Football has attracted spectators to the stands in more than a hundred years, and even more into the television sets of the past few decades. A much newer phenomenon is the e-sport. The manufacturer EA Sports Fifa football game is among the most popular, and is the game that twelve of Sweden’s biggest football clubs will compete in with team of specially contracted e-sportare.
, SEF, manages the men’s league allsvenskan and superettan. It is also the SEF, which has been a driving force in getting their members – Sweden’s best football clubs – in the e-allsvenskan. Denmark, where the e-superligaen premiered in 2018, is something of a role model.
“Our job is to try and take advantage of our medlemsklubbars interests and also find new worlds that we have not taken advantage of in the past,” says Niclas Jansson, digital developer at SEF.
He continues:
” We know that many of the younger supporters of our team also are supporters to the Fifa players, they have grown up with this game. There is nothing that is exclusive to an under-20 or under-18 generation, but the game is strong there. So there is a way to tie these fans closer to our leagues (allsvenskan and superettan).
through a spelkonsolräknas not of the game as a sport, but this year, some of the country’s most classic sporting associations to be represented by the e-player as Lukas Gummesson (AIK), Emil Berggren (Djurgården) and David Eidhammer (Malmö FF).
have a written contract with between two and five Fifa players. The league which had kicked off on march 1, is determined during a final day on 25 may, where the eight best teams. The matches are broadcast via Discovery Networks service Dplay.
– Given the large crowd of young viewers who already are, we are convinced that it is a younger audience that will see e-allsvenskan from the start. But of course hope and we welcome all viewers, ” says Hanif Hosseini, director of sports on Eurosport and Discovery Neworks Sweden.
At Malmö FF, who have recently played matches of football against Chelsea, accommodated high hopes for what the new series might mean for the club’s market value.
– To be able to push the interest of the association in more channels, build the brand and create new revenue streams, ” says the CLUB’s ceo Niclas Carlnén.
” It feels like it can be great in the future. In Denmark, received the final, which was played on a big arena, a lot of attention. We see good potential that it may be in a similar way in Sweden. Gentlemen, ladies and boys and girls, in thousands, follows the e-sport already, ” says Olle Arnell, presstalesperson of Djurgården.
the AIK, the defending champion in the united states, expresses a more cautious optimism.
– It has the potential. But everything is very new, it will take at least a season before we know what all this is worth. We felt that it would be foolish to not go with the year 1, we would like to be with from the beginning when something new happens in the fotbollsfamiljen, ” says AIK’s cfo Håkan Strandlund.
Elisabeth Bergqvist Photo: Mattias Ahlm/Sveriges Radio
the analysts of the encounter between the old and the new in american football?
Elisabeth Bergqvist is speljournalist and host of the P3 Games in the Swedish Radio. She says:
– Sportklubbarna is probably afraid that future generations are not engaging in sports. There are young people who live their lives in the field of gaming, and fail to engage in it is good with sports. In this way, it can pick up the youngsters, and at the same time show the clubs that they have an eye on the present. I see really no disadvantages for the clubs. To enter the e-championship is about to have 2-5 paid player and a coach, so it is not a jätteinvestering.
Hanif Hosseini on the Discovery Networks refers to the research firm Newzoo, which follows the development within e-sport. According to them, attracted e-sports last year, 395 million spectators, a figure that is expected to grow to 580 million by 2021. Newzoo calculates that the e-sport 2021 will translate sek 14.8 billion, compared with 8.3 billion in 2018.