By David Owen
March 14 – The world’s biggest football confederation by population covered and the football league with arguably the biggest international following have signed a mutual cooperation agreement.
The deal unveiled in London today between the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) and the English Premier League seeks to formalise and expand cooperation in fields such as social and commercial development, knowledge sharing and club exchange programmes that, in many cases, is already under way.
“The agreement comes at a point where we want to show some commitment to all that has been going on, to formalise it a little,” Richard Scudamore, the Premier League’s chief executive, told Insideworldfootball. “It might be brief in terms of pages, but it is significant in terms of its intent and commitment to activity.”
“The signing of this agreement is not just ink on paper,” added Shaikh Salman bin Ibrahim Al Khalifa, the AFC President. “The whole of Asia follows the clubs in England and the Premier League is a top priority for us.”
There is certainly no doubting the importance of the Asian audience in terms of the Premier League’s international reach.
“You have just got to look at the numbers,” Scudamore said.
“Half of the homes that are watching Premier League football are in Asia. Outside the UK, four of our top five individual markets by value are within Shaikh Salman’s confederation…
“Clearly it is hugely significant. The strategic aims of the Premier League look more to Asia than probably anywhere else. That’s why mutual cooperation is very important.”
Equally, from the AFC’s perspective, the scope for drawing on the Premier League’s expertise in a variety of areas, both on and off the pitch, looks substantial.
“We are already heavily involved on the ground in 10 countries in terms of the Premier Skills coaching programme,” Scudamore explained.
“We are already involved on the ground in various AFC countries with things beyond Premier Skills [such as] the Inspire by Kicks programme, which is the tough-to-reach areas. We are working with the police in Indonesia and various other places.”
“We have been helping with referee development for some time. There has just been a visit by top Asian referees to Saint George’s Park….
“We don’t enter into these agreements lightly. We choose to have [them] with people we can actually work with and have a decent relationship with…
“It is not a one-way-street agreement. There is a huge mutual benefit.”
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