July 27 – Attracted by sponsorship deals, shirt sales and TV rights deals, Premier League clubs, and Barcelona, have been looking to Asia’s billion football fans. Following in the footsteps of Manchester United, clubs are focusing on Asia, spending time there in pre-season and opening up local offices.
According to sports research company Repucom more than 820 million of Asia’s 1 billion football fans follow the English Premier League.
The main challenger to the Premier League clubs comes from Barcelona, who negotiate their own TV rights deals and who the SCMP reported last week intend to join Manchester United in opening up an office in Hong Kong- leasing a 3,000 sq ft office space in the prime Central District.
English soccer’s broadcast deals in Asia are estimated to generate over £340 million a year, and with 330 million mainlanders as estimated to be interested in the Premier League the importance of China is likely to rise.
Manchester United, who have over a million Chinese fans as well as sponsorship agreements with Wahaha and the China Construction Bank, will be hoping the pitch holds up under the weather for their game against local Hong Kong side Kitchee FC later on today.
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