Football Funding- The FA
The majority of football funding, goes through the governing body, the FA, which as one of its most import responsibilities, hands out the current £70 million total fund to the clubs; big or small.
There are many sources of which the FA generates the funding to supply the public with football fixtures and training. However, the majority of the funding comes from just four major sources. Firstly television income from BskyB and the BBC, which generates just under 50% of the total funding for football in return for the broadcasting rights of the matches they want to show. Secondly the sponsorship deals of which the FA has with its five major companies Pepsi, Calrsburg, Umbro, Mc Donald’s and Nationwide. These entire put together, generates 23% of the income to the sport. The remaining two sources of income come from international matches and competition payouts which make up a total of 24% of the total income. The pie chart Right expresses this data clearer.
The FA has been able to use its major properties namley England football team and the FA cup, to genertate television income through its domestic contract with BskyB and the BBC. It has also rececently initited with a four year sponsorship that they not only use to generate income for football, but also meet there aims and objectives, by using each of the products to aim at a particular group as shown below.
Each Partner is directly linked to one of the five key strands of football - "the pillars" - identified in The FA's long term strategy:
- Men's football - our mass market (Partner - Carlsberg)
- Women's football - our growth market (Partner - Nationwide)
- Youth football - our future market (Partner - Pepsi)
- Community football - our "classroom" and our "showroom" (Partner - McDonald's)
- Elite football - our "showcase" (Partner - Umbro)
Each Partner has access to The FA's top two brands - The FA Cup and England - and a share of exposure to all other pillars.
Partners are also linked to important grass roots development activities in each pillar, which in turn are carefully aligned to delivery of The FA's strategic plan. The scheme builds the base from which football's future can be developed in this country. There will be benefits....
- For Fans: The FA Cup and England team "returned" to the country.
- For FA Partners: a more dynamic and less cluttered environment. Clear link from top of game to grass roots
- For The FA: Protection of key brands, less complex commercial arrangements, accelerated activity in key development areas (e.g. women's, youth), better financial return to football.
Football Funding-The Premier league
The massive interest which surrounds the professional game is clearly reflected in the annual turnover of the FA premier league, which is now exceeds £200 million of income. Most of which comes from its links with big media companies BBC and BskyB. A breakdown of this is illustrated in the pie chart to the right.
As you can see the majority of the funding comes from the 90% of income generated by television contracts. The remaining 10% is made up from sponsorship deals.
Since the inception of the Premier league in 1992 some clubs have reaped unprecedented financial benefits, largely through the redistribution of television moneys, but also through additional funding for professional centres of excellence and stadium development.
The system for distributing television money to clubs from the television companies is as follows;
- 50% is distributed to the clubs in the premiership equally
- 25% for the number of television appearances
- 25% is based upon the final league position in the table. The higher you are, the more money you get.
The table below shows how television funds are distributed to each premier league club in the 2002/2003 season.
Professional Clubs
A full time professional football clubs are now ran on a highly commercial basis, although not all clubs can command the same finacial resources as others. Comercialism has always been part of football, but following the formation of the Premier league in 1992 two different finacial teirs have emerged to split the game. Due to its worldwide appeal, membership of the premier league brings with it a range of commercial oppertunities that simply cannot be accessed by the teams in the lower leagues. These include significant shares in television revenue, interest from high-profile sponsors, increased season ticket and gate recipts, and greater merchandising oppertunities. These trands are perfectly illastrated by Manchester united Football club, which from its excecive merchandiding and comercilaism has become no doubt the richest football club in the world. As you can see from the table below, which shows the income of the club.
Further Evidance that the game is adapting to commercial forces can be seen in the number of clubs that have floated themseleves onto the stock market. Usally to generate substancial funds to create captital and adapt the stadia or buy new players to gain a better reputation. So far there have been 17 clubs that have floated themselves on the stock market, since the first team did, tottenham Hotspurs in the early 1980’s. The share prices for a selection of clubs can be seen in the table below. Data was taken form on thursaday 15th April 2004
Football Funding- Voluntering Funcing
There are aproximatly 46,000 vonlantry clubs in the united kingdom, with a combined membership of 1.6 million. Most volountry clubs rely heavily on income from subscriptions, small sponsorships arrangements, donations and a range of fund rasining activities, such as bag packing at super markets. In a growing number of cases, clubs have been successful in securing grant aid from sources like the national lottery and the football trust.
Football Funding- Grants
In 1993 the national lottery Act paved the way fro the Uk’s first National Lottery. Although the lottery is regulated by centeral government, a commercial consortium called camolot was awarded a seven year licence to run it. This was once again renewed again in 2002.
Out of every pound spent on the lottery, nearly 28 pence is divided between six good causes which include arts, sports, charaties, heratiage, celebrating the millenium and a new cause health, education and enviroment. As an average percentage, the sport cause recivies around 16.6% of the total lottery funds. This means that an estimated £200 million will be given to sporting needs of the uk including football causes.
Football Funding- Sport England
Sport England is accountable to parliament throug DCMS. Its members are appointed by the seceratry of state for culture, media and sport. With its funds sport Englandworks in partnership with the public, volountry and private sectors in order to fulfil these stratrgic aims. Thses aims are best understood through the sport England Slogan “More people, More Places, More Medals” In order for sport England to achivie these aims it has developed a number of initiatives, that form part of four main prgrammes, namely active schools, active communities and world class players. As most of these iniatives are ran alongside other partners such as local schools, all of the sports including football and tennis etc will benefit from the injection of cash.
Sport England’s involvement in Football
Sport England funds the Football Association (FA) with, supporting their development plan. Football has been named as one of the 10 England priority sports. In the immediate future, Sport England will be working closely with the FA to produce a business plan for the sport, which includes funding. It does not however fund men’s professional football.
Football is also involved in the following Sport England initiatives:
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For girls’ football, County Sports Partnerships - currently working with 41 partnerships
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Awards for All - with funding of more than £6,726,625 for various projects
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Step into Sport – currently implementing their strategy
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Racial Equity - achieved the preliminary standard
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Club Development Programme – receiving £9.4 million primarily for youth academies
Development programmes
Sport England is a funding partner of The Football Foundation, which was established to bring a variety of benefits to
Local communities through grass roots football. The Foundation’s main goals are to:
- Develop a new generation of modern facilities in parks, local leagues and schools
- Provide investment to increase participation in grass roots football
- Strengthen the links between football and the community, harnessing its potential as a force for good in society.
Previous funding
Year National Community
1995 – 1996 £11,250 £6,226,654
1996 – 1997 £45,000 £9,082,435
1997 – 1998 £45,000 £16,855,978
1998 – 1999 £172,990 £143,561,034
1999 – 2000 £174,025 £12,396,847
2000 – 2001 £132,000 £7,483,498
2001 – 2002 £108,000 £28,891,218
2002 – 2003 £0 £8,422,637
2003 – 2004 £0 £1,128,221
Note: National funding is a total of Exchequer funding and the World Class Programme. Community funding is a total of the following programmes: Community Capital, Safer Sports Grounds, Active Communities Development Fund, all Active Sports Programmes, Community Athletics Refurbishment Programme, Football Youth Development, School Sport Coordinators, Sport Action Zones and Awards for All. The summary is by the financial year, according to the start date of the award period – an award may continue over a number of years.
Football Funding- Players Wages
Although the game in the Premier League is generally in good financial health, there have been concerns about the amount of money that many players are now demanding from their clubs. Players’ of the ‘maximum wage’in the 1960’s, but are nothin compared with the developments since the late 1990’s.
Top Players can now earn as much as £50,000 a week as a result of changes to transfer rules, and the influx of money into the game from sponsors and television companies. This as ypu can well imagine, takes up a considerable amount of money that is given to the Club via the FA and other lucrative deals. The table to the right illastartes what percentage is taken up from the clubs annual income on players wages.
As you can see from the table, as the team gets lower in the premier league, the popularity of the club becomes lower. Therefore there are fewer sponsorship deals, which means a greater porportion of the funds has to go to the players wages, in comparision to the teams in the premier league which has to use up a smaller percentage of the funds.
Football and the Mass Media
The relationship between the game of football and the mass media is very close and has been subject of intense debate. At most people exsperience the game of football via the media rather than activly participating and spectating at events. It is important to understand that as the development in media technoology has evolved, the media relationship between football growers ever stronger.
There are many forms of mass media that play a pivitol role in the way in which the game is ran. In particular the game has been influenced via the following forms;
Newspapers, magazines and books
Newspapers, magazines and books have influenced the footballing world since the middle of the nineteenth century , when a successful sports newspaper, ‘sporting life’ introduced a new idea; to include pages just dedicated to sports- mainly football. This in turn forced many of the other newspapers to introduce sections to there newspapers which reported on sporting events. This is still carried out today, with the largest newspapers etc have full page pull outs dedicated to the game. Football also has provided great subject matter for numerous books and specialist magazines aimed at a variaty of ages.
Radio
The main breakthrough for Radio came between 1926 and 1939, when the number of radio licences rose from 2 million to 8 million and the number of householdswith access to a radio reached 71%. At this time the BBC was the sole broadcater and used its influence to broadcast football fixtuers across the country. Nowdays the BBC still plays a leading role in sports broadcasting, most notably through its 5 live channel.
Due to new technology, sporting events from around the world can be herd on didgitial radios, for as little as £70 for a handset.
Television
Of all of the media, it is television that has exerted the biggest influence on the development of modern football. The BBC began broadcasting a limited black and white service during the latter years of the 194’s. By the time commercial television came around in the 1950’s in the form of ITV, football one of the main way it was used to encourage more people to hire or purchase sets . since then, television owenership has continued to gro, so that nearly all households in the uk now have access to at least one set.
In terms of football broadcasting, one of the most influential developments in providing footballing programmes came in 1984 when cable television and broadcasting Act , which was cleared the way for subscription televisionin the form of satalite and cable. Before this legislation, football could only veiwed on free-to-air terrestrial channels like BBC1 &BBC2, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5. Following the merger of Sky TV with the British Satalite broadcating in 1991, sky Sports was launched as the country’s first subscription channel. In its first year sky sports showed over 7000 hours of sport; of which football made up a high porportion of shows. This was significantly more than all the terestrial channels combined.
In 1996, it screened Frank Bruno’s defence of his heavyweight title as its first ‘pay-per-veiw’ event, which required veiwers to pay an additional one-off-fee to veiw the match. This is now common practice for larger games of football, such as the FA premeier ship final etc.
More recently,the introduction of digitial television has enabled Sky sports to introduce the concept of interactive television, which provides subscribers with extra services such as match staistics and action replays at the touch of the red button.
While satlaite and cable veiwing has increased significantly since its inception in 1989, it should be noted that free-to-air terrestrial channels still dominate the market for television audiences.
The table below shows the annual percentage shares of viewing between 1997 and the latest figures 2002. The data was taken from BARB.co.uk (television statistics)
Audience size and profile
With the games enduring popularity it has meant that the media has not been slow to use football as a means of attracting large audience. Just like tabloid newspaper ‘The Sun’ and The ‘Dailiy Mirror’ which uses football to secure its market ( Lower class football loving fans). The same is true for television;
- 35% of all adults are interested in football , making it the number one sport.
- 16.5 Million adults enjoy watching football on television, again putting it at the top of the veiwing list.
- The biggest televison audience for football in the world was in 1998. England Vs Argintenia. It attracted 26 million veiwers worldwide.
Football has a broad appeal that may be spreading due the continuing better marketing of clubs and the FA. However, this does not mean that the media fail to recognise the main characteristics of their audiences. Skysports has tried to classify which of its footballing audiences fall into specific catorgories; the results of which are on the ajacent page.
Audience Profile of Sky Sports Football Supporters
Adults by Sex
Viewers By class
Viewers By age
Hours Dedicated to football on the Television
As well as commanding the largest audiences, football is also the most extensively covered sport in the media. The table below show the time devoted to football on the television.
The research above, from Mintel, has identified that there are currently 2,367 opportunities to watch professional league and cup football in England each season, excluding Scottish and non league competitions. As part of this research it was also established that football coverage is on the increase and currently accounts for 5,316 broadcasting hours a year.
Inches dedicated to Football
The sheer amount of football coverage in the media can also be measured through the column space dedicated to football games and the player’s private lives.
In respect to mass-circulation newspapers, the sports section has always played a vital role in helping sustain market position. In the early years, when football sections were first introduced, all of the coverage was centred on the games played and individual player’s performances; more recently though the public’s appetite for newsworthy stories about private lives off the pitch has created a new genre in sports journalism.
An excellent example of this is David Beckham’s coverage, of him both on the pitch and off it. David Beckham has not only created great newspaper stories, whilst on the pitch, kicking a rival player and getting sent off, but also whilst off the pitch; an alleged affair with several women and his fashion disasters etc.
Either way, whenever Beckham has been up to something from the little things such as buying a new car to getting fooled during a game, you can guarantee that somewhere in the world he and his wife will be in a tabloid newspaper, somewhere in the world.
Football on the Internet
The most recent form of media; the internet serves a large proportion of up to date information across to its footballing fans. With its increasing popularity and ever increasing speed to downloading information the internet provides quick access to club websites that host information on future fixtures, merchandise and activity games etc to its fans. In addition it also serves as a place for other fans to disgust issue surrounding the club. The internet also allows people to access live images anywhere in the world of games happening thousands and thousands of miles away in Manchester, via a computer and the internet.
To the many benefits of the internet, it also in the past has served as a pain in the arse. When information surrounding players names have been kept away from controversial stories, such as the Rape allegations in London; the internet was the only place that those names could be access, as tabloid newspapers could not print them due to being bound to silence through legislation.
Importance of football to the media
There can be little doubt that the mass media view football and sports alike as a key weapon in the battle for viewers, listeners and readers. More recently, football in particularly has become such a great source of revenue that the media are prepared to pay ever increasing sums of money to secure broadcasting rights to key football matches. The diagram shows the key features that shape the media’s interest towards football.
For newspapers and commercial television, companies like ITV and Sky there are strong relationships between readership or audience size and turnover. Publicly funded broadcasting organisations like BBC are equally concerned about audience size, though more as an indicator of its own quality and value for money than a source of income of profit. What is significant in all instances is the role football plays in securing large audiences. In the context of football, the media has always broadcasted the key events as it simply caters to the demands of the viewers which have always been there.
In relation to pay-for view television and newspapers the added expense reflects viewing figures, in comparison to ‘free-to air channels’ which the viewing figures are much higher. Table below shows the difference in the viewing figures between ‘pay-to-view’ and ‘free-to-air’ channels. Figures are shown in millions.
Audience Profile
In order to maximise the size of an audience it is vital that football coverage represents the interests of a particular type of reader, listener or viewer. Thus meaning that for every TV, article etc that the media has based it on a footballing topic, it is aimed at which the most people are going to read/watch. For the profile of the ‘News of the World’ which is working class, is different to the middle-class sector profile of the Sunday times. There the News of the world as a commercial decision has decided to devote more space to the stronger working class appeal of football than say the Sunday times which does have football coverage but not to such an extent.
In addition, the television side of the media also creates a profile to which they aim there coverage at. Sky Sports once commissioned research into football audience and discovered that audience tended to be younger and affluent males who fit into one of the three categories in the table below.
Consequently Sky sports has attempted to appeal to satisfy the needs by providing the needs of its main audience, football fans with new technology features to its programming. These include newer camera angles and in depth statistical analysis at the touch of the red button.
How the Mass media has influenced football
The debate surrounding the influences of the mass media on football matches has continued for a number of years, but with the introduction of new media forms such as satellite, cable and digital television that the debate has intensified in recent years. Like any argument, the two sides points to the negatives and the positives about the media’s involvement. On one hand, the media has increased revenues for football’s governing bodies FIFA, the exposure of football to the wider audiences, as well as the promotion of healthy forms of competition. However, the other side of the coin is that the media’s influences into the games have only distorted the game, either for the media own financial gain or FIFA. Other things amongst the media’s reasons for covering football so closely, have also come about due to the involvement with the teams in the premiership including;
- Funding of football
- Media Presentation of football
- Rules of the Game
- Event Programming
- The effects on the football participation
- The conduct of players and supporters
How the Mass media has influenced football: Funding
The financial rewards that stem from the media’s involvement in football are now a key feature of the way football is organised in a global market place. For example terrestrial channels, the justification for securing television rights to key football matches is to gain an advantage in the battle for viewers. Football is seen as attractive in the ratings battle because it has the capacity to attract large numbers of viewers, sometimes on a worldwide scale. For subscription channels like sky the importance of securing high-profile football matches lies in the fact that most income is generated from direct- to – home subscribers.
How the Mass media has influenced football: Participation
A feature of the media’s involvement in sport is the way in which some footballers are able to achieve celebrity status both on and off the pitch the field they play for. For international starts like Ronldo and David their ability as footballers combined with huge personnel earnings with private sponsorship deals make them the subject of much media attention. The same can be said of our home-grown celebrities, like David Beckham, whose exploits off the field and on tend to command the same level media attention as his performances on it.
While most famous footballers generally welcome the attention of the media, there have been cases when the media has been accused of using footballers names to sell papers, for there own financial gain. One such example is the revelations that Manchester united player missed his drugs test deliberately to not get caught. As a consequence the player was not only embarrassed by his miss judgement of the FA’s drug team, but his public conception of him was totally damaged. The newspaper, instead of admitting that they were solely doing it for financial reason, stated that they did it to expose the immoral and illegal behaviour of a sportsman.
How the Mass media has influenced football: Rules of the Game
Football is controlled by its governing body on both an international level by FIFA and at a national level the FA. An important aspect of the organisational duties, of both organisations is to formulate and amend the rules of the game. Although the media cannot directly influence the way in which football is governed, there have been instances when the media have exerted pressure on FIFA and the FA to amend rules to suit there personnel needs. The main reasons for such action is to allow larger audiences by making football ‘media friendly’ and much more entertaining to there target audiences.
One of the main ways in which the media has influenced the rules and regulations is when media technology is used to assist match officials. Positive examples of this include the use of slow motion replays in football matches to show whether or not a player was offside or fouling another player deliberately; thus helping adjudicate close- call decisions. The video evidence in football matches highlights serious foul play not spotted by the referee, therefore making it a cleaner fairer game for all.
On the negative side some people believe that the media interference into match decisions threatens the very nature of the game. In the case of football; this has always prided itself on being a fast flowing sport with few interruptions, but proposals for the use of media technology to help referees make decisions have raised concerns that the game will become fragmented by lengthy delays while officials scrutinise the evidence.
However, it is not only the influences from the media that amend and imitate rules into the game. One example of this is when FIFA attempted to encourage attacking from behind play by outlawing the tackle from behind. Although most supporters would applaud moves to eliminate violent play, some fans fear that the original nature of the game is now being compromised and that football may one day become a non contact sport.
On a more positive note other changes, such as three points for a win and the elimination of the back pass to the goalkeeper, have been widely acclaimed as improving the game’s quality and appeal. This has prompted FIFA to consider further changes, such as the use of goal-line cameras to adjudicate, whether the ball has crossed the line and imposing time limits on goal-keepers to release the ball more quickly, as shown in the article below.
How the Mass media has influenced football: Media Influences to Football Scheduling
If television has brought some influence to bear the rules it has certainly had an impact on the scheduling of football matches. Up until the intervention of BskyB, it was usual for nearly all football matches to start at 3.00pm on a Saturday afternoon. In order to maximise audience size, televised games are now scheduled at times when typical fans have no there football commitments, such as Friday and Monday evenings and Sunday afternoons.
More recently, the deals struck by different television companies for the rights to European competitions have resulted in football being shown every day of the week. For some, this demonstrates televisions flexibility to the needs of the viewers. For others, football coverage has now reached the point of saturation and there is a fear that fans will simply become bored by the game.
How the Mass media has influenced football: Media’s Presentation of the Game
Footballs presentation through the media is one that merely reports the games in a subjective manner; highlighting the highs and lows, strengths and weakness, triumphs and defeats. This creating the impression that from its wide spread coverage across the range of media outlets, the sort does not deal with any issues relating to politics or power.
However, this is not to underestimate the power of the media to pick up and drop off which sports, including football which is worthy of coverage on its programmes/ newspaper articles. Currently there is an influx to the amount of media coverage related to footballing topics, with the majority of articles reporting on the premiership. But this was not always the cup, during the time of the Rugby world cup of 2003, footballing topics took the back seat as rugby became more popular than football, due to the coverage of the games. Thus allowing the media to satisfy the publics need for the coverage of the particular sport.
The media does have a strategy though when it provides the viewer/reader with the coverage of the games they want. By providing them with a familiar format and one they readily understand, the media can insure that the captive audiences that they have managed to gain so far are not put off by all of a sudden a different format. For example, the lexis of which the media chooses to use when reporting on say a match normally is associated with the semantic field of war. Words such as ‘crushed’, ’destroyed’ and ‘humiliated’ are often associated with the defeated.
The entertainment side of the game are often evident in the media’s fascination with hyping up its audience so that they are ready for the game ahead. Important football matches, for example when England played Germany in the Final of euro 96, there was extensive coverage leading up o the match. Examples including the other teams profile and past performances. These articles are simply there to entertain the audience.
Although the style of presentation varies only slightly year in year out, it cannot be said that not all media genres follow the same pattern; as some media like to change there style up to date and fresh. Either way there is little doubt that sometimes, keeping the same format can ensure that the audiences are captivated and remain a reader/viewer.
Media Influences: conduct of players and supporters
Although football has always contained an unruly element, the difference today centres on the media’s ability to highlight instances of misbehaviour by players and spectators alike. During the 1970’s and 1980’s the decline in football attendances was attributed largely to the problem of hooliganism and has since been the subject of much academic research.
While theories about football hooliganism vary, a number of researchers have pointed to the way in which the media have used this issue either to sell more newspapers or certain groups, especially young working-class unemployed males, as scapegoats for wider problems in society.
Of more concern to the football authorities at the present time is the behaviour of players on the field of play. Football has always contained its fair share of disciplinary problems, but more recently the debate surrounding the conduct of players on the pitch has intensified.
Trends In football
The football industry is continually changing and developing. Therefore people involved within the industry must remain vigilant to the why the trends occur, and how they influence the development of the sport. Examples of these trends include;
- Increasing participation in football related activities for example football package holidays/trips
- Decreasing participation in football related activities for example, reduced numbers visiting stadium to watch the game
- The changing expectations of participants and spectators for example, football players wage increases
- Changing markets for football activities e.g. the aging population and health of the customers
- Technological developments E.g. fabrics and materials used in construction of sports grounds, equipment and design.
- The influence of fashion on sport e.g. wearing trainers and popularity in sports
Women’s Participation in Football
Since people began participating in playing football, it has always been predominately males that played the game, from a working class background. However, from research this would appear to be changing. During the 1990’s there was an only 80 girls team, but by the latter half of the 90’s the figure had risen to 1,000. The number of female players also increased from 21,500 in 1996 to over 34,000 in 1998. The results from the survey show the details much clearer.
With more young girls playing football in schools and through football academy style venues for example the professional footballers association (PFA). In past research MORI found that 51% of all secondary school girls had participated in football some form, some time or another.
In terms of football spectating the future appears to be equally bright. Although football remains the preserve of young men, the sir Norman Chester centre for football research has established that females now constitute around 12% of all spectators. It also found that less than half of all fans now watch the game in all male groups.
The influence of females within the game has been reflected in the media’s response to the increase in female participation. Results from the AXA FA women’s premier league are widely reported throughout the newspapers in addition to the weekly column dedicated to women’s football.
In context to other countries, the UK still remains behind the likes of Germany and the USA, where the percentage of females participating in football is considerably higher.
Sports tourism
Now that the average person has a greater amount of disposable income, the sports tourism trend will increase in the years to come. At the moment sports tourism is even more popular than ever before and is set to increase even further due to the following reasons;
- A greater desire to travel, coupled with the increased disposable income levels of the average man/women
- Lower air fares and easier travel, especially long haul flights
- Greater interest in football matches outside the premiership
- More information on and awareness of international sports fixtures, especially via the internet and global sports broadcast.
- The growing popularity of short break, activity and special- interest holidays
- Improved marketing by the sports and tourism industries
Currently there are many footballing events in the UK that attract large numbers of spectators, both from abroad and within the UK. For example, in 1996 the FA, held ‘Euro 96’ in which it attracted 280,000 visitors spectators across the event; many travelling from various parts of Europe in order to see there country play.
The trend of football tourism has become so inevitably popular, that during the year 2000, the British tourist Authority (BTA) launched an interactive sports tourism page, which with its partners with the culture, media and sport, UK Sport and other sporting bodies (including the FA), sport sponsors and tourism organisations hope to strengthen the sport speciation holidays through its four objectives;
- To position footballing holidays any other sporting holidays as part of British tourism products along side heritage, culture, lifestyle and the countryside.
- To raise awareness within the football industry of the economic benefits and potential clientele of foreign visitors
- To contribute to the winning of major international football events
- To complement the football association’s strategies set by the department media and sport.
An example of the current packages that are going to become even accessible to the fans of tomorrow can be found at . The company specialise in providing its customers with packages centred on football matches. In this example the company offer packages surrounding Arsenal Football club.
Tennis Introduction
History of Tennis
Tennis originated in France in the 12th century and was referred to as "jeu de paume," the game of the palm, played with the bare hand.
As early as the 12th century, a glove was used to protect the hand. Then starting in the 16th century and continuing until the middle of the 18th century, rackets of varying shapes and sizes were introduced.
The racket as we know it today, but with a lopsided head, thick gut, and longer handle was being used in 1750. The shape of the racket enabled the player to scoop balls out of the corners (walls and floor were considered in-bounds) and also to put ‘cut’ or ‘spin’ on the ball.
The Tennis Ball
The first tennis balls were made of leather stuffed with wool or hair. They were hard enough to cause a serious injury and could even kill someone. Starting in the 18th century, ¾" strips of wool were wound tightly around a nucleus made by rolling a number of strips into a little ball. Then string was tied in many directions around the ball and a white cloth covering was sewn around the ball. From the beginning of lawn tennis in the 1870’s, India rubber, made from a vulcanisation process invented by Charles Goodyear in the 1850s, was used to manufacture lawn tennis balls.
Origins of seeding
Seeding was created to prevent selected players in a tournament meeting until the later stages of the draw. It was first used in the US National Championships in 1922 and then adopted in the Wimbledon Championships in 1924. Each nation was allowed to nominate up to four players in the singles and two pairs in the doubles who were then drawn to fall in different quarters of the draw. Seeding on merit was adopted with selected players being placed in fixed positions in 1927.
Origins of Scoring
In the early days, both rackets and tennis scoring were used for lawn tennis. With rackets scoring a game comprised 15 aces, which could be won only by the server who remained "hand in" until the loss of a rally. Tennis scoring was adopted for the first Wimbledon Championships in 1877 and became the standard.
Scoring; 15, 30, 40
The origins of the 15, 30, and 40 and so on are not known, but are thought to have medieval and French roots. One possible explanation is that the scoring system is based on the presence of a clock face at the end of the tennis court. A quarter move of the appropriate hand was made after each rest, with the score being called as 15, 30, or 45 as the case might be. When the hand moved to 60, the circuit was completed and so was the game.
Deuce and Love
The term "deuce" is derived from the French "deux", where an advantage of two points has to be gained. "Love" is generally taken as being derived from the French "l"oeuf", the egg, symbolising nothing. It has also been claimed that the term "love" comes from the English phrase "neither for love nor for money", i.e., for nothing.
Sudden Death
The first significant change in scoring was made during the US Professional Indoor Championships in Philadelphia in early 1970 when the Sudden Death nine-point system was used without official sanction.
At six games all each player alternated with two service points in a best of nine point series. If the scoring was set at four points all, the last serving player had a third service point with the receiver having choice of sides.
The outcome of that rally decided the set, or match. The system’s weakness was that a player could go from start to finish without losing a single point on service and yet still be beaten.
Scoring; 12 point or 9 points
In the summer of 1970, the International Tennis Federation sanctioned the experimental use of the tie-break leaving the choice of system up to each national association. Great Britain and other nations adopted a 12-point method and the US favoured the nine-point system.
In the 12-point method, service changes after the initial point and then after every two. The player first reaching a total of seven points wins the game. If the score is tied at six points all, a lead of two points must be established.
A revised tie-break system was adopted in 1971 to operate when the score reached 8-all in any set except in the third or fifth set of a three set of five set match, respectively. The 12-point system was used first at Wimbledon in 1971.
In 1979, the tie-break regulations were changed to operate at 6-all in any set except the final set of a match. From 1975 it became part of the rules of the game as an optional scoring method, to be used at six or eight games all.
The Development of Tennis
Since the start of the 20th century, the sports industry as a whole has undergone radical developments in the way in which they are participated, watched and are available to the general public. Meaning which some of the most popular sporting activities have had to adapt to insure that they remain popular and at the top of the league of sporting activities that people participate in during there leisure time. Tennis is no exception.
As it stands tennis currently stands at one of the most popular sports of the UK, even though it has had to remain vigilant to a variety of influences that has affected the leisure industry as a whole.
The sport of tennis has developed considerably more so since the end of the second world war, when the general public had more money to spend on themselves, and most importantly time to spend on leisure and recreation activities, such as tennis. A clear indication of how tennis has adapted to the times, is through the level of attendance at matches. As you can see in the table below the most prestigious sporting events in tennis, spectator levels have continued to grow year in year out. So much so that the average spectator rate for each of the two week event has reached the max capacity of the ground.
However, this level of speciation has only become more popular in recent years, as it has become fashionable to be connected with the event. With exception to this fixture, levels of Tennis participation, has decreased more so since its hay days in the 1970’s when the most number of people came to watch tennis matches. This is probably due to the fact that most other leisure and recreation industries simply were not as widely available to the majority of the UK. In addition, the reduction of speciation levels in tennis has also come about due to the developments in communication technology, such as television and radio etc. This has led to the lowest attendances to a tennis match back in 1994, when terrestrial channel BBC began broadcasting extensive coverage of events, such as Wimbledon.
Although the Tennis industry has decreased overall in its spectating popularity, in recent years (with exception to Wimbledon) it has also had to compete with other new popular leisure and recreation activities. For example, since the late 1980’s, skate boarding has also become a very popular activity to participate during leisure time. In addition to the common misconception that tennis is a middle class sport, tennis spectator and participations have dropped and expectations of the game have increased.
Now days with people in general having a greater disposable income (average person receives £51.20 per person, per week to spend on leisure activities) and a larger variety of leisure opportunities than ever before, tennis clubs, had had to clean up there act to attract enough custom to remain operational.
In response the tennis industry providers such as LTA and David Lloyd, local authorities and private clubs had to increase the thinking in the way in which they provide there tennis facility/services. To enable them to get the edge over there rivals, facility providers such as the ones above, had to think in many wave lengths in order to get the custom. One of the ways in which this is done, is by providing specialist technological surfaces to its customers. Allowing them to play the best game possible. In addition clubs have also had to think about the ancillary facilities it has had to offer, such as restaurants and social events off the court. Similarly, demands have also been made by customers to make the game an all-year round activity, which has been the main influence in the extraordinary growth in in-door tennis facilities.
However, the development of tennis in recent years has not been so successful. The main controversial threat to tennis is the increase in participation levels. Some say this is good as it is increasing the numbers that participate in the game, however, other disagree as these people only play for the purpose of health and not for competition. An issue that has increasingly grown in the recent years and threatens the sport in the future. Organisations, such as main tennis provides, like David Lloyd have implemented schemes that specialise in health development through tennis along side its normal tennis program of training and competitions.
Scale and Economic Importance
Tennis without a doubt is one of the worlds most important racket sports ever played. Participated by millions upon millions of people every year and watched by even more- tennis is the most widely known and participated racket sport. Through which a considerable economic activity is generated.
However, evidence to support this statement is limited and hard to come by, although information on consumer spending and value of volunteer labour provide useful indicators. It is thought that British consumers spend £3.5 Billion a year participating in sport, although tennis expenditure accounts only a modest proportion of this. Total spending on goods for racket sports participation is barely £200 million, which for an average player is roughly £30 a year. These trends are given further weight when the spending patterns of racket sports participants are compared with their team-playing counterparts. The tables below show clearly the economic significance that is made from tennis.
Sports clothing purchased during the last 12 months
Sports footwear purchased during the last 12 months
Spending on sports equipment during last 12 months
Tennis participants overall do not contribute much towards the economy through the purchasing of clothes and sports equipment; the fact is it still generates £200 million pounds. Small in comparison to football, but substantial none the less.
Even though it is apparent that tennis does not generate a considerable amount towards the economy, it does however have an interesting expenditure pattern for tennis services. In terms of the economy this can be seen as very encouraging.
For example, Mintel has recently found that the an average family joining a private facility like David Lloyd’s leisure club would on average be prepared to spend £1000 a year on membership, activities and related purchases. This means that even though the family wouldn’t be adding to the contribution of the economy directly through buying rackets etc it is doing it indirectly as David Lloyd provides tennis facilities.
Tennis’ economic significance; Employment
The majority of the employment, surrounding the tennis industry, comes from the voluntary employees that offer there time to help support the game that they love.
In the voluntary sector, tennis participation remains strong, which indicates the volunteer labour is still a vital element in the game’s overall development. It is possible to assess the monetary value of this labour by multiplying a shadow wage by the total number of volunteer worked hours. This has been worked out below;
If all of the tennis volunteers were paid a standard wage of £8.31 per hour, their efforts combined would contribute to approximately £35.5 million to the economy. Measured in this way tennis is the most valuable sport in the UK.
The Organisation of Tennis
Participation
Tennis is the most popular participant racket sports in the UK; 2 % of the adult population claim to play the game regularly. However, recent trends in the game have sent the participation levels down. This maybe due to many factors including; loss of interest, time constraints or even a preference to participate in sport for health rather than competitive reasons. The graph below shows how the participation levels of tennis has dropped considerably even in the past decade. The current survey estimates that there are 3.5m players, of which 1.16m are dedicated or regular players playing at least 25 times a year.
As the graph clearly shows, the main captive participants for tennis, are people that play on an infrequent basis. In addition the graph also shows that the more dedicated the player becomes to the game the lower the level of participation rate is. The largest drop in tennis participation was during 1996, when the game took the back seat in summer games popularity due to the euro 96 matches taking place in England.
In addition, the game also has a stronger following of participants aged between four to seventeen; when it is taught in many public schools as part of there compulsory physical education lessons. Between the ages of 18-54, the participant levels drop to an average of 450000 participants a year playing the game. The participant level considerably drops after 55, when most of the players this age are unable to keep up with the fast pace of the game due to natural aging process.
Another piece of research also showed how the total leisure time, was shared with other sporting activities, such as swimming and football. The research shows that tennis players claim on average to participate in more than 3 other sports in addition to tennis, with swimming (lengths or lessons), football, aerobics/gym/work out and jogging/running emerging as the most mentioned overlap
The playing standards of tennis, shows through research that the majority of players are at novice standard (52%), and the minority of people that play tennis professionally. The graph below, shows the varying levels of standards of tennis ability.
Other facts relating to tennis participation include;
Playing Restrictions: The main restrictions to playing are time (39%), work (5%), family (5%) and school (3%).
Playing Reasons: The main reasons for playing tennis are: enjoyment (73%), to keep fit (38%) and social reasons (26%).
Days Played: The mean number of days played by all standards is 29 per year, rising to 45 days for club social players and 76 days for club team and above.
Playing Partners: People play most often with their friends (56%), family or relations (32%) or other club players (11%)
Another way in which tennis participation can be measured is the TV viewing and tournament events. These figures show how tennis has maintained its position as one of the UK’s most popular sports.
- 24% of all adults are interested in tennis, making it fifth sport in overall popularity in the UK.
- 1% of all adults pay to watch live tennis tournaments; the main tennis events in the UK attract around 666,335 spectators every year, and more…
- 11 million adults enjoy watching tennis on television, making it the fifth most popular televised sport.
- Wimbledon is the best-attended UK tennis tournament, drawing a crowd of 424,998 over its two weeks in June and July yearly and 32,692 average spectators daily.
As all of the research concludes the participation of tennis, is less popular than other popular UK sports such as football. However, there is still a major following, especially in the younger generation of participants.
In recent trends of the game the participation levels are down. This maybe due to many factors including; loss of interest, time constraints or even a preference to participate in sport for health rather than competitive reasons. One of the ways in which this can be monitored is the TV viewing and tournament events. These figures show how tennis has maintained its position as one of the UK’s most popular sports.
- 24% of all adults are interested in x, making it fifth sport in overall popularity in the UK.
- 1% of all adults pay to watch live tennis tournaments; the main tennis events in the UK attract around 666,335 spectators every year, and more…
- 11 million adults enjoy watching tennis on television, making it the fifth most popular televised sport.
- Wimbledon is the best-attended UK tennis tournament, drawing a crowd of 424,998 over its two weeks in June and July yearly and 32,692 average spectators daily.
Participation of children; In & Out of School
There are currently almost 4 million tennis players in the Uk, of whom more than 1 million play at least once a fortnight at a club or sports facilities. Among the more frequent players there is fairly evenly divided between males and females, while over half are under the age of 24.
One of the most important factors in a young person’s decision to participate in tennis is the way in which they are exposed to the sport at school. In a recent survey conducted by MORI, it was found that the frequency of tennis participation in schools had risen from 16% in 1994 to 18% in 1999. The graphs on the adjacent page shows the most frequently played games during school lesson per year.
The research shows that the findings highlighted opposite demonstrate why the LTA is currently trying to initiate partnerships between schools and the wider community. At the heart of these initiatives are community Tennis Partnerships (CTP’s), which aim to create links between clubs, local schools and local authorities. To date 77 CTP’s have been established.
Although the introductions of CTP’s have generally been welcomed, some doubts remain as to whether or not they are being developed in the right locations. Some commentators believe that levels of tennis participation among young people will only increase significantly when facilities, equipment and coaching are provided in more deprived local areas.
Another way in which the LTA has developed tennis within the young is through developing the game, to make it more enjoyable and therefore encourage participation. The adjacent page shows how the LTA has done made the game child friendly.
What’s been achieved BY the Program
The table below shows the benefits that the scheme has given to the tennis industry;
Games played frequently in school lessons in the last school year (11) 1996
Games played frequently in school lessons in the last school year (11) 1999
The Organisation of tennis
The game of tennis is split up into four main sections; International, national, regional and local levels, and ran by several governing bodies including;
- International Tennis Federation (ITF)
- Association of Tennis Professional (ATP)
- Women’s Tennis Association (WTA)
International Tennis Federation
The ITF is the international governing body for tennis and is one of the world’s largest sport federation’s worldwide, representing five regional associations and 200 national associations. It has its origins in the international Lawn Tennis Federation (ILTF) formed in 1913. Its main responsibilities include;
- Administrating the rules of tennis, including the technical specifications for courts and equipment;
- Organising international competitions such as the grand slam events , the Davis cup and the Federation Cup.
- Structuring tennis by sanctioning international circuits and events like the ITF junior world ranking circuit and ITF veterans events;
- Funding a variety of tennis initiatives as part of its worldwide development programme.
The ITF consists of a President, Francesco Ricci Bitti, an Executive Vice President, Juan Margets, plus five Directors and over 80 staff based at the ITF's headquarters in London and around the world.
ATP tour WTA tour
The ATP tour organises the men’s professional tennis tour (excluding the four Grand Slam, events). The WTA tour is responsible for women’s professional tour which consists of nearly 60 events in 25 countries.
National Level
The modern game of tennis originated in England after a major Wingfeild published the first set of rules and marketed basic equipment in 1874. Not long afterwards the lawn tennis association (LTA) was et up as sport’s national governing body, a role that is still plays today. In Northern Ireland, tennis is governed by a separate organisation, Tennis Ireland (Ulster Branch), whereas the associations for Wales and Scotland are still affiliated with the LTA.
Another important role for the LTA is to oversee the development of the game at all levels. It has published a four year plan entitled ‘ A strategy for the New millennium- British Tennis and You’, which contains a number of initiatives, including;
- The provision of additional facilities through the indoor Tennis Initiative (ITI)
- Supporting the development of centres of excellence
- Training coaches through the LTA Coach Licensing A Scheme, as shown below in the diagram
Regional and Local Levels
The LTA channels of its support for grassroots tennis through its county offices. The aim of the LTA’s county administration is to provide an infrastructure which supports the development of tennis at a local level for its 2,386 affiliated clubs. The LTA is currently considering how it can assists clubs by providing resources which help them attract more members.
The funding of tennis
The commercial side to tennis established in 1968 when the tennis authorities allowed professional players to enter main competitions. From this point on, the likes of Rod Laver, who had previously turned professional, returned to the tennis scene and amateurism soon disappeared from the highest levels of the game. The financial implications of the new professional era are largely dealt with by international and national governing bodies for sport.
As the national governing body for tennis in this country, the LTA is central to the funding of the game at all levels. A breakdown of the LTA’s annual income is shown in the table below;
Tournaments & Events
Wimbledon championships are the world’s most famous tennis tournaments and the major sources of income (73%) for both the LTA and the all England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC), whose facilities are used to stage the event.
The tournament itself generates the most of its income from the sale of television rights, paying spectators and more recently corporate hospitality.
Some commentators have blamed the tennis authorities for placing too much emphasis on corporate guests, many of whom prefer to watch the tennis from the comfort of their hospitality tent rather than visiting the courts themselves. As a result it has been claimed that dedicated tennis fans find it impossible to purchase tickets for important matches, even though games are often played in front of non capacity crowds.
Criticisms have also been levelled at the LTA for failing to invest enough money in the grassroots of the game. In response the LTA has pointed to a number of initiatives which it is now trying to implement, such as specialist indoor facilities, regional centres of excellence and community Tennis Partnerships (CTP’s) (see Sponsorship Partners)
As the LTA is a non profit making organisation a significant amount of income is reinvested in the game; mainly at grass root levels as this is where funding is needed most, to enable development of facilities and coaching initiatives.
Tennis Funding; Membership to clubs
One of the ways in a lot of funding is raised at a local level is achieved, is through local membership to a club. The average expected cost of joining a small tennis club with 3 or 4 courts among players who were currently non-members was £185; more than double the actual costs involved. This is set to grow in the years to follow as 40% of all player non-members claimed they would be very or quite interested in joining a small club if there was one in their area. In addition 27% also claimed that they would be very or quite interested in joining a slightly larger club with say 8 courts, a bar and some floodlit courts, costing closer to £150-170 a year.
Tennis in the Media
Tennis like all sports have been shaped considerably in recent years by the mass media coverage of matches and fixtures.
Audience size and profile of tennis
Tennis undoubtedly does not have the same profile within the media as other sports in the UK, like football. However, it does secure large audiences. In 2000 and 2001 13 million adults claimed that they enjoyed watching television, making it the fifth most popular sport of those surveyed.
The majority of England’s media attention is focused on Wimbledon fortnight, when tennis dominates the back and front pages of newspapers. Ina addition it also features a considerable amount of footage on television; especially on BBC when its normal programming is severely altered to accommodate live coverage. This is because Wimbledon World Championships is one of the significant ways to attract audiences, to its channels. The table below shows, how tennis attracts 8.1% of the sport viewings a year, which is ranked fourth in the television coverage table.
This audience percentage of tennis has continued to grow considerably over the years, as the tennis profile continues to expand; due to publicity and media coverage.
Despite some claims to the country, tennis spectating remains the reserve of the elderly middle class. This view is confirmed by research in to the profile of tennis spectators, as it shows that the common characteristics of tennis spectators include;
These results are also backed up by supporting evidence. The average player of tennis, as discovered in the general household questionnaire in 1996, found that based on the socio-economic classification categories, the majority of the players were from a middle class backing.
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Theses findings have important implications for the media and tennis. If the media are to benefit from tennis then itself needs to have a broad appeal. Similarly, tennis is equally aware that it needs the support of the media to help achieve this objective.
Hours devoted to Tennis
The importance of tennis to the media is reflected in the level of coverage it receives on television. The latest statistics shows that the amount of television time dedicated to tennis is around, 1,410 minutes on sky sports and Euro sport ad a further 206 hours on free to air terrestrial channels; which represents 8.1% of the free to air terrestrial channels and 6.4 % for that of sky sports and Euro Sports.
The hours devoted, to television also helps to spread the message of tennis, to help people from all backgrounds and abilities to find out where and how they can play.
In 2003, the British media, from news channels to consumer magazines, committed the equivalent of over £22 million worth of airtime and media space telling this story and promoting the game.
The LTA believe that working with our media partners to support tennis initiatives from grassroots up, we can help Britain become a great tennis nation.
Effects of Television on tennis participation
The effects of television on rates of tennis participation would seem to be significant, although there is always a debate as to how long any such impact may last. Certainly most tennis providers admit that their peak periods fall during or immediately after major televised tournaments like Wimbledon.
What really adds to the impact of television, however, is when home-grown players perform well in high profile events like Wimbledon or the Davis cup. In this respect the emergence of both Tim Henman and Greg Reseski in the world’s top ten has provided British tennis with its most successful performers for many years. What remains to be seen is whether either player has the ability to win a major tournament and the likely effect this could have on levels of tennis participation in this country.
Tennis on the Internet
Among those with Internet access, almost a quarter (23%) claimed to have ever made some tennis related enquiry, focusing primarily on accessing information on tennis (15%), tournaments (13%) or specific players (7%), though still with very few having yet bought or ordered tournament tickets (5%) or tennis equipment (5%) over the net.
Rules of the Game and Event Programming
The rules of tennis have remained largely unchanged over the years. Discussion of the future has forced on concerns that tennis has become fewer medium friendly due to advances in racket technology and the increased physical prowess of players. Racket technology in particular has been blamed for increasing dominance of servers, with the result that spectators and viewers have to make do with shorter rallies and a reduced variety of strokes, as in previous years. This has led to a consensus that tennis has become less entertaining and devoid ‘characters’.
Some of the changes which have been aired include the reduction of the size of service area in order to slow the service down, exerting pressure on the server by only allowing one serve, and making all players use the same rackets. At Wimbledon, experiments have already been conducted using low-pressure balls, although the effect on the nature of the game has proved negligible.
Tennis has no been slow to accommodate the interests of the media. At the Australian open in 1997, for example, a number of players complained about the scheduling of the matches in the heat of the mid-day sun in order to accommodate the interest of worldwide television.
In another development, both the men’s and the women’s Wimbledon singles finals have recently been rescheduled to take place on a weekend during prime time slots. The authorities determination to keep to the schedule , especially following interruptions for bad weather, has been questioned by a number of players who believe that they are asked to play too many games over too short a period of time.
The conduct of the players and Supporters
Generally speaking the conduct of tennis players and supporters does not provide the authorities with any major problems. This has not always been the case. In the 1970’s and early 1980’s players such as Ilie Nastasie, Jimmy Connors and perhaps most famously of all, John McEnroe, became notorious for their ill tempted antics on court.
In response, the ITF introduced a number of disciplinary measures, whereby players are forced to forfeit points for president bad behaviour. These moves seem to have been successful, with fewer confrontations now taking between players and umpires.
The notoriety of players like McEnroe and Nastasie stemmed largely from the way they were vilified by the press. At the time the press generally took the line those players who misbehaved and set a bad example to youngsters and should be punished accordingly. However, there is a sneaking suspicion that certain sections of the media were grateful for the newsworthy stories provided by such players. So much so that players in the 1970’s till the mid 1980’s had more stories dedicated to them than modern counterparts such as Tim Henman.
Trends in Tennis
Over the years the development of tennis has continued to adapt to make it the game that it is today. Among the many trends that have already been for filled in the game, other ones have yet to come. These are;
Changing expectations of participants and supporters
Changing expectations of participants and supporters e.g. Prize money at professional events, and seating and ancillary facilities at tennis stadia.
Developments in technology
Developments in technology affecting the design of rackets, playing surfaces and devices to help umpires officiate at matches.
Increase media coverage & fewer spectators at games
More people are going to watch the game via television. Therefore, more media coverage and a higher profile for tennis an less spectators visiting a . Research shows that all household members, roughly one in twenty-five claimed to have spectated at any professional tennis tournament over the past two years, equivalent to 2.2m individuals. Among players attending tournaments, 41% attended just one day, though the average was 4 days.
More access to tennis events/tickets etc via the internet
Most players with Internet access (48%) said that they would make some use of the net, focussing on buying or ordering tournament tickets (33%), accessing information on tennis (25%), tournaments (23%), or specific players (17%), and buying or ordering tennis equipment (17%)
