies (Beech & Chadwick,

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2007, p. 194-195) but the branding strategies still have to focus on the fact that the most important
thing in a football club is their core products which are the players, coaches, the venue and the
equipment (Mullin, Hardy, & Sutton, 2000).
The products besides that will be extensions of the core part of the brand for a football club. The
consumers that the football clubs are targeting are their brand loyal fans and new fans. There is
different segmentation of the fans described in Westerbeeks book. According to the Stewart-Smith
model of sports fans there are six different fan segmentations. I will use this model to describe
which fans the clubs have and which they are targeting with their branding strategies. There are two
segments again which are dividing the 6 different fan types. The first fan types are the one who
cares about success of the club and the other one who lives for the excitement of the game.
Success of the club is divided in to three different fan types:
Passionate partisans: This is fans who are following the team no matter how it goes, the partisans
really doesnt care about how the team play as long as the win, a fan like this will always come on
the station if they are able to it.
Champ followers: This is fans that are only following clubs which are having success on the field.
They will not meet at the stadium when things are going bad, but if the clubs are having success and
are playing well they will come.
Reclusive Partisan: The reclusive partisan is very much passionate about the team, but they are not
attending games on the stadium very often.
________________________________________________________________________________
The games quality is divided in to three different fan types:

Aficionado: The aficionado fan is someone how is coming to the game to see a beautiful game with
a lot of action. Its more important to a fan like this that the game is exciting and beautiful than
how actually win the game. This fan is more loyal to the sport than any team but will regularly be at
the stadium.

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: This spectator is only happy if the game is exciting and if they can expect an exciting game they
will be at the stadium. For example FC Barcelona versus Real Madrid or Manchester United against
Liverpool. Sometimes these fans are at the stadium, but they have no preferences of the team there
are playing.
Theatregoers casual: The same preferences as the theatregoers. Committed but the differences are
that they are watching fewer games than the theatregoers committed. (Westerbeek & Smith, 2003,
p. 71-75)

1.1 Figure: Stewart-Smith model of sports fans. Page 75 Hans Westerbeek

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These segmentations of the fans is an important tool in the brand strategies, because the clubs now
have an easier tool to target their fans with different marketing strategies, which then will affect the
brand value positive and increase the brand value.
________________________________________________________________________________
The internationalisation of a sports team brand model:

This framework can identify where they clubs are using their brand right now and how they can
developed it. There are 4 different set of theories for football clubs and these are relevant brand
reputation strategy (Think local, act global), brand affinity (Think local, act global), brand
challenger (Think local, act global), brand conquistador (Unifying local brands) (Richelieu, Lopez,
& Desbordes, 2008, p. 35). The three out of four strategies mostly focus on going from thinking on
your local market but making a more global strategy this is an approach which is easier to use for
the clubs when they are internationalizing their football club.
Brand reputation: Football clubs can often use the success brand which they have had in their own
country to be positive when entering new countries. The internationalisation strategy will be done
over longer time so they can build up the market (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008, p. 36-37).
Brand affinity: The Company will select a method where they will be offering unique experience to
their fans, it will as the last one is a gradually offering more and more experience so that their fan
base will increase. The football clubs will be offering brand communities to the fan clubs etc. which
will make the fan club feel a closer bond and make it easier to make an emotional tie to the football
club (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008, p. 36-37).
Brand challenger: Brand recognition is very important for a company, but is very expensive in
commercials etc. if you not are the leader on the market. Therefore its very important to try and
show the strengths you have towards your competitors. The technique football clubs are using to get
brand recognition is trips around the globe in the offseason at which time they play games and
investing in the big stars to have them play at their team (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008, p.
36-37).

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Brand conquistador: The brand conquistador is very much used in football today. This is done by
working together with other clubs all over the world and there are many examples like FC
Barcelona who has a Barcelona club in Argentina as well. We have also Red Bull Salzburg
RasenBall Leipzig and Red Bull New York (Red Bull) who also are working together because of
the same owner (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008, p. 36-37). Its the same we have with the
marketing alliances between Manchester United and the New York Yankees (Westerbeek & Smith,
2003, p. 35).
Stages of internationalisation of the brand:
From a local to a regional brand The most important thing here is to built the preferences for the
brand around in the near region which can be done by working together with small clubs in the
regions a create a coorporation where everybody support the big club of the region.
From a regional to a national brand Here its very important to increase the brand recognition.
This can be done by national strategic alliances with other clubs etc. and buying national
starplayers. The starplayers brand then will increase the brand regionition of your own club.
From a national to a international brand Hiring international stars to the club instead only having
national players, making trips around the world so more people are getting closer to the club and
building a more emotional feeling about the club. You can also do small things like putting up your
website in different languages, making international folders when people are coming to the game
etc.
(Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008, p. 38)

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Figure 1.2

Methodology:

The research in this paper is divided into three parts.

The first part was to do a web analysis of the football clubs and this will be done by focusing on all
the information. First the information will be gathered together from Facebook, own webpages and
etc.
The second part will be done by dong a research of three clubs, the focus will be on three clubs they
are focusing on different strategies.

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The third part will be done by doing a final review of the results in part one and two on how they
club are managing their strategy.

Web based analysis of football clubs:

The thesis has a focus towards a more international focus than a national focus why I have selected
3 different leagues from three different countries. The focus will be on the Bundesliga in
Germany, The Premier League in Britain and Superligaen in Denmark. The web based analysis
focus on simple thing to differ the clubs in the The internationalisation of a sports team brand
model. The differences will be focusing on 3 different factors:
1. Facebook followers
2. International sponsors
3. Different language on the website
Theses 3 parameters will make it easier to sort the clubs into the 4 different stages in the model
which is local, regional, national and international (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008).

Bundesliga:

Bayern Mnchen:

Bayern Mnchen is the biggest club in Germany according to follower fans on Facebook. At the
moment they have around 9.6 million followers (Appendix A). The population in the city of
Mnich today is 1.185.400 so this shows that the interest of Bayern Mnichs brand is much bigger
than only local and regional fans (Appendix A). Some of the sponsors of Bayern Mnchen are big
international companies like Adidas, T-Mobile and Audi. Besides having big sponsors Bayern
Mnchen is also the most valuable football brand in the world today. These intangibles show that

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Bayern Mnchen is in the internationalisation stage with their brand (Richelieu, Lopez, &
Desbordes, 2008) (Marketing Week, 2013) (Bayern Mnchen).

Borussia Dortmund:

Today Borussia Dortmund has around 5.2 million follower fans on Facebook. The population of
the city of Dortmund today is 587.600 (Appendix). The focus of the club today is to be an honest
and a local team for the region of Ruhr and that the region can be proud of and want to support their
team (Bchler & Jrke, 2012). The language on the website is Japanese, English and German and
with international sponsors like Huawei and Trkish Airlines (Appendix A), but still the focus of
Borussia Dortmund is much more on a national focus with their brand (Borussia Dortmund).

Schalke 04:

Today Schalke 04 has around 1.8 million followers on Facebook. The population of the city is
276.200 (Appendix A) and this shows that interest of the club is more than only for the city of
Schalke. The biggest sponsors in Schalke 04 are Gazprom, Veltins and Adidas (Appendix A), the
language possibilities on the webpage is German, English, Russian and Japanese (Appendix A). The
focus of Schalke 04 brand is more a national focus (Schalke 04).

Bayer Leverkusen:

Today Bayer Leverkusen has around 300.000 followers on Facebook. The population of the city of
Leverkusen is 161.700 (Appendix A). The biggest sponsors are a blend of big international
companies like FujiFilm and regional companies like Sparkasse Leverkusen (Appendix A). The

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languages on the website are English and German (Bayer Leverkusen). The focuses of their brand
are more national (B04 Marketing).

Borussia Mnchengladbach:

Borussia Mnchengladbach has around 313.000 follower fans on Facebook. The population of
the city is 264.400 (Appendix A). The language possibilities on the webpage are Spanish, English
and German. Besides The Bank of Santander the sponsors are national German companies
(Borussia Mnchengladbach). The focus the club has today is a more regional focus where they are
targeting the regional fans with their brand.

VFL Wolfsburg:

VFL Wolfsburg has around 201.000 follower fans on Facebook and the population of the city of
Wolfsburg is 119.300 (Appendix A). Language on their website is German and English (VFL
Wolfsburg). Sponsors in Wolfsburg are both national and international companies like Volkswagen,
Cashpoint, Castrol, Adidas and Panasonic (Appendix A). Volkswagen is the main sponsors in
Wolfsburg and the focus is both locally and nationally for both of them because Volkswagen is
located in Wolfsburg (Volkswagen). The focus of the club is more regional focus with their brand.

Mainz 05:

Mainz 05 has around 100.000 follower fans on Facebook and the population of the city is 186.700
(Appendix A). The regular sponsors in Mainz and not the shirt sponsor Nike is very much medium
sized German companies (1. FSV Mainz 05). The language possibilities on the webpage are

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English and German (Appendix A). Mainz is a small club with medium sponsors and there are a lot
fewer followers of the club than people living in the city. Mainz is branding with a very local focus.

Hertha Berlin

Hertha Berlin has around 182.000 followers fans on Facebook and the population of Berlin is
3.275.000 (Appendix A). The language possibilities on the website are English, German and Polish
(Hertha Berlin). Some of the sponsors in Hertha Berlin are Deutsche Bahn, Nike, Audi, Cashpoint,
Coca Cola, Warsteiner, and Berliner Volksbank. This shows that even though Hertha Berlin are
focusing locally, big companies like Coca Cola are interested in your brand when the local market
is Berlin which is the capital city of Germany.. The brand of Hertha Berlin is not a regional brand
but more a local brand.

FC Augsburg:

FC Augsburg has around 111.000 follower fans on Facebook and the population of the city
Augsburg is 253.800 (Appendix A). The language option on FC Augsburgs website seems to be a
thing which is not interesting to the club because the only option is German (FC Augsburg). The
sponsors in FC Augsburg are also only German companies like AL-KO, Jako, SGL Group, LEW
(FC Augsburg). The focus of FC Augsburg brand is a local focus.

Hannover 96:

Hannover 96 has around 247.000 follower fans on Facebook and the population of the city
Hannover is 516.300 (Appendix A). AS language possibilities on the website Hannover has English
and German (Hannover 96). At the moment the Hannover 96 sponsors are TUI, Jako, Volkswagen,

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NDR 2, and Continental (Hannover 96). Sponsors and number of followers shows that the brand of
Hannover 96 is a regional brand right now in the model.

TSG 1899 Hoffenheim:

TSG 1899 Hoffenheim has around 106.390 follower fans on Facebook and the population of the
city Hoffenheim is 3.000 (Appendix A). Hoffenheim has two different language possibilities,
English and German. The sponsors that TSG Hoffenheim has are very international companies like
Audi, Coca Cola, SAP, Wirsol and Puma (TSG 1899 Hoffenheim). SAP is of course sponsor
because of the owner of Hoffenheim, Dietmar Hopp also is the owner of SAP (Forbes). The focus
of Hoffenheim cant be local because of the city limit and therefore the focus is more of the region
of Mannheim which their brand is focusing on.

Werder Bremen:

Werder Bremen has around 685.000 follower fans on Facebook and the population of the city
Bremen is 527.900 (Appendix A). The language possibilities on the website are both English and
German. Today the sponsors in Werder Bremen are Wiesenhof, TargoBank, Nike, Volkswagen,
Coca Cola and AbInBev (Werder Bremen) which shows that many very big international
companies are having an interest in the brand of Werder Bremen. The brand Werder Bremen
football club is a national brand in Germany.

VFB Stuttgart:

Today VFB Stuttgart has around 363.000 follower fans on Facebook. The population of the city
Stuttgart is 581.100 (Appendix A). You can read the webpage of VFB Stuttgart in the German and

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the English language. The sponsors of VFB Stuttgart today are Mercedes Benz, Krombacher, Puma,
EnBw and Fanuc (VFB Stuttgart 1893) which shows that big German companies has a interested in
be associated with the brand of VFB Stuttgart. The brand of VFB Stuttgart is today a regional brand
in Germany.

Eintracht Frankfurt:

Eintracht Frankfurt has today around 295.000 followers fans on Facebook and the population of
the city Frankfurt is 648.000 (Appendix A). The languages on the website are both German and
English. The sponsors of Eintracht Frankfurt today are Alfa Romeo, DB, Jako, Krombacher and
Fraport. Eintracht Frankfurt has many German sponsors besides the Italian car company Alfa
Romeo (Eintracht Frankfurt). The brand of Eintracht Frankfurt is a very local brand with is
focusing on the city of Frankfurt.

SC Freiburg:

SC Freiburg has today around 124.000 follower fans on Facebook and the population of the city
Freiburg is 206.300 (Appendix A). Today the only language on the website of SC Freiburg is
German (SC Freiburg). The sponsors of SC Freiburg are Ehrmann, Europa Park, Mage Solar, Nike,
Opel, Rafi, Rothaus and Tipico (SC Freiburg). All the sponsors apart from Nike and Opel are
normal medium German companies. The focus of the SC Freiburg brand is very local and that is
shown by different factors like few followers compared to city size and language on website.

FC Nrnberg:

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Today FC Nrnberg has around 231.000 followers fans on Facebook and the population of the
city Nrnberg is 486.700 (Appendix A). The languages on the website of FC Nrnberg are German
and English (1. FC Nrnberg). Today FC Nrnberg has the following sponsors NKD, Adidas, Audi,
Lotto Bayern, Grundig, Whrl, Thomas Sabo, PSD Bank, N-Ergie and Kulmbacher (1. FC
Nrnberg). The sponsors in FC Nrnberg are a very much divided bunch of both international and
national companies. The focus of FC Nrnbergs brand is local brands which are focusing on the city
of FC Nrnberg.

HSV:

HSV has around 582.000 followers on Facebook and the population of the city Hamburg today is
1.686.100 (Appendix A). The possible languages on the website are both English and German
(Hamburger SV). The biggest sponsors in Hamburg SV are Emirates, Adidas, Imtech, Sparda Bank,
T-Mobile, Holstein, Grand Elysee Hamburg, NDR 2, Tipico and Cewe-print.de. The sponsors are a
blend of Hamburg companies and big German companies and international big companies like
Emirates which is the main sponsor (Hamburger SV). The focus of HSV is towards Hamburg and
therefore local, but the local focus for HSV on Hamburg is not a bad idea because of the population
in Hamburg.

Eintracht Braunschweig:

Eintracht Braunschweig has today around 104.000 followers on Facebook and the population of
Braunschweig is 243.700 (Appendix A). The languages on the website are both English and
German. The sponsors in Eintracht Braunschweig are Seat, Nike, Volkswagen Financial Service,
BS Energy, Staake and Wolters Pilsner (Eintracht Braunschweig). This is many German sponsors in
the football club and therefore the focuses are more towards a local focus on Braunschweig. The
focus of Eintracht Braunschweig is very much on being a local brand.

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Sum up of the Bundesliga:

The Bundesliga seems to be a league with many clubs focusing very much on their local
environment instead of using the international market. The clubs are not thinking very international
because they are not offering very many different languages besides English and German. This
means the German club maybe not will fulfill their total brand potential.

________________________________________________________________________________

Premier League:
Chelsea FC:

At this moment Chelsea FC has around 19 million follower fans on Facebook and the city of
London where Chelsea FC is located has a population of 7.074.265 (Appendix B). Chelsea is
offering a big deal of different languages on their website English, Chinese, Japanese, South
Korean, Indonesian, Russian and Thai (Chelsea FC) which shows they target very many different
markets. Chelsea uses their players as brand ambassadors. As an example we can see that the club is
using their players to attract new sponsors (Brand ambassadors Chelsea FC). The biggest sponsors
in Chelsea FC is today Adidas and Samsung which are big international companies (Chelsea FC).
With these factors in mind Chelsea FC brand is an international brand.

Arsenal FC:

Arsenal FC has around 16 million followers fans on their Facebook page and Arsenal FC is
located in the city of London where the population is 7.074.265 (Appendix B). The language
possibilities on the webpage are Chinese, American, British, South Korean and Japanese (Arsenal

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FC). Arsenal FC is trying to work their brand in to a corporation together with strong partners. This
could for example be working together with their sponsors like Nike and Emirates (Barnett &
Michael, 2013) (Arsenal FC). Arsenal is trying to be a club which is more focused on close
relationships with their fans and in that way they can get more partisan fans who follows Arsenal no
matter how it works out on the pitch (Westerbeek & Smith, 2003 p 71-75) (Barnett & Michael,
2013).

Manchester United:

Manchester United has around 37 million followers fans on their Facebook page and Manchester
United is located in the city of Manchester where the population is 430.818 (Appendix B). The
language possibilities you have on Manchester Uniteds homepage are English, French, Spanish,
Arabic, Chinese, Japanese and South Korean (Manchester United). Manchester United is the
worlds second biggest football in brand value (The Telegraph, 2013) and their strategy is also to
increase their brand interest by opening stores in Singapore, Macau, Thailand and India (Strategy
Manchester United).

AON and Nike are the biggest sponsors in Manchester United today

(Manchester United). Manchester United is defiantly a club which is acting both international and is
international.

Manchester City

Manchester City has around 7 million follower fans on their Facebook page and the city of
Manchester population is 430.818 (Appendix B). Manchester City is offering a wide range of
different language possibilities on their own homepage such as English, French, Arabic, Chinese,
Indonesian, Japanese, South Korean, Portuguese, Spanish, Malayan, Russian and Thai (Manchester
City) which clearly shows that Manchester City is trying to act international by offering a wide
range of languages. Manchester City has a very international squad why a lot of people can relate to
the squad (Players Manchester City) and by having these many nationalities the club can also
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increase their brand awareness. The owner of Manchester City comments on the value of having
loyal fans (Partisans) The fans are the heart and soul of this club, that's one of the most rewarding
aspects of being involved with Manchester City. The owner of Manchester City is Sheikh Mansour
Bin Zayed Al Nahyan (Manchester City). Manchester is an international brand.

Tottenham Hotspurs

Tottenham Hotspurs has around 3 million follower fans on Facebook and the population of the
city of London where Tottenham Hotspurs is located is 7.074.265 (Appendix B). The language on
the website of Tottenham Hotspurs is only English (Tottenham Hotspurs) which is showing that the
club is acting very national and that is their focus. The sponsors in Tottenham Hotspurs are Hewlett
Packard, AIA and Under Armour (Tottenham Hotspurs). Tottenham Hotspurs wants their brand to
be associated with flair, style and adventure according to executive director Charlie Wijeratna
(Tottenham Hotspurs). Tottenham is today a national brand and their focus is mostly on Britain.

Everton FC:

Today Everton FC has around 460.000 follower fans on Facebook and the population of the city
of Liverpool where Everton FC is located is 467.995 (Appendix B). The language possibilities on
Everton FC homepage is English and Thai and the sponsors in Everton FC today is also a Thai
international company Chang Beer who is a part of Thai Brewery (Everton FC). Everton has a Latin
slogan, 'Nil Satis Nisi Optimum' (nothing but the best is good enough'), which they are using
according to their brand (Sinclair & Mark, 2013). This should shows the values which is admired
in Everton FC on the field. Everton is trying to move from a more national focus towards an
international focus with a new sponsor like Nike who has international recognition (Joseph &
Sebastian, 2012). The focus of Everton is still mostly a national focus but they are trying to move
towards the international focus.

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Liverpool FC:

Liverpool FC has around 13 million follower fans on their Facebook page and the population of
the city of Liverpool is 467.995 (Appendix B). The language possibilities on their webpage is
Arabic, Australian, Bangladeshis, Brazilian, Chinese, English, French, Greek, Indian, Indonesian,
Malayan, New Zealand, Norwegian, Pakistani, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, South African, Thai,
Turkish and American (Liverpool FC). This shows that Liverpool FC has a very international focus
with very many different languages on their website. Sponsors in Liverpool FC are Standard
Chartered, Carlsberg and Warrior (Liverpool FC). The last couple of years Liverpool FC have made
brand association with different companies to increase the brand awareness. An example is a
corporation at the independent day of Bangladesh where the club together with the biggest mobile
provider Rabi wished A happy independent day to the people of Bangladesh (Rogers & Paul,
2013). Liverpool is acting global as Paul Rogers admits but they are thinking locally (Rogers &
Paul, 2013).

Southampton FC:

Southampton FC has around 100.000 follower fans on Facebook and the population of the city of
Southampton is 214.859 (Appendix B). The language on their website is only English
(Southampton FC) which limits the possible market place Southampton can use their brand in. The
biggest sponsors in Southampton today are aap3 , Carling and Adidas. Julius Duncan (media
relations and marketing, and creating an integrated comments approach to develop the brand both
domestically and internationally) There is huge potential to use digital and social media alongside
traditional channels to communicate the clubs story both domestically and globally.
(Southampton FC).

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Newcastle United:

Newcastle United has around 530.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the city of Newcastle has
a population of 282.338 (Appendix B). The only language you find on the homepage of Newcastle
United is English (Appendix B). Three of the biggest sponsors in Newcastle United are foreign
companies like Electronic Arts, Volkswagen and Puma (Newcastle FC) which shows that the
interest for Newcastle is not national. Sponsoring Newcastle United will give a company media
attention: Newcastle United FC is constantly in the media spotlight allows sponsors to reach as
wide an audience as possible, through many markets (Newcastle commercial). This quote shows
that Newcastle is targeting a global market and by doing that they are acting international.

West Bromwich Albion:

West Bromwich Albion has around 105.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the city of
Birmingham where West Bromwich is located has a population of roughly 1.020.589 persons
(Appendix B). The language on their website is only English (West Bromwich Albion) which
shows that WBA is focusing more locally than internationally. Some of the sponsors in WBA are
Adidas, Carlsberg and Asian Gaming Partner (West Bromwich Albion). The focus for WBA is a
local focus especially at the nearby area.

Aston Villa:

Aston Villa has around 1.4 million followers, fans, on Facebook and the city of Birmingham has
around 1.020.589 in population (Appendix B). The only possible language on the website of Aston
Villa is English (Aston Villa). At the moment some of the sponsors in Aston Villa are Dafabet
Asian online betting, Macron Italian jersey maker, Fiat, Carlsberg and Turkish Airlines (Aston

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Villa) which all are international companies and this shows that there is an interest for Aston Villa
internationally. The focus for Aston Villa is more of a national thinking in and a regional focus.
Hull City AFC:

Hull City has around 190.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population of the city of Hull
is 266.775 (Appendix B). The language on the website of Hull is only English (Hull City) and
therefore Hull City will have harder job if they want to have a global focus. The sponsors to Hull
City AFC are mostly locally English companies (Appendix B) (Hull City) why they fits very well
to the identity of Hull City. Hull City is thinking both locally and acting locally.

Swansea Football Club:

Swansea football club has around 205.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population of the
city of Swansea is 230.180 (Appendix B). The language on the website of Swansea is English and
the sponsors in Swansea Football Club today are Adidas, LG G2, GWFX.com and Carlsberg
(Swansea City). The focus for Swansea is moving towards more international sponsors and
therefore Swansea has moved from regional a focus towards a more international way of thinking.
Swansea City has become a global brand over the last 24 months and this agreement will only
help to boost the clubs current appeal Swansea City Vice-Chairman, Leigh Dineen (Swansea
City).

Cardiff City:

Cardiff City has around 145.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population of Cardiff is
315.040 (Appendix B). The only language possibilities on the website are English on Cardiffs
homepage and some of the biggest sponsors in Cardiff today are Visit Malaysia and Puma (Cardiff
City). The sponsorship for Visit Malaysia is not because of the international acting by the club but
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because of the Malaysian owner Vincent Tan (Duerden & John, 2014). Cardiff has also changed
their logo and color of the jerseys over the last year and risked of alienating their fans (Bodger &
Adam, 2013). In spite of all these factors the focus of Cardiff is mostly locally to rebuild their club.

Norwich City:

Norwich City has around 127.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population of the city of
Norwich is 126.221 (Appendix B). The only language on the website is English (Norwich City) and
this make the focus more on Britain and other English speaking countries. Some of the sponsors in
Norwich City today are Avica British, a multinational insurance company, Errea Sport from Italy
who is producing jerseys, Lotus and Molson Coors (Norwich City). Norwich City wants to learn
from the NBA clubs how to increase their brand identity, brand awareness and at the end the brand
value In a statement of intent the club says the partnership is not only to raise the profile of the
club around the world, but also to monetize the Canaries, as the club is known, brand (Joseph &
Sebastian, Marketing Week, 2012 Norwich). Norwich is a local thinking football club trying to
move towards both regional and national quickly and use the global market in the end.

West Ham FC:

West Ham FC has around 385.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population of the city of
London where West Ham FC is located is around 7.074.265 (Appendix B). The language available
on the website is English (West Ham United). The sponsors that West Ham United has today are
companies like Adidas and B365 (West Ham United). West Ham United is a club who will develop
their brand with a new stadium which is going to be opened within two years (Olympic stadium).
West Ham also has hired Arsenals former marketing director to help develop their brand in order to
optimize their commercial opportunities in the Premier League (Eleftheriou-Smith, 2013). At the
moment West Ham is a club which is focusing local.

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Stoke City:

Stoke City has around 112.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population in the city of
Stoke where Stoke City is located is 254.438 (Appendix B). The only language you can use to read
the news at their webpage is English (Stoke City). The sponsors in Stoke City are for example
Bet365 which is also owned by the owner of Stoke Peter Coates (Conn, 2011). Besides Bet365
other sponsors in Stoke City is Carlsberg and Novus (Stoke City). The focus for Stoke City is both
local and acting locally to attract the local area.

Fulham FC:

Fulham City has around 345.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and Fulham FC is located in the
city of London where the population is 7.074.265 (Appendix B). The language on the website is
only offered in English (Fulham FC). Some of the sponsors today of Fulham FC are Maraton Bet,
Adidas, Stanley, American Airlines, Brother at your side, Carslberg and Jack Wolfskin (Fulham
FC). Fulham is focusing very much on the American market after the new owner Shadid Khan, an
American business owner, bought Fulham FC and the focus today is much more global than it was
earlier (Prince-Wright, 2013).

Sunderland AFC:

Sunderland AFC has today around 125.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population in
the city of Sunderland where Sunderland AFC is located is 294.261 (Appendix B). The language
offered on the website is only English (Sunderland AFC). The sponsors that Sunderland AFC has
today are Bidvest, Adidas, Strongbow, StudHub, BetButler, TLC88.com, Tanzania Tourist Board,
South African Airways and NipMan (Sunderland AFC). This shows that Sunderland is a club which
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many international companies are interested in and the interest for Sunderland could also be
affected by the international diversity of the player squad in Sunderland AFC (Sunderland AFC).
The focus for Sunderland AFC is to be of interest to the international market.

Crystal Palace Football Club:

Crystal Palace has around 40.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and Crystal Palace is located in
the city of London where the population is around 7.074.265. Crystal Palace website is only
offering English as the language on their website (Crystal Palace). The sponsors to Crystal Palace
today are Farr Vintners, Holler Watches, 12Bet.com and gac.com (Crystal Palace). Crystal Palace is
a small club focused very much on keeping their hardcore partisan (Westerbeek & Smith, 2003
P.75) crowd because the club then can expect to keep hold of their fans.
________________________________________________________________________________

The Danish Superliga

FC Copenhagen:

FC Copenhagen has around 150.000 followers, fans on Facebook, and the population of the city
Copenhagen where FC Copenhagen is located is 559.440 (Appendix C). The language on the
webpage is both English and of course Danish (FC Copenhagen). All the sponsors FC Copenhagen
currently has are Danish companies. FC Copenhagen is focusing very much on the local area with
their slogan The citys team (Erin-Madsen) which shows that the focus primarily is on being the
team of Copenhagen.

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FCM:

FCM has around 11.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population of the city Herning
where FCM is located is 86.595 (Appendix C). The language on the website is only Danish which
shows that focus is on Denmark (FCM). Some of the sponsors in FCM today are Falk Laurtisen,
Stark, Bravo Tours, JBS, Handelsbanken and Faxi Kondi (FCM). The name of FCM stands for
Football Club Midtjylland which clearly shows that they are trying to focus on the regional area of
Midtjylland as their main focus (FCM).

AAB:

AAB has around 27.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population in the city of Aalborg
where AAB is located is 203.448 (Appendix C). The language on the website is only Danish which
shows that focus is only on Denmark (AAB Sport). Some of the sponsors in Aalborg are Faxe
Kondi, Adidas, Spar Nord and Nordjyske which is mostly regional companies (AAB Sport). The
focus for AAB is to be Aalborg the city of Aalborgs football club and therefore the focus is local.

Brndby IF:

Brndby IF has around 95.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population of the city
Brndby where Brndby IF is located is 34.210 (Appendix C). Brndby has the language of Danish
and English and little bit of German on their webpage (Brndby IF). The sponsors in Brndby are
Hummel, Carlsberg, Danica Pension, Danske Bank, Danske Spil, Friis Rengring og
Vinduepolering ApS, Loxam A/S who all is pretty big national Danish companies (Brndby IF).
Brndby IF is known as all of Denmarks team through successful branding in the 90s (Brndby
IF) and therefore the focus for Brndby is a national focus.

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Randers FC:

Randers FC has around 17.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population in the city of
Randers where Randers FC is located is 96.007 (Appendix C). The language on the website is in
Danish but the weekly letters is also written in English (Randers FC). Some of the biggest sponsors
in Randers FC are Auto C, Sparekassen Kronjylland and Verdo which is very regional sponsors
(Randers FC). The focus for Randers is on the region around Randers.

FC Nordsjlland (FCN)

FCN has around 16.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population in the city of Farum
where FCN is located is 38.236 (Appendix C). The language on the website of FCN is both English
and Danish (FCN). Some of the biggest sponsors in FCN today are Arbejdernes Landsbank, City
Container, Diadora, Faxe Kondi and Norrecco (FCN). This is a team which, by their name, is trying
to identify on their focus which with this name is a regional focus of the northern part of Zealand.

OB:

Odense football club has around 35.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population in the
city of Odense where OB is located is 193.370 (Appendix C). The language on the website is
Danish and therefore the focus is more national (OB). Some of the sponsors in OB are Carlsberg
and Puma (OB) which both are big companies. The focus for OB is to be all of the Funens team
(The islands team).

AGF:

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Aarhus Gymnastic Association has around 36.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the
population of Aarhus where AGF is located is 319.094 (Appendix C). The language on the website
is Danish and therefore the focus is national (AGF). Some of the sponsors in AGF are Hummel,
Krifa, Optimera, NRGI, Yousee, Faxi Kondi and Arbejdernes Landsbank (AGF). Aarhus is
branding themselves as the football club of city (AGF concert).

Viborg FF:

Viborg FF has around 6.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population of the city of
Viborg where Viborg FF is located is 94.333 (Appendix C). The language on their website is only
Danish (Viborg FF). The biggest sponsors in Viborg FF are Peter Larsen Kaffe, Viborg Stifts
Folkeblad, Designa, Frugt Karl, Danske Andelskasser Bank and Kappa (Viborg FF). Most of the
sponsors are local which shows that the focus of Viborg is a local focus with their brand.

FC Vestsjlland (FCV)

FCV has around 9.000 followers, fans, on Facebook and the population of the city of Slagelse
where FCV is located in is 77.167 (Appendix C). The language on their website is only Danish
(FCV). The biggest sponsors in FCV are Harboe, GES, Seas-NVE, Sparekassen Sjlland and
Videra (FCV). The focus for FCV is showed both with regional sponsors in the western part of
Zealand and with the name of the club which is Football Club of Western Zealand.

Esbjerg FB:

Esbjerg FB has around 23.000 followers, fans, on their Facebook and the city of Esbjerg where
Esbjerg FB is located is 115.051 (Appendix C). The language on the website is only Danish and

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therefore the focus is on only Denmark (EFB). Some of the biggest sponsors in Esbjerg FB are
South Energy (SE), Blue Water Shipping, Nike, Det Faglige Hus and Sportigan (EFB). The focus
for Esbjerg FB is in the area around Esbjerg.

Snderjyske Football Club:

Snderjyske Football Club has around 4.500 followers, fans, on their Facebook page and the city
of Haderslev where Snderjyske is located is 56.051 (Snderjyske). The language on the website is
only Danish (Snderjyske). Some of the biggest sponsors in Snderjyske are Fros, Davidsen and
Diadora (Snderjyske). The focus for Snderjyske is very much on the area where they are located
which the area of Sonderjylland is.

Sum up:

The Danish clubs are very focused on a regional focus instead of national, which is shown by the
fact that you have a tendency in the Danish clubs only to use your brand in small areas like locally
or regionally because its the easiest way of doing things.

________________________________________________________________________________

In-depth analysis of selected strategies of three international clubs

I have selected to do an analysis of three different clubs and therefore I will select one club from
each country and doing a deep analysis of their branding strategy. I will select the clubs according
to the brand model internationalization of sports brands (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008).

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The analysis will be done with one club there are focusing locally which will be HSV in Germany. I
will select FCM from Denmark to see their regional branding strategy. The international thinking
brand will be Arsenal from Britain.

Arsenal FC:

The branding strategy in Arsenal FC I will start with by looking on brand awareness, brand
positioning, brand elements, brand equity and secondary association. Brand awareness consists of
brand recognition and brand recall performances. Brand recognition is related to peoples ability to
remember your brand when they are hearing the name. Brand recall is more about remembering the
brand name after hearing about the industry (Keller K. L., Conceptualizing, Measuring, and
Managing Customer-Based Brand Equity, 1993).
Arsenal FC has around 17 million followers on Facebook and the gap to the main leader in Britain
on brand value Manchester United is still big, Manchester United has today around 37 million
followers (Appendix B). Arsenal is very happy with the brand awareness today, but they will like to
increase they global awareness into success economically (White, 2011). The mental map (Keller
K. L., Strategic Brand Management, 2008 Chapter 4) in figure 1.3 shows the way people are
thinking about Arsenal today, that its a club with for example a positive way to play football in and
still can maintain off the field and on the field success.
The logo of Arsenal FC is because of the history of Woolwich where Arsenal FC was from and the
area was known for a long military history and therefor it was one of the reasons behind the cannon
that Arsenal FC has today, the logo has changed from earlier being 3 big cannons with a dog face
on it. One of the older things they have done today is putting 15 laurel leaves to honor the 15 people
how started the club in 1886 (Marketing Arsenal).
The old slogan that Arsenal FC had in many years was changed in 2011. The old slogan was in
Latin Victoria Concordia Crescit which meant victory comes from harmony and was very much
appreciated from the fans (Mount, 2011). The new slogan Forward should also relate to the logo

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with battle and moving forward and winning together, Arsenal FC has chosen has a slogan there is
built very much more together with their logo (Mount, 2011).
With the brand positioning for Arsenal FC the focus will be on their main target consumers, main
competitors, the brands similarities to their competitors and how the brand can differentiate from
their competitors (Keller K. L., Strategic Brand Management, 2008 Chapter 2). The main target
consumer for Arsenal FC today is the fans outside of the stadium because they with getting extra
revenues outside of the stadium their would be less presure on earning money on match day
(White, 2011).
The main competitors for Arsenal FC today is clubs like Manchester City, Manchester United,
Liverpool and Chelsea FC because of the interst for the clubs are very high and they are all fighting
to gain the international marketshares (Appendix B). The similarity with the clubs that they are
competting with is for example that they all have tv channels, the clubs that for example haves tv
channels today are Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal (Arsenal FC) (Liverpool
FC) (Manchester United) (Chelsea FC). Easier access to the fans through your own media (BT
Sport). The same coach in many years has made the positive football a standing vision in Arsenal
FC and therefore they can attract with stability and you know what you can expect (White, 2011).
The secondary assocaitions that Arsenal FC has today are often partnerships with their sponsors for
example as Huawei which will offer exclusive phone deals and other things under the football
games so that interst can increase for the brand of Huawei. The main thing for Arsenal will be to
earn money on a big deal and increase the knowledge of the club of Arsenal FC in China (Bastin,
2014). Channels of distrubution of Arsenal FC is both through their own television which is made
together with BT Sport (BT Sport), other channels is their own webpage where Arsenal FC can
come with their own messeages without going through a filter of journalists (Arsenal FC).
The events that Arsenal FC has today are mostly game day where people are coming to the game
and getting a big experience of watching Arsenals players playing. Other events is when they are
travelling around in Asia and other places in the world to increase the brand awarness and make
people being intersted in being fans.

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The brand assets in Arsenal is the squad which is divided into 4 different chains where you have the
goalies, defenders, midtfielders and forwardes. Arsenals FC first squad is a very wide range of
different nationalities with 11 different nationalities on 28 different players. The average age of the
squad of Arsenal FC is 25.86 which is very positive for Arsenals future because that is a very
young average age for a squad (Appendix E). The valuation of the squad in Arsenal today are 335
million and is valued as the fourth most valuable squad in the Premier League
(Transfermarkt.co.uk).
The brand equity will be looked at through different points I have already focused on. The brand
loyalty (Bech, 2012) seems to be very high in Arsenal, some of the point that can affect a high
loyalty is that the lower prices on the stadium which Arsenal is focusing on (White, 2011) and
besides that Arsenal FC has very many passionate partisans fans which will follow the teams no
matter how it goes, these fans are very attractive for the club because they will always pay for
coming on the stadium and therefore give income to the business Arsenal FC (Westerbeek & Smith,
2003 P 67).
Other areas that Arsenal can focus of on fans to increase brand equity is by playing exciting football
as Wenger prefers, this will then attract more aficionado fans which are more thinking about how
exciting the game are (Westerbeek & Smith, 2003 P 67). The brand awareness as desribed earlier is
very high and this is also very positive for the brand equity for Arsenal FC. The perceived quality of
the game that people are watching are a high level of football which is very exciting to watch
(White, 2011).
The brand associations is very positive for Arsenal because they have increased as Stan Kroenke
(owner of Arsenal FC) to bigger and more global sponsors (White, 2011) (Arsenal FC). The brand
assets in Arsenal FC are their stadium and all their football players. The stadium was finished in
2006 and therefore a very new stadium with a capacity with around 60.000 seats (The Stadium
Guide), the brand assets in Arsenal are very good and very positive. The brand equity in Arsenal is
very high if I put all the factors together. (Keller K. , 2003).

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Figure 1.3
Mental Map Arsenal

The brand strategy for Arsenal FC:

Arsenal FC in the model of The internationalisation of a sports team brand model, by sorting out
where Arsenal is working out from its easier to see their strategy and how for example would have
a possibility to improve their brand. Arsenal is today a brand challenger because of they are trying
to work with their strategy with thinking locally but are acting very globally, this has been showen
by they owner Stan Kroenke how in his blue print for Arsenal focussed very much on having
more success with increasing the income of international fans (White, 2011) (Richelieu, Lopez, &
Desbordes, 2008). Arsenal is for example doing trips around the world to increase the brand
awareness for Arsenal in developing countries like Malaysia which they have visited the last couple
of years (Arsenal news, 2012).
In the summer Arsenal FC made a big investment into a new asset to the football club to increase
the populartity with the fans how craved for a new star player and to get a new star which also
would increase the brand value in the rest of the world for Arsenal FC. The star they signed this
summer was Mesut zil from Germany they bought in Real Madrid, Mesut zil is a very famous
product inside of football and therefore both commercial and on the field to give hope to the fans
and the rest of the players its very positive (Lawrence, 2014).
Experiential marketing is often used today by football clubs and Arsenal FC is also using it today
and they are doing it by connecting the fans with a unique experience on a modern stadium like

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Emirates Stadium (The Stadium Guide), then when you are in at the stadium you can get a good
experience with the mood on the stadium and in the end the main event which is the game will
entertain you and give you what you probably expected what you came for(Kapferer, 2012 P 4244).
The channels (Keller K. L., Strategic Brand Management, 2008 Chapter 4) that Arsenals are using
in their brand strategy is:

Arsenal shopping stores which they are four of in London where you both can buy
merchandise and tickets in.

Retail sale of their jerseys and other merchandise

Arsenal.com where you also can ordre tickets and buy merchandise

Other sports retailers online

(Arsenal FC).
Arsenal FC are using brand ambassords to improve the brand equity and in the end maximize their
product better. Arsenal are using their players as a brand ambassords therefore it will both affect
them positive and negative with their behavior in public, for example when they announced a deal
with Cooper Tire Europe (Cooper Tire + Arsenal, 2014) Arsenal used 3 players as brand
ambassords, but there is also risk in your branding strategy by selecting a player to be brand
ambassord as mentioned above your need they players to be on their best behavior in public or else
this strategy will ruin your possibility to be succesful (Keller K. L., Strategic Brand Management,
2008 Chapter 4).
So therefore will a club like Arsenal often select players with a more positive reputation to send out
because you dont want to risk that the clubs brand get smashed and you then will have hardere with
attracting new sponsors. Communcation tools that Arsenal also are using are their own facebook
and twitter page, today Arsenal has around 17 million followers fans on facebook and this will
make it easier for a club like Arsenal to spread their words around because so many are following
them on social medias (Keller K. , 2003 Chapter 4). The other ways there are to using social medias
today is to get people on the stadium to post on facebook when they are there so that other people
on their network will think about doing it them selves (Keller K. , 2003 Chapter 4). Buzz building

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(Keller K. , 2003 Chapter 4) is a very normal brand communication style that Arsenal and other
Premier League clubs are using, this is a way to build up an excitement for different games and
thereby also make it possible to differentiate the prices that you can demand for each game, for
example is Arsenal running with an A,B and C ranking of their games, if you then know its an a
game the prices will be higher but you should also expect a much better game than if its an c game
because of the relative competition will be increased (Tickets Arsenal).

Sum up Arsenal:

Arsenal FC are using very many different branding tools to success in the football world and since
2011 the strategy has changed very much with Stan Kroenke has owner and he is focusing very
much more on the branding situation that you should focus very much more outside of the UK,
Stan Kroenke is an American business man their have focused more on that the criteria for
increasing sales and improving the economic situation and make it more possible to compete with
their competitors is to increase the brand awareness all around the globe, this is because that the
British market nearly is filled and its harder to get market shares of fans their instead of in
countries where the knowledge about football is not really big yet.
The total value of Arsenal today is valued as the 4th most valuable football team on the globe. The
income can be divided into three sections where the turnovers from match days were $ 484 million,
the broadcasting turnover was $ 443 million and the commercial turnover was on $ 237 million.
These figures show that Arsenal has a possibility to increase the income from commercials if you
look at the income in the different sectors (Forbes Arsenal) (White, 2011). For example Manchester
United had a commercial income of $ 930 million last year and therefore it show a possibility to
increase the turnover (Forbes Manchester United). As a brand Arsenal is valued as the 6 most
valuable brands in football today which this show that Arsenal of course can improve although they
are already one of the biggest leaders in football today.

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________________________________________________________________________________

HSV:

The branding strategy in HSV I will start with by looking on brand awareness, brand positioning,
brand elements, brand equity and secondary association. Brand awareness consists of brand
recognition and brand recall performances. Brand recognition is related to peoples ability to
remember your brand when they are hearing the name. Brand recall is more about remembering the
brand name after hearing about the industry (Keller K. L., Conceptualizing, Measuring, and
Managing Customer-Based Brand Equity, 1993).
HSV has around 582.000 (Appendix A) followers fans on Facebook their gap to the market leader
in Germany (Bundesliga) Bayern Mnchen are around 8.9 million followers (Appendix A) so there
is a huge differences between the two clubs and therefore there will always be a big potential in a
club like HSV because of their location of the city of Hamburg with the population around
1.686.100 million (Appendix A), so therefore can HSV of course increase their brand population in
the city of Hamburg and other places and thereby increase their brand value and get more success of
and on the field.

Brand elements in the HSV branding strategy: The logo in HSV was designed in 1919. One of the
reasons behind using this logo in HSV is that the club is located at the port of Hamburg city and
therefore it made sense to implement something about shipping and therefore they selected a blue
diamond which at that time was used by a shipping company (Molles HSV homepage). The forces
with an old logo are a high recognition for all people. When someone sees the logo of HSV they
have probably seen it before and therefore its a strong side to keep the same logo and only make
small changes to the logo over time (Keller K. , 2003 Chapter 4).

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Brand positioning of HSV: The brand strategy for HSV and how to position themselves with a
focus on their main target consumers, main competitors, the brands similarities and their
competitors and how they can brand the club different to their competitors (Keller K. L., Strategic
Brand Management, 2008 Chapter 2). Like many other football clubs HSV of today are very much
focused on young people as their target consumer (mostly young men) and have contact to these
through for example social medias like Facebook where HSV have almost 582.000 followers. in
todays markets many of the people who are coming to the Stadium are young people like the MLS
in the US where 64 % of the fans at the stadium are young people, age under 44 years, and mostly
male (Slide Share).
Brand extensions HSV: Hamburg SV has built up a brand extension by having a handball team
which is very successful and this is a way to increase the brand awareness and target a new market
because your are entering a close related business as HSV handball is also a sports team. You can
use the synergy effects because people who only watches handball can get an interest with the other
kind of sport and the other way around (HSV handball).
Main competitors for HSV: The main competitor for HSV is Borussia Dortmund which is a club
not far away from Hamburg and has a big number of fans (Appendix B). Borussia Dortmund is
number 10 on the brand value list off football clubs and HSV is number 16 on this list (Brand
finance, 2013). Brand similarities between HSV and their main competitors are that they are
keeping the ticket prices at the stadium down to attract full crowds at the stadiums. One of the brand
differences from the clubs in Britain is that the average ticket price is more than $ 10 lower in the
Bundesliga compared

to the Premier League (Brand finance, 2013). The brands differences

between HSV and their main competitor are that compared to Dortmund HSV is succeeding, even
with low prices on stadium tickets, to earn money (Brand finance, 2013). Last year HSV had a
turnover of roughly $ 21 million more than Borussia Dortmund on match days. The stadium
capacity of Borussia Dortmund is 80.720 and the capacity on Hamburg SV stadium is only 57.000
which clearly show that HSV is much better at getting high incomes at the stadium but demanding
higher prices for more exclusive seats and the same prices for lower class seats (Borussia Dortmund
Ticketprices) (Forbes Hamburg SV) (Forbes Hamburg SV) (Hamburg SV Ticketprices) (Stadium
Guide Dortmund) (Stadium Guide Hamburg).

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rand associations with their partners (sponsors). The last couple of years one of the biggest partners
in HSV has been their club jersey sponsor, Emirates Airlines, who is a very big international
company. Emirates Airlines is also working together with five other big football clubs in Europe
(Arsenal, PSG, AC Milan, Real Madrid, and Olympiacos) (Staff, 2012). Besides investing in
Hamburg SV Emirates Airlines also helps with other projects for example they had the day of
ultimate fan experience which was to make a fan come close to the team. Such events can help
both the brand of HSV and Emirates to get positive promotion (Emirates) (Beech & Chadwick,
2007 P 186-194).
The secondary associations for Hamburg SV and the other brand association for Hamburg SV: A
very important association for HSV is there history because the brand association for fans
nostalgia is seen as something very important. The history makes people become fan of the club
and gives something to talk about between the fans why its also very important to remember to
honor their retired players (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194). Today 47 % of the loyal fans are
fans who can relate to the history of the club and HSV is doing a lot to maintain the fans interest
such as having a museum at the stadium, which makes it easier for the fans both national and
international to learn more about the club and get a closer relation to the club (Hamburger SV)
(Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194). The brand association for a club connected to a star player
can help improving the brand. Today HSV has Rafael Van der Vaart in the squad who is a very
famous football player and Rafael Van der Vaart has more than 1 million followers on Facebook
where they club of HSV has around 5 million followers. These numbers shows that the star player
has approximately 20 % of the whole number of HSVs fans and this show how a player today can
attract fans to the club because he has hes own followers (Van der Vaart) (Beech & Chadwick,
2007 P 186-194).

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Some of the events that HSV are offering are a round tour at the stadium, which is a way to achieve
emotional bonds between the fans and the club (brand) and this will make it easier for the club to
make fans become more partisan fans instead of normal fans. The emotional bond makes it easier to
make people more loyal to the brand (Hamburger SV) (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194).
The brand assets in HSV are the squad which is divided into 4 different chains where you have the
goalies, defenders, midfielders and forwards. The HSV squad have 10 different nationalities which
make it a very international squad and therefore easier to attract people from different nationalities
as fans, because normally there is a player from their own country who they can relate to which is
much easier than relating to foreigner (Appendix D) (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194). In
average the squad in HSV has an age of 24 years which make them a very young squad (Appendix
D). The value of the squad is according to transfermarkt 89.275.000 (Transfermarkt.de).
Brand loyalty for football clubs like HSV is the ability for the team to keep hold of their fans
(Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194). The attendance at Hamburg SV stadium last year was in
average 52.916 (Europes highest attendances) and the maximum attendances on HSV stadium are
57.000 (Stadium Guide Hamburg). The average attendances on Imtech Arena (Hamburg Stadium)
are

= 93 % which rank them as number 8 in the world in average attendance. This shows a

very high brand loyalty in Hamburg and the area for HSV (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194).
Brand loyalty is very important for a football club like HSV because such makes it nearly
impossible to other clubs to attract the dedicated fans and therefore it will protect the brand more
from competition than needed. The difference for football brands vs normal brands is that the brand

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will have loyal customers from a very early age compared to other businesses but still they clubs
have to do many things to keep hold of the fans as the risk for a club is to have a lot of fans whos
only interest only are the games and if the club start losing these fans will often abandon ship and
move to a new successful club Therefore the work for brand loyalty

is very high to a club like

Hamburg SV (Westerbeek & Smith, 2003 P 67) (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194).

The brand strategy for HSV:

Using the model of The internationalisation of a sports team brand model, you can sort out where
HSV is working out from and thereby its easier to see their strategy and how, for example, they
would have a possibility to improve their brand. Today HSV is a brand affinity because they are
trying to think more global by working with companies like Emirates but still they are acting very
locally within the city of Hamburg. HSV is working very much on being successful with fan
attendance which is also showed earlier in this report with around 93 % attendance in average at the
stadium and this shows that the fan loyalty is very high and that people are interested and the
affinity for the team is very high (Emirates) (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008). The club is
trying to build up a new era in the club with a new strategy which is focusing more on young
players whom they can keep over a longer period and whereby the fans can build a closer
relationship to the players. Frank Arnesen was hired in to improve this strategy so that the club and
thereby the brand can successful on the field again and increase the brand value (Dunbar, 2013).
The channels that HSV are using in their brand strategy are (Keller K. L., Strategic Brand
Management, 2008 Chapter 4):

HSV YouTube channel

HSV has two stores in the city center and two stores in the Imtech arena

Imtech Arena

Other retailers online/offline

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(Hamburger SV).
today HSV are using social medias like Twitter, Facebook and HSVs YouTube channel which are
ways to get in close contact to your fans and it is also a way by which you with success can talk to
your fans without having a filter which you might have through all the medias where you cannot be
sure what is written or said (Hamburger SV) (Appendix A). These channels are a good way to come
out with your strategy through your interaction, for example by interviews with the players so that
they fans feels emotional closer to the club afterwards and by using the social medias you can also
talk about events that you want to do etc. HSV has selected a strategy with their ticket prices to
differentiate the games into A, B, C and D games by using these model HSV can make the more
attractive games more expensive and the lesser attractive games cheaper, HSV will by doing this
make it easier to max out their capacity because of differentiated prices (Hamburg SV
Ticketprices).
Sum up HSV:
HSV are using different tools to be successful both national and international on the football market
In the world of football today HSV has selected to gamble on more than one sport with both having
football and handball in their organisation, and the reasons behind this are, of course, earning more
money but also to increase the brand awareness by attracting handball fans to watch football games
and the other way around. The target for HSV is getting more brand affinity and this strategy is
working well for HSV with their income on match days. The problem for HSV is more on the
commercial side of football and the broadcasting rights where their income is not as high as their
main competitor Borussia Dortmund. Together with the German League HSV will have to improve
their income from the broadcasting rights. Compared to the Premier League which sells as number
one of the football league in the world the Bundesliga is still number five today (Panja, 2013).
Today HSV is valued as the 18th most valuable football team in the world. The yearly income can
be divided into three sections where the turnovers from match days were $ 89 million, the
broadcasting turnover was $ 51 million and the commercial turnover was on $ 115 million. The
figures show that HSV has a possibility to increase their income from broadcasting over the next
couple of years (Forbes Hamburg SV). As mentioned above the broadcasting rights will need to be

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increased over the next couple of years and by doing this you will also increase the amount that
HSV will earn on the broadcasting deals (Panja, 2013). Last year Dortmund earned around $ 131
million from the broadcasting and this is way much more than the amount HSV earned and shows
that Dortmund is playing international (Forbes Borussia Dortmund). As a brand HSV is today
valued as the 16 most valuable brand and there is of course potential to increase this when you look
at the city size of Hamburg and of course there is also potential internationally (Brand finance,
2013) (Appendix A).

________________________________________________________________________________
FC Midtjylland:

The branding strategy of FC Midtjylland. I will start by looking on brand awareness, brand
positioning, brand elements, brand equity and secondary association. Brand awareness consists of
brand recognition and brand recall performances. Brand recognition is related to peoples ability to
remember your brand when they are hearing the name. Brand recall is more about remembering the
brand name after hearing about the industry (Keller K. L., Conceptualizing, Measuring, and
Managing Customer-Based Brand Equity, 1993).
Today FC Midtjylland has around 11.000 followers on Facebook and the gap to the main leader on
brand value in Denmark FC Copenhagen is still very big as FC Copenhagen has around 151.000
followers on Facebook (Appendix B). The brand of FC Midtjylland stands stronger today with the
big sponsorship contract with the company Einar Hessel, a car dealer in Denmark (Srensen, 2014).
The success on the field this year has also made FC Midtjylland a more attractive brand because of
the first place in the Danish Superliga (Superligaen).
The brand elements in FC Midtjylland: The logo in FC Midtjylland was in 1999 developed when
the club started as a fusion of Herning Fremad and Ikast FS. The logo was developed as a wolf and
the reason behind selecting a wolf was that a wolf is always is looking for a new prey, a new target
which they think can make the club more successful (FCM History). In FC Midtjylland they have a

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slogan going through the organisation from the academy to the professional section in the club
Whoever stops trying to be better stops being good. This slogan focuses on always improving
yourself if you want to succeed (FCM Akademiet)(Keller K. L., Strategic Brand Management, 2008
Chapter 4).
The brand positioning for FC Midtjylland: The focus will be on their main target consumers, main
competitors, the brands similarities to their competitors and how the brand can differentiate from
their competitors (Keller K. L., Strategic Brand Management, 2008 Chapter 2). The main target
consumer for FC Midtjylland today is men within the age from 18-40because these are the target
group who mostly are attending the stadiums (Sports Analysis Institute, 2011).
The main competitors to FC Midtjylland are FC Nordsjlland, OB and AAB which are clubs at the
same level as FC Midtjylland in Denmark. The clubs FCM are competing with

have more

followers on Facebook compared to FCM. All four clubs are focusing on their regional area and
thereby trying to be more attractive to a bigger audience than only just the city where the team is
located (Appendix C). The similarities between the clubs are described above and their strategies
are more or less the same where the clubs are focusing on a regional area where OB is focusing on
Funen, FCN are focusing on the area of North Zealand, AAB are focusing on the region of Northern
part of Jutland and FCM are focusing on the region on the center of Jutland (Appendix C).
The differences between FCM and their main competitors are that FCM are new on the fields and
therefore more risk willing than the older clubs who have existed for many years. As FCM says in
their value statement We are always ambitious, a challenger and a new thinking football business
(FCM Values)
FCM Handball is also one of the things FCM has brought into the organisation and this is a possible
way to increase the brand awareness and thereby having a possibility to hit a bigger market because
you can attract people from handball towards football and the other way round and thereby gaining
synergy effects. Doing this it`s more possible to increase the brand awareness and make it easier to
get people to football or handball and increase their brand loyalty to the brand and end up getting a
lot of partisan fans (Westerbeek & Smith, 2003 P 69) (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194).

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Brand associations in FCM with a partner like MCH is very much related because of FCMs
stadium is located at MCH (Messecenter Herning) area and the stadium is also owned by MCH why
the two brands are working very close together (FCM Sponsors) (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186194).
The new brand associations that FCM are trying to build is a CSR project inspired from Germany.
Today FCM, Ikast Brande Municipality and Falk Lauritsen a travelling bureau - are working
together in this project. The locals should be a project where the partners today and new companies
joining the project can help each other by branding the other partners in the CSR projects. FCM
expects that their brand awareness in the area and the brand value will increase with this new
project (FCM branding, 2013).
Events in FCM are mostly match days where FCM had an average at their home game last year of
5.800 attendances in every game. The capacity on the stadium MCH Arena are 11.809 and the
figures

show that the percentage of attendance in the 2012-2013 was 49 % which states that

FCM has a hard time filling up their stadium capacity (Superliga Stats).
The brand assets in FCM are the squad which is divided into 4 different chains where you have the
goalies, defenders, midfielders and forwards. FCM have 10 different nationalities in their squad
which make it a very international squad and therefore easier to attract people from different
nationalities as fans because there is normally a player from their own country whom they can relate
to (Appendix F) (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194). The squad in FCM is in average 24,87
years old and therefore its a very young squad (Appendix F). According to transfermarkt the value
of the squad is 12.350.000 (Transfermarkt Superligaen).
Brand loyalty for football clubs and for FCM is their ability to keep hold of their fans (Beech &
Chadwick, 2007 P 186-194). In average the attendance at FCM was, as mentioned above, 49 %
which is a very low number (Superliga Stats). Brand loyalty is very important to a football club like
FCM because the more brand loyalty you can create the harder it will be for competitors to get such
a fan to change team and therefore you need to attract loyal fans like Partisans who always will be
the backbone of the club (Westerbeek & Smith, 2003 P 67). The differences for football brand vs
normal brands is that the brand will have loyal customers from a very early age compared to other

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businesses, but still they clubs have to do things to keep the fans as the risk to a club is to have a lot
of fans who only are champ followers and when they club are starting to lose they will often
abandon ship and move to a new successful club, therefore the work for brand loyalty has to be
done for a club like FC Midtjylland (Westerbeek & Smith, 2003 P 67) (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P
186-194).

The brand strategy for FCM:

By using the model of The internationalisation of a sports team brand model, to sort out where
FCM is working out from its easier to see their strategy and how, for example, they would have a
possibility to improve their brand. Today FC Midtjylland is a brand which is pre-international
which means that the main thing in FCM is to survive as a football club before focusing on being a
national brand. FCM has had a bad economy and therefore its very important just to focus more on
the local area of center Midtjylland and still work on your brand, but the main driver in this strategy
is to focus right now on improving the economy in the company (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes,
2008) (Mulvad, 2013). This is why it will be more normal for FC Midtjylland to focus their brand
national instead of focusing towards the international market especially when they club are not yet
ready to such a move.
The channels that FCM are using in their brand strategy are (Keller K. L., Strategic Brand
Management, 2008 Chapter 4):

Jack-Pot Herning where you can buy FCM merchandise

FCM store on the stadium

MCH Arena

Other retailers online/offline

(FCM)
The social medias that FCM are using today is Twitter, Facebook and FCMs YouTube channel
which are ways to come in a close contact to your fans and a smart way where you can talk to your
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fans without talking to a newspaper media, online media or a television channel and make sure that
you are getting your visions out as you always know what has been written on your own media, the
webpage (FCM) (Appendix C). The YouTube Channel, Facebook and Twitter are a good way to
come out with your strategy through interaction with your fans. FCM has selected a strategy with
their ticket prices to differentiate the games into A and B prices and by using this model FCM can
make the more attractive games more expensive and make the less attractive game less expensive
(FCM Billet)
Sum up FCM:
FCM are using many different branding tools to succeed. FCM are using all the social media tools
they are able to in order to increase the brand awareness of the football club and thereby they will
hopefully have more success in the future. FCM has a lot of work to do in the task of increasing
their fan base which you can evaluate on the basis that the club is very young and they only have
around 11.000 followers on Facebook and if you look on the attendance rate which was around 49
% last year. No doubt, FCM needs a big improvement.
FCM are using new branding strategies like the CSR project Local Plan which should help
increasing the brand awareness in the local area and make the fans follow them instead of their
competitors in the local area like AGF, Viborg or Esbjerg. As earlier described FCM has a
credibility problem because of their economic problem and therefore the club needs to focus on
reestablishing their economy at first in order to have all the people who do not trust the project
change towards a more positive view and actually believe in the project. The squad age and the
academy is something FCM can build a good branding history around why the focus from FCM
should be on keeping the cost down to focus even more on their own players from their academy
and drop buying older more expensive players.
The brand value of FCM today is not that high but still it has improved over the last year because
the club has improved their economy and the club also has increased their play on the field which
also has a big effect on the fan crowd and on how many people who wants to support the club.
There is also a lot of money in differences in getting a high position in the league. All three effects
will be effected if it goes positive you will both increase commercial values because of more money

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in sponsorship deals, money from broadcasting is often divided by a system whereby

you are

getting more money the higher position you have in the league and as the last one you have the
match day income which also will increase because the better the team perform the more people
will come to the stadium and watch the games.

Discussion:

I selected three clubs and through my web analysis I have discovered where the clubs, at the
moment act differently internationally and in their branding strategy. Today they clubs are using
many of the same platforms to get through to their fans as all the clubs in the analysis I have done,
no matter how big they are, are using both Twitter, Facebook and a YouTube channel to get in
touch with their fans(Appendix A,B,C). The branding strategies for clubs like HSV and Arsenal and
other clubs in The Premier League and The Bundesliga seems to focus much more on thinking very
international which is possible for the clubs because of the big broadcasting deals covering many
countries all around the world (Pilger, 2014) (Panja, 2013).
The broadcasting deals make it easier for the club to hit the global market. People all around the
world will be able to see the brand and the brand will get an increasing brand awareness because
people will be watching football and by this learn and know what the brand are inside the industry.
In the British Premier League 6 out of 20 squads are offering more than English as the language on
their webpage and this makes it easier to connect to fans all around the globe. You could have a
person watching the game on television in Thailand but as this person doesnt understand English
he and she can visit Evertons homepage and still be able to connect closer to the brand because
Everton also present their homepage in Thai. Therefore as a brand in football today it seems very
important to offer more languages if you want to succeed globally in the sport business (Appendix
A).
The Danish Superliga is more focus towards the national plan and none of the clubs today are really
using the potential of increasing their brand in other countries than in Denmark. The clubs in
Denmark like FC Midtjylland which I have analyzed could learn much from the clubs in the

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Premier League and The Bundesliga where the clubs are focusing more towards using their brand
all around the world. An idea could be a Scandinavian league consisting of clubs from Norway,
Sweden and Denmark who could build up their own league and their brand would then increase the
brand awareness in all of the countries in Scandinavia.
The factors which are affecting the strategies for the football clubs today are very much dependent
on the income of the football club why you can say that the more success a club has on the football
field the more success branding wise. As an example you can look at Manchester United who,
through their history, has had a very big success and Manchester United has been one of the most
successful clubs over the last many years and have won a lot of Championships to the club and here
its shows that the success on the field has a very big effect on how successful the football club can
be brand wise (Manchester United). Manchester United has around 37 million followers and that is
more than the double compared to number two of all of the clubs in the big analysis I did. The
figures shows that a success on the field will affect the off the field success (Appendix B), but still
they clubs have a challenge if they want to move from more of a short-term approach where they
only focus on winning to be successful off the field as well. It demands a lot of effort to build a
strong brand which is a much longer process than buying some good players and therefore not very
attractive to club owners who wants immediate success (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 194-195)!
The focus in this case shows that the Danish football clubs doesnt focus on being international and
therefore the clubs were irrelevant in the focus on being an international brand. Both in the Premier
League and in The Bundesliga the focus to many of the clubs were on being an international brand
and this was for example through the different languages that the clubs are using on their webpage
so people can read the page in their native language (Appendix A) (Appendix B). Brand reputation
specialist was a model that many of the clubs today are using. The reason for using this model is
that its cheaper because the clubs slowly will move into different countries and this is often a good
way for a club with lesser resources like Everton FC who penetrated the market of Thailand slowly
and having succeeded on that market you can move on to other closely related markets (Everton
FC) (Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008).
The different strategies used by football clubs are very much related to the success in a club for
example clubs like Everton (Number six last year) which I mentioned above uses a strategy like

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brand reputation specialist. A club like Manchester United (Number one last year) is focusing very
much on being a brand affinity specialist and thereby having success with making an emotional
bond between the club and its fans. Brand challenger is coming today mostly from clubs like
Manchester City which are owned by rich men who uses the clubs like a toy and therefore the
strategy will be more a brand challenger strategy. The reason behind this strategy is to build a
bigger fan base quicker and such will be done through signing big player contracts like Manchester
City (Number two last year) did in 2012 with Carlos Tevez (Bold.dk Premier League table)
(Richelieu, Lopez, & Desbordes, 2008)(Conn, The Guardian, 2012).

How the brand strategy differs between international football brands and more locally brands. The
local brands are focusing very much on how to target their local customers only on Facebook, for
example with Danish language on the Facebook page belonging to a Danish club. Bigger clubs like
Liverpool for are offering their twitter pages in different languages and therefore it is possible to
target very much brooder and earn more money on a global business model. This is one of the
biggest differences in their brand communication.
The international differences between football brands who are working on being a global brand.
Some of the differences between the global football brands are that the top football brands like
Arsenal, Manchester United, Bayern Mnchen and other top 10 brands are travelling around the
world in the summer break to increase the brand awareness and thereby in the end get a bigger base
of fans (Tour 2013 Manchester United). Many other clubs who want to be a global brand dont use
the time on tours like these which the top clubs think is necessary in order to maintain the interest
from the fans.
The analysis through this report shows that the clubs should do like Manchester United and
understand that building a strong brand demands focus from the club and at the same time realize it
takes long time because a sustainable brand takes time to build up (Beech & Chadwick, 2007 P 194195), but today the clubs are forced to have the short time approach because of building up a strong
brand needs both capital and a successful history to succeed. The new clubs with a very
aggressive branding strategy like Manchester City and Chelsea who both are trying to be brand

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challenger specialist are focusing very much on a short strategy where the results are most
important. The reason for this is that both clubs have owners who are extremely rich and more
focused just about winning and therefore the branding strategy are focused on winning now and
then thinking about the brand later (Conn, The Guardian, 2012). In the short term such clubs might
have success at the football field but clubs like Manchester United are showing that results and
successful branding is a mix which need to be together to make sure you succeed in the football
world today.

Conclusion:
The conclusion of this case is that football clubs today are focusing very much on a short time
approach and the problem with the short time approach is that brand is totally depending on the
results at the football field. The strategy seems to focus much more on being a brand challenger
specialist because they clubs are using a lot of money buying new players so that they have players
who are more attractive brand ambassadors who have many fans and therefore can attract more fans
to the club and make it more successful. Other parameters for a short time approach is that if you
succeed on the football field you can end up having big success filling up your attendance at the
stadium and thereby also having success financial later, but the risk for the brand with this short
time approach branding strategy is that you get many theater-goers who only are coming to watch
an interesting game and you cannot expect that he/her comes every time. Fans like champ followers
will often also follow with the success on the field.
The brand affinity which is a longer strategy, time wise, which Manchester United and Dortmund
are focusing on very much... One of the reasons behind this strategy is that you will get many more
fans because you get partisan fans who always turn up and are very reliable fans and therefore you
can expect that the attendance in general will be higher like Manchester United and Dortmund have
today (Westerbeek & Smith, 2003 P 75) (Europes highest attendances).
The brand is a very important thing to protect and therefore clubs today will be working more on
their brand in the future with behavior of the players, events you are participating in and other areas
because you cannot risk to damage your brand in football working together with things you should
not have done and by this getting a bad reputation. Therefore the clubs will also be forced to look in

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to where the money is coming from and as for sponsors coming in to football in the future the clubs
must realize that they cannot accept everybody.
The brand should in the future like I have written focus more on the long time approach and respect
the fans and not change a club in general like Cardiff City (Appendix B) did and thereby risk to
damage your brand by alienating their fans. You risk your brand will stand very much weaker
because the economy of the club will get worse due to fewer fans, old sponsors who will not be
interested in the club if they cant get the promotion needed and promised and therefore the clubs
has to listen more to the fans in the future if they want to succeed with their brand long term.

Page 51 of 60

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1. FSV Mainz 05. (n.d.). 1. FSV Mainz 05 homepage. Retrieved 10 10, 2013, from
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AAB Sport. (n.d.). AAB Sport webpage. Retrieved 9 23, 2013, from AAB Sport frontpage:
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Aaker, D. (1991). Managing Brand Equity. New York: Free Press.
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Kinetics.

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frontpage: http://www.safc.com/

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Page 61 of 60

Appendix A: The Bundesliga

FC Bayern Mnchen:
Followers on Facebook 9.863.537
Language on their webpage: German, English, Japanese, Spanish, Chinese, Russian and Arabic.
Sponsors: T-Mobile, Adidas, Audi, Allianz, HypoVereinsbank, Lufthansa, Paulaner, Yingli Solar,
Man, Samsung and ImTech. Coca Cola
Bayern Mnchen the Bavarian football team.
German teams are far more for attractive than ever. David Haigh, chief executive at Brand Finance
says: Now the Bundesliga is delivering world-beating, fluid football rather than the more
workmanlike style German teams had been known for it could be a more attractive alternative for
sponsors.
http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/news/bayern-munich-oust-man-utd-as-top-footballbrand/4006829.article
Bayern Mnchen is now number one in brand value.
Population in the city: 1.185.400
________________________________________________________________________________
Borussia Dortmund:
Followers on Facebook 5.285.639
Language on their webpage: German, English and Japanese
Sponsors: Evonik industries, Puma, Signal Iduna Park, Opel, Trkish Airlines, Brinkhoffs, SpardaBank, Flyeralarm, Huawei, Signal Iduna, Hankook, Westlotto and Wilo.
Focus very much on how to attract fans through being an honest and local team for the region of
Ruhr. They are proud of the changes made from spending a lot of money after nearly going
bankrupt. Make a solid business model.
http://casem.eu/docs/12-900_EN_PREVIEW.pdf
Population in the city: 587.600
________________________________________________________________________________

Page A

Bayer Leverkusen:
Followers on Facebook 300.480
Language on their webpage: German and English
Sponsors: LG, DEVK, Fujifilm, HappyBet, Opel, Sparkasse Leverkusen and Adidas.
Focus on the Ruhr the same as Dortmund is also a focus on that part of Germany because of their
location.
Population in the city: 161.700
________________________________________________________________________________
Schalke 04
Followers on Facebook 1.868.479
Language on their website: German, English, Russian and Japanese
Sponsors: Gazprom, Veltins, Adidas
Russian language because of their main sponsor Gazprom which is from Russia
Population in the city: 276.200
________________________________________________________________________________
Borussia Mnchengladbach
Followers on Facebook 313.716
Language on their website: German, English and Spanish
Sponsors: Deutche Postbank, Bank of Santander, Deutsche Telekom, Man and Kappa
There is a national focus on their webpage with only messages in German.
Population in the city: 264.400
________________________________________________________________________________
Wolfsburg
Followers on Facebook 201.352
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: Volkswagen, Cashpoint, Castrol, Adidas and Panasonic

Page B

All news is made both in German and English

Population in the city: 119.300
________________________________________________________________________________
Mainz
Followers on Facebook 100.324
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: Entega, Coface, Nike, Urano, Opel and Bitburger
Population in the city: 186.700
________________________________________________________________________________
Hertha Berlin
Followers on Facebook 182.778
Language on their website: German, Polish and English
Sponsors: Deutsche Bahn, Nike, Audi, Cashpoint, Coca Cola, Warsteiner, Berliner Volksbank
Population in the city: 3.275.000
________________________________________________________________________________
FC Augsburg
Followers on Facebook 111.342
Language on their website: German
Sponsors: AL-KO, Jako, SGL Group, LEW
Population in the city: 253.800
________________________________________________________________________________
Hannover 96
Followers on Facebook 247.199
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: TUI, Jako, Volkswagen, NDR 2, Continental
Population in the city: 516.300

Page C

________________________________________________________________________________
TSG Hoffenheim
Followers on Facebook 106.390
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: Audi, Coca Cola, SAP, Wirsol, Puma
Population in the city: 3.000
http://www.liberoguide.com/hoffenheim-sinsheim/
________________________________________________________________________________
Werder Bremen
Followers on Facebook 685.558
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: Wiesenhof, TargoBank, Nike, Volkswagen, Coca Cola, AbInBev
Population in the city: 527.900
________________________________________________________________________________
VFB Stuttgart
Followers on Facebook 363.485
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: Mercedes Benz, Krombacher, Puma, EnBw, Fanuc
Population in the city: 581.100
________________________________________________________________________________
Eintracht Frankfurt
Followers on Facebook 295.309
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: Alfa Romeo, DB, Jako, Krombacher, Fraport
Population in the city: 648.000
________________________________________________________________________________

Page D

SC Freiburg:
Followers on Facebook 124.428
Language on their website: German
Sponsors: Ehrmann, Europa Park, Mage Solar, Nike, Opel, Rafi, Rothaus and Tipico
Population in the city: 206.300
________________________________________________________________________________
1. FC Nrnberg:
Followers on Facebook 231.192
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: NKD, Adidas, Audi, Lotto Bayern, Grundig, Whrl, Thomas Sabo, PSD Bank, N-Ergie,
Kulmbacher
Population in the city: 486.700
________________________________________________________________________________
HSV:
Followers on Facebook 582.614
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: Emirates, Adidas, Imtech, Sparda Bank, T-Mobile, Holstein, Grand Elysee Hamburg,
NDR 2, Tipico, Cewe-print.de
Population in the city: 1.686.100
________________________________________________________________________________
Eintracht Braunschweig:
Followers on Facebook 104.042
Language on their website: German and English
Sponsors: Seat, Nike, Volkswagen Financial Service, BS Energy, Staake, Wolters Pilsner.
Population in the city: 243.700
http://www.citymayors.com/gratis/german_topcities.html
The statistic I have about the German cities population.

Page E

Appendix B: Premier League:

Chelsea FC:
Chelsea uses their players as brand ambassadors, their players are their main assets and the club
brand risk damages if a good brand ambassador messes up in his private life.
http://www.chelseafc.com/brand-ambassadors
Chelsea uses their players as brand ambassadors. The players are the main asset for the club, the
brand risk damages if the ambassador has problems in his private life.
Brand limitation to increase. This is for example because of stadium capacity there is to low both in
total seats, they only have the 30th biggest stadium in Europe and they only have 5000 hospitality
seats where other clubs they are comparing them self to - have more than 5 time so many.
http://www.brandfinance.com/images/upload/brandfinance_football_brands_2012.pdf
Brand limitation to increase: An example is the stadium; capacity is far below that of other clubs.
Chelsea FC has the 30th largest stadium in Europe with only 5000 seats available for hospitalities
where other clubs they are comparing themselves to have 5 times as many.
Chelsea TV is both on Facebook and through their website, this is a way to show their brand more
and get more brand awareness.
Followers on their official Facebook page are 19.719.673
Chelsea: English, Chinese, Japanese, South Korean, Indonesian, Russian, Thai
Population in the city: 7.074.265
________________________________________________________________________________
Arsenal FC:
Followers on their official Facebook page are 16.380.637
Dont exist for commercial purpose but more as a club for the fans (Tom Fox chief commercial
Arsenal)
Sustainable business model
Brand is defined by more than winning
The brand needs strong partners to compete (Sponsors)

Page F

Arsenal brand is working towards a club accessible for everybody; the brand strategy will focus
more towards the fans who are not (attending the games) coming on the stadium in the future. ??

We approach the business side of the football club only to help and aid the football side of the
club. Tom Fox
Language on website: Chinese, American, South Korean and Japanese
Population in the city: 7.074.265
________________________________________________________________________________
Manchester United:
Followers on their Facebook page are 36.830.694
Language on website: English, France, Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese and South Korean.
4 registered trademarks with different brand products.
Identifying the sponsors with the club and implanting strategy to strengthen the partnership. Offices
for brand strategy are in London, North America and Asia to be close to regional firms all over the
globe.
Manchester United is trying to increase the brand knowledge with opening different stores all over
the globe.
By increasing the emphasis on our commercial businesses, we will further diversify our revenue,
enabling us to generate improved profitability. The strategy adapted for Manchester United in the
future.
http://ir.manutd.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=133303&p=irol-strategy
Population in the city: 430.818
________________________________________________________________________________
Manchester City:
Followers on their Facebook page are 6.870.789
Language on website: France, English, Arabic, Chinese, Indonesian, Japanese, South Korean,
Portuguese, Spanish, Malayan, Russian and Thai.
By a with a large investment in star players the brand awareness of the club will increase all over
the world.

Page G

Manchester City is trying to increase their brand awareness with an international squad, so that fans
in many different countries can identify themselves with the club. The current 1st team squad has 13
different nationalities.
http://www.mcfc.co.uk/Players
The fans are the heart and soul of this club, that's one of the most rewarding aspects of being
involved with Manchester City. The owner of Manchester City is Sheikh Mansour Bin Zayed Al
Nahyan.

Population in the city: 430.818

________________________________________________________________________________
Tottenham Hotspurs:
Followers on their Facebook page are 2.832.693
http://www.someoneinlondon.com/category/projects/a-brandworld-for-tottenham-hotspur
Important for the brand to drop the yellow color to increase the brand strength (Holt)
Around the world Premier League football is was watched on TV last year by 3.9 billion people,
1.24 billion
The slogan of Tottenham Hotspurs rallying slogan Glory Glory could soon be transformed into
the slightly more 21st Century sounding Flair, Style and Adventure as the club embarks on a
major business rebranding
Language on website: English
Population in the city: 7.074.265
________________________________________________________________________________
Everton FC:
Language on their website: English and Thai. Thai because of their main sponsor who is from
Thailand (Chang Beer a part of Thai Brewery).
Followers on their Facebook are 464.628
Changed their logo to a more modern look to appeal to a broader specter of fans.
http://www.creativereview.co.uk/cr-blog/2013/may/everton-crest
Removing an important slogan for the fans on their logo but implanting on the stadium instead.

Page H

'Nil Satis Nisi Optimum' ('Nothing but the best is good enough')
Sponsorship deals with international brand like Nike and Thai Brewery will make it easier for
Everton
FC
to
get
brand
awareness
around
the
globe.
http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/news/everton-fc-agrees-nike-deal/4000942.article
Population in the city: 467.995
________________________________________________________________________________

Liverpool FC:
Followers on Facebook are 13.385.669
Language on website: Arabic, Australian, Bangladeshis, Brazilian, Chinese, English, French, Greek,
Indian, Indonesian, Malayan, New Zealand, Norwegian, Pakistanian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish,
South African, Thai, Turkish and American.
Thinking global, acting local (Liverpool FC)
http://www.sportspromedia.com/guest_blog/inside_liverpool_fc_thinking_global_acting_local/
Co-Partnership with other brands, they have for example Rabi in Bangladesh next biggest mobile
operator to wish a happy independent day.
Population in the city: 467.995
________________________________________________________________________________
Southampton FC:
Followers on Facebook 99.269
Language on website: English
There is huge potential to use digital and social media alongside traditional channels to
communicate the clubs story both domestically and globally. Julius Duncan (media relations and
marketing, and creating an integrated comms approach to develop the brand both domestically and
internationally)
http://www.brandrepublic.com/news/1163225/
Population in the city: 214.859
________________________________________________________________________________

Page I

Newcastle United:
Followers on Facebook 536.099
Language on their webpage: English
Newcastle TV as a brand extension
Three sponsors with not only English background as Electronic Arts, Volkswagen and Puma.
Our sponsors look to harness the loyalty, passion, emotion and heritage associated with this one of
the world's most famous Clubs when delivering their own message to key market. The fact that
Newcastle United FC is constantly in the media spotlight allows sponsors to reach as wide an
audience as possible, through many markets. http://www.nufc.co.uk/page/Club/Commercial/About
Population in the city: 282.338
________________________________________________________________________________
West Bromwich Albion:
Followers on Facebook 105.891
Language on their webpage: English
Very local acting
They have international sponsor like Carlsberg, Adidas and an Asian gaming partner.
Population in the city: 1.020.589
________________________________________________________________________________
Aston Villa:
Followers on Facebook 1.464.527
Language on their website: English
Sponsors: Dafabet Asian online betting, Macron Italian jersey maker, Fiat, Carlsberg and Turkish
Airlines.
The target is Birmingham for Aston Villa which is a city with a population over 1.000.000 people
and the region surrounding it.
Population in the city: 1.020.589
________________________________________________________________________________
Hull City AFC:

Page J

Followers on Facebook 189.255

Language on their website: English
English sponsor partners. Thinking local and acting local.
Population in the city: 266.775
________________________________________________________________________________
Swansea Football Club
Followers on Facebook 206.385
Language on their website: English
Sponsors: Adidas, LG G2, GWFX.com and Carlsberg are some of the biggest sponsors in Swansea.
Carlsberg will defiantly focus on Swansea because of Michael Laudrup.
"Swansea City has become a global brand over the last 24 months and this agreement will only
help to boost the clubs current appeal." Swansea City Vice-Chairman, Leigh Dineen
Population in the city: 230.180
________________________________________________________________________________
Cardiff City:
Followers on Facebook 145.256
Language on their website: English
Sponsors: Puma, Visit Malaysia
New logo to make it more appealing to a broader customer segment has alienated some very
hardcore
supporters
(http://chestermarketing.blogspot.dk/2013/07/identity-crisis-footballbranding.html)
Dont follow fans advice bad for brand reputation.
Population in the city: 315.040
________________________________________________________________________________
Norwich City
Followers on Facebook 127.181
Language on their website: English

Page K

http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/news/norwich-city-fc-eyes-global-brand-status/4005230.article
In a statement of intent the club says the partnership is not only to raise the profile of the club
around the world, but also to monetize the Canaries, as the club is known, brand.
Sponsors: Avica British multinational insurance company, Errea Sport from Italy makes the jerseys,
Lotus and Molson Coors
Population in the city: 126.221
________________________________________________________________________________
West Ham FC
Followers on Facebook 385.731
Language on their website: English
Sponsors: Adidas but mostly big local companies like Bet365
Big stadium capacity in the future with the Olympic stadium, big opportunities to offering their
brand partners good hospitalities seats.
http://www.marketingmagazine.co.uk/article/1220933/west-ham-poaches-arsenal-marketing-chiefboard-role
Hiring Arsenals former marketing director to optimize the commercial opportunities there is in the
Premier League.
Population in the city: 7.074.265
________________________________________________________________________________
Stoke City
Followers on Facebook 112.048
Language on their website: English
Sponsor: Bet365 (Owner at the same time), Carlsberg and Novus.
The focus for Stoke City seems to be thinking local and acting local.
Population in the city: 254,438
________________________________________________________________________________
Fulham FC
Followers on Facebook 346.264

Page L

Language on their website: English

Sponsors: Maraton Bet, Adidas, Stanley, American Airlines, Brother at your side, Carlsberg and
Jack Wolfskin.
The club is focused more on the US market than ever with the new owner Shahid Khan, an
American Businessman, who has now bought the club. You can also see this with the sponsors that
the club is working together with their Co-Partnership with American Airlines is a good sign, so
therefore a more global thinking and a local acting.
Population in the city: 7.074.265
________________________________________________________________________________

Sunderland AFC
Followers on Facebook 126.760
Language on their website: English
Sponsors: Bidvest, Adidas, Strongbow, StudHub, BetButler, TLC88.com, Tanzania Tourist Board,
South African Airways and NipMan.
Population in the city: 294.261
________________________________________________________________________________
Crystal Palace Football Club
Followers on Facebook 40.256
Language on their website: English
Sponsors: Farr Vintners, Holler Watches, 12Bet.com and gac.com
A small club with a very partisan crowd, but they are thinking very local and acting local.
Population in the city: 7.074.265
________________________________________________________________________________
http://www.citymayors.com/gratis/uk_topcities.html
The statistic I have about the British cities population.

Page M

Appendix C: The Danish Superliga

FC Copenhagen
Followers on Facebook 151.952
Language on website: Danish and English
Sponsors: Carlsberg, Travel 2 football, Adidas
Population in the City: 559.440
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
FCM:
Followers on Facebook 11.041
Language on website: Danish
Sponsors: Falk Laurtisen, Stark, Bravo Tours, JBS, Handelsbanken, Faxi Kondi
Population in the City: 86.595
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
AAB:
Followers on Facebook 27.233
Language on website: Danish
Sponsors: Faxi Kondi, Adidas, Spar Nord, Nordjyske
Population in the City: 203.448
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
Brndby IF:
Followers on Facebook 95.984
Language on website: Danish and English

Page N

Sponsors: Hummel, Carlsberg, Danica Pension, Danske Bank, Danske Spil, Friis Rengring og
Vinduepolering ApS, Loxam A/S.
Population in the City: 34.210 (But in Copenhagen)
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
Randers FC:
Followers on Facebook 16.584
Language on website: Danish, Week letters in English
Sponsors: Auto C, Sparekassen Kronjylland, Verdo
Population in the City: 96.007
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
FC Nordsjlland:
Followers on Facebook 16.484
Language on website: Danish and English
Sponsors: Arbejdernes Landsbank, City Container, Diadora, Faxi Kondi, Norrecco
Population in the City: 38.236
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
OB:
Followers on Facebook 34.060
Language on website: Danish
Sponsors: Carlsberg, Puma
Population in the City: 193.370
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________

Page O

AGF
Followers on Facebook 35.778
Language on website: Danish
Sponsors: Hummel, Krifa, Optimera, NRGI, Yousee, Faxi Kondi, Arbejdernes Landsbank
Population in the City: 319.094
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
Viborg FF:
Followers on Facebook 5.550
Language on website: Danish
Sponsors: Peter Larsen Kaffe, Viborg Stifts Folkeblad, Designa, Frugt Karl, Danske Andelskasser
Bank, Kappa.
Population in the City: 94.333
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
FC Vestsjlland
Followers on Facebook 9.019
Language on website: Danish
Sponsors: Harboe, GES, Seas-NVE, Sparekassen Sjlland, Videra.
Population in the City: 77.167
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
Esbjerg FB:
Followers on Facebook 22.901
Language on website: Danish
Sponsors: South Energy (SE), Blue Water Shipping, Nike, Det Faglige Hus, Sportigan

Page P

Population in the City: 115.051

http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________
Snderjyske
Followers on Facebook 4.561
Language on website: Danish
Sponsors: Fros, Davidsen, Diadora
Population in the City: 56.051
http://www.noegletal.dk/noegletal/servlet/nctrlman.aReqManager
________________________________________________________________________________

Appendix D:

HSVs Football Squad

Goalkeepers:
Age Nationality
34
Czech Republic
29
Germany
20
Germany

Jaroslav Drobny
Rene Adler
Florian Stritzel
Defenders
Dennis Diekmeier
Michael Mancienne
Heiko Westermann
Johan Djourou
Marcell Jansen
Lasse Sobiech
Zhi Gin Lan
Slobodan Rajkovic
Jonathan Tah

24
26
30
27
28
23
22
25
18

Page Q

Germany
Britain
Germany
Schweiz
Germany
Germany
Germany
Serbia
Germany

Midtfields
Ouasim Bouy

20

Tomas Rincon
Hakan Calhanoglu
Ivo Ilicevic
Milan Badelj
Tolgay Arslan
Petr Jiracek

26
20
28
25
24
28

Rafael Van Der Vaart

31

Kerem Demirbay
Matti Steinmann
Valmir Nafiu

20
19
19

Netherland
s
Venezuela
Turkey
Croatia
Croatia
Germany
Czech
Republic
Netherland
s
Germany
Germany
Macadonia

Forwards
Pierre-Michel Lasogga
Maximilian Beister
Ola John

22
23
21

Jacques Zoua

22

Average age of players

Different nationalities

24,22
10

Germany
Germany
Netherland
s
Cameroun

http://www.hsv.de/teams/bundesliga/teamfoto/

Appendix E:

Arsenal FC's Football Squad

Goalkeepers:
Age
23
28
28

Wojciech Szczesny
Lukasz Fabianski
Emilliano Viviano

Page R

Nationality
Poland
Poland
Italy

Defenders
Bacary Sagna
Per Mertesacker
Thomas Vermaelen
Laurent Koscielny
Nacho Monreal
Carl Jenkinson
Kieran Gibbs

31
29
28
28
28
22
24

France
Germany
France
France
Spain
Britain
Britain

Tomas Rosicky

33

Mikel Arteta
Jack Wilshire
Mesut zil
Aaron Ramsey
Santi Cazorla
Mathieu Flamini
Abou Diaby
Kim Kllstrom
Gedion Zelalem

32
22
25
23
29
30
27
31
17

Czech
Republic
Spain
Britain
Germany
Wales
Spain
France
France
Sweden
Germany

Lukas Podolski
Yaya Sanogo
Olivier Giroud
Nicklas Bendter
Theo Walcott
Ryo Miyaichi
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain
Serge Gnabry

28
21
27
26
24
22
20
18

Germany
France
France
Denmark
Britain
Japan
Britain
Germany

Average age of the squad

Different nationalities

25,86
11

Midtfielders

Forwards

http://www.arsenal.com/first-team/players

Page S

Appendix F:

FCM's Football Squad

Goalkeepers:
Age
25
19
21

Nationality
Denmark
Denmark
Denmark

Francis Dickoh
Kristian Bach Bak
Jesper Lindorff Juelsgrd
Frederik Mller
Patrick Banggaard
Santiago Villafane
Sonni Nattested

32
32
25
20
19
25
19

Erik Sviatchenko
Kolja Afriyie
Andre Rmer

22
32
20

Ghana
Denmark
Denmark
Denmark
Denmark
Argentina
Faroe
Islands
Denmark
Germany
Denmark

29
31
29
19
20
19
23
23
29

Nigeria
Denmark
Iceland
Sudan
Denmark
Nigeria
Nigeria
Nigeria
Sweden

19
37
28

Nigeria
Denmark
Netherlands

Jonas Lssl
Oliver Koch
Jakob Haugaard
Defenders

Midtfielders
Oluwafemi Ajilore
Jakob Poulsen
Eyjolfyr Hedinsson
Piono Sisto
Marco Larsen
Musefiu Ashiru
Rilwan Hassan
Izunna Uzochukwu
Petter Andersson
Forwards
Paul Onuachu
Frank Kristensen
Tim Janssen
Page T

Sylvester Igboun
Morten "Duncan" Rasmussen

29
23

Average age of the squad

Different nationalities

24,78
10

http://fcm.dk/superligatruppen

Page U

Nigeria
Denmark