The effect on football fans of commercialisation of the game.

What is it about?

Football supporters have been encouraged to express their club loyalty by ‘thinking business’ - acting as consumers and generating money deemed necessary for their clubs to compete at the highest levels. This book aims to show, however, such expressions of loyalty are far from hegemonic and often interface haphazardly with traditional ideas about what constitutes the ‘loyal fan’.

Featured Image

Photo by Emma Dau on Unsplash

Photo by Emma Dau on Unsplash

Why is it important?

While there is little doubt that professional football is experiencing commodification, the reality is that football clubs are not simply businesses, nor can they ever aspire to be organisations driven solely by expanding or protecting economic value. Rather, clubs hover uncertainly between being businesses and community assets.