EDS Football Marketing

[jamesha]

This season it seems increasingly difficult to watch EDS games as many kick off at the same time as Premier League games and soare not shown on City+ etc.

I find it weird how low profile EDS football is given the over exposure of all things football in the media. e.g. obscure comments are endlessly dissected by "journalists" - see the MEN web site, Liverpool Echo etc.

In the US College Football is the third most popular spectator sport behind professional baseball and professional football and makes a lot of money.

I think that EDS football has potential to become a lot higher profile, and thus more competitive if marketed more aggressively. e.g. play games on a set evening when not much other football is played - Thursdays or Fridays could work well.

Would this be a good thing? - people have bemoaned the standard of EDS football and called for B teams but maybe just raising the profile of the existing competition would help.

 

[blueswede21]

The reason(s) why college sports are popular in America can't really be transferred over to English football since every "big" city/town already has at least one local professional football team that people there support, the same can't be said for America where the professional leagues don't have teams in every city/town so college teams fill that vacuum. I also fail to see an inherent link between profile and competitiveness per se. There may be one, but if there is it's less obvious than you make it out to be. Furthermore, a raised profile can only be beneficial if it means it could attract higher quality players, something which it won't do since clubs don't treat their reserves as "main clubs" that need investment in that sense. Having "B clubs" would solve that issue, but poses bigger problems in terms of endangering the traditions of the English football system. So, for me, I gotta say this doesn't sound like a good proposition, unfortunately.

 

[jamesha]

The reason(s) why college sports are popular in America can't really be transferred over to English football since every "big" city/town already has at least one local professional football team that people there support, the same can't be said for America where the professional leagues don't have teams in every city/town so college teams fill that vacuum. I also fail to see an inherent link between profile and competitiveness per se. There may be one, but if there is it's less obvious than you make it out to be. Furthermore, a raised profile can only be beneficial if it means it could attract higher quality players, something which it won't do since clubs don't treat their reserves as "main clubs" that need investment in that sense. Having "B clubs" would solve that issue, but poses bigger problems in terms of endangering the traditions of the English football system. So, for me, I gotta say this doesn't sound like a good proposition, unfortunately.

Thanks for your response - you make some very valid points. I guess that I am frustrated as some great football is played at EDS level yet watching it seems increasingly difficult. The league run in last year was great with lots of the games being on City+ but now it seems we will only get highlights after the game.
I guess football at EDS level should be mostly about player development rather than winning trophies but playing before such small audiences does not help that.

 

[The Footy Diary]

A lot of the teams in this age bracket in Cat 1 and 2 clubs play the majority of their games on Monday afternoons or evenings (usually the day before a first-team game for Football League clubs) - not sure whether you think that would be any good for yourselves or not with the PL games that get scheduled on Fri/Mon nights.