In February, Real Madrid asked to postpone the last home game of the season. Disease? Extreme weather? Hurry up. Taylor Swift. One night in late May, Swift showed why football clubs have fallen in love with musicians. The American pop icon stepped out at the Santiago Bernabéu, where more than 80,000 football fans had been replaced by “Swifties”. – Wow, this place is very, said Taylor Swift. Then she delivered 45 hits, while Real Madrid’s directors were grinning widely. They didn’t care about the music. For three hours, fans devoured expensive food and beer. Swift’s Eras Tour is the most lucrative music tour of all time, and if you include tickets, an average fan will spend more than NOK 10,000 per night. The next night Swift came back and did it all over again. FLOWS TO THE STADIUM: Long queues outside the Santiago Bernabéu before the Taylor Swift concert. Photo: Manu Fernandez / AP Real Madrid used to turn down such concerts because the crowd trampled the grass, but the newly renovated Santiago Bernabéu can divide the pitch and store it underground. In two days when the stadium would otherwise have been empty, the Spanish newspaper Marca writes that Real Madrid earned around NOK 100 million. It was a solid victory in a match where the world’s biggest clubs are fighting to have the biggest, best and most lucrative home ground. Welcome to football’s stadium war. Everyone wants “dwell time” There are two matches in modern top football. On the field, the coaches fight to win titles. Outside, presidents and chairmen fight to earn the most. The krones are tallied by the Deloitte Money League, an annual list of the teams’ earnings. Before, the list was not so important, because the owners could use their own money to buy players, but now teams can only buy and pay stars with money they earn themselves. This means that sales of things like kits, tickets and TV rights largely determine how much each club can spend on the superstars. POPULAR KITS: Real Madrid make good money from the sales of Kylian Mbappé and Vinícius Júnior’s kits. Photo: Miguel Oses / AP Since the money rush around TV rights has subsided, the clubs are now asking how they can make the most of the biggest asset they own: the stadium. – I don’t think all fans understand that these clubs are businesses, says Ian Nuttall. Nuttall owns the website The Stadium Business and has worked in the industry for 30 years. Before, the stadium had a few seats set up around the pitch, he says, but now the clubs have directors dedicated to squeezing as many kroner as possible out of the arena. Since more seats mean more tickets, elevator cranes are popping up all over Europe. In Spain, Barcelona have sold off future income in exchange for money now to refurbish the Camp Nou. In England, Liverpool and Manchester City are expanding, while Chelsea and Newcastle are making plans. Manchester United are considering demolishing Old Trafford. Many raise ticket prices, much to the anger of fans. Others will increase their income with the help of “dwell time”. Spaceship, cinema and witch’s cauldron Dwell time is the time fans spend in the stadium before and after matches. The expression is from the US, where teams do everything to get people to show up early and leave late. Time at the stadium means money spent on food, drink and supporter equipment. – When we see American investors entering the British market, we know that they will follow the American model, says Alice John to news. John works for the group behind the Deloitte Money League, and follows the club’s pursuit of fans’ money. If you want the guests to stay for a while, you need good hospitality and a great home, and here the standard is set by the new Santiago Bernabéu. With a renovation of NOK 20 billion, the classic arena has been given a steel facade that makes it look like a spaceship, expensive restaurants and a sea of VIP seats. A new roof can be opened and closed. During big matches, the arena becomes a boiling cauldron with the lid on. Real Madrid won 16 of 19 league games there last season – and lost none. NEWLY RENOVATED HYBRID MAIN ROOM: The new Santiago Bernabéu can offer large screens under the roof, hotels, shops, food, drinks – and football and concerts. Photo: Manu Fernandez / AP Just below the ceiling hang huge screens that offer replays, close-ups and lineups. Before a match, they show advertisements for a sponsor, an airline, while the sound of an airplane thunders through the speakers. You feel the advertising on your body, like in a big cinema, and the gods know what it cost. The stands are steep, the noise from the fans is deafening, and the screens remind you that the supporter’s shop is open after the match ends. In the 2022/23 season, Real Madrid reigned at the top of the Money League with an income of almost NOK 10 billion. – They understand that stadiums are hybrid businesses, says Nuttall. – Stadiums are a bit of a hotel, a bit of hosting, a bit of a shop, a bit of food and drink. And on match days they are all those things at the same time. The hotel that is almost always closed Although teams such as Real Madrid make good money on match days, they have a problem that other businesses avoid. On Saturday or Sunday, they get 80,000 “customers”. On Monday it is empty. And on Tuesday. And on Wednesday. The pitch still needs to be watered, and the power is on. – This industry has an off-and-on button, says Nuttall. Apart from tours and museums, stadiums generally have little to offer outside of match days. Paul Fletcher, a director of several English teams who have built new stadiums, said recently that he does not understand why clubs have not done more with their stadiums. He said the following to the website The Athletic: – Can you imagine spending several million kroner on a new hotel, and then staying open one day every other week? This is where Taylor Swift comes into the picture. Photo: Scott A Garfitt / AP Concerts allow the clubs to make money when the supporters are at home and the players are on the beach. According to Nuttall, Real Madrid now has a group of people dedicated to taking concert promoters out for dinner. He says the organizers care about two things: Making as much money as possible Getting in and out of the stadium as quickly as possible The Santiago Bernabéu holds three times as many spectators as a large indoor arena. The renovation has made it easy to go in and out with equipment. When Swift was going to Madrid, Real Madrid thanked Atlético Madrid as hosts. Real Madrid has not only welcomed Taylor Swift. This summer saw the arrival of Argentinian hip-hop star Duki, Spanish singer Manuel Carrasco and Colombian reggaeton singer Karol G. And Swift moved on to other football stadiums: Estádio da Luz (Lisbon) Parc Olympique Lyonnais (Lyon) Principality Stadium (Cardiff) Johan Cruyff Arena (Amsterdam) San Siro (Milan) Wembley (London) Anfield (Liverpool) BACK AT ANFIELD: Jürgen Klopp was at Taylor Swift’s concert at Anfield this summer. Here from the farewell speech as Liverpool manager in the same place. Photo: Jon Super / AP In England, she lured Jürgen Klopp back to Anfield for the first time since he resigned as Liverpool’s coach. – Now it’s Taylor time! Klopp said in a video on Instagram. And then he went to a concert, perhaps with a thought in the back of his mind that every beer he bought helped make the old club a little bit richer. The ATM The only thing that can compete with music as alternative entertainment in football stadiums is American football. Tottenham Hotspur know this. AMERICAN FOOTBALL IN EUROPE: Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen during an NFL game at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Photo: Ian Walton / AP When the team from north London opened their new stadium in 2019, they wanted to become Europe’s home for American football. The American league NFL is doing what many owners want – and what many fans fear – for football’s biggest leagues to do: Every year they play official games on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. “Spurs” have a 10-year agreement with the NFL to arrange games. The NFL pays rent. Spurs receive a share of the revenue from food and drink. Since matches last four hours, Spurs earn three times as much as a regular football match. Throw in a number of concerts – Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, Red Hot Chili Peppers – Spurs become another winner in the stadium war. Spurs increased their revenue by 20 percent in the latest version of the Money League. Now the rivals look with envy at Spurs’ home ground, or as The Athletic calls it: “An ATM with 62,000 seats”. Advertising on the roof Other clubs are betting on facilities around the stadium. When Alice John meets with clients, they talk about how to create a place people visit 365 days a year. They have found that hotels and shopping centers near the stadium increase dwell time. – The stadium is like an iconic anchor, which can be the center of other facilities, says John. She points to Manchester City, which has its home ground right next to the brand new Co-Op Live, Europe’s largest indoor arena, with space for 23,500 spectators. Manchester United is said to have been inspired by SoFi Stadium, a new arena built in Los Angeles for the NFL teams Los Angeles Rams and Los Angeles Chargers. It is surrounded by shops and apartments, and will be part of the World Cup in 2026 and the Olympics in 2028. SOFI STADIUM: Large hall with space for 70,000 spectators in Los Angeles. Photo: Gregory Bull / AP Nettbanken SoFi has paid NOK 6 billion for the name over the next 20 years. Since the stadium is located by the airport, it has advertising on the roof. These are opportunities – income – United dreams of. The teams that do nothing lose ground. At least United have the ability to build, if they want to spend the money. Chelsea is struggling to find space for a new home, and the situation is even worse in Italy, where almost all teams rent pitches from the municipalities. Italian teams have long struggled with low TV revenues and tight budgets. Some arenas are characterized by cracked cement and peeling paint, often with running tracks around the grass. Most of them are old – and you can tell. In Milan, the big teams Inter and Milan are owned by Americans. They play at San Siro, which is iconic and venerable, but which Uefa recently stripped of the 2027 Champions League final because they lacked a guarantee of an early renovation. Milan’s Gerry Cardinale wants a new stadium that can also host concerts. – And then, quite frankly, I want to build stadiums for all the other teams in Serie A as well, says Cardinale according to SportsPro Media. ALMOST 100 YEARS OLD: Milan’s San Siro has been in use since 1926 and was last renovated in 2016. Photo: PIERO CRUCIATTI / AFP He knows that if the entire league becomes more attractive, Milan’s value increases. But for five years, the Milan clubs’ dream has been stuck in politics and bureaucracy. Only Juventus owns its own ground in Italy’s top division, and no Italian team is among Deloitte’s 10 richest. Everyone wants to take part What happens next? Alice John predicts more construction and renovation. Nuttall agrees, but believes that the huge projects will soon be over. The reason is sustainability. Stadiums are concrete and steel planted in the middle of neighborhoods to host 30 games a year, says Nuttall, and predicts less new and more renovation. He reminds that the Los Angeles Olympics in 2028 will not build a single new arena. What about the combat experience? Nuttall envisions more sound, higher intensity and initiatives that make the fans feel involved. – We have gone through a generational change where the fans have become participants in an entertainment production, says Nuttall. He highlights the “fan cam”, an idea from the US where fans in the stands are shown on large screens around the arena. Nuttall says football competes with all other entertainment, with all the demands it brings. – My children don’t just want to go to the theater and sit there for two hours, says Nuttall. – Then they get bored. They will be part of the show. They want to go on stage. They want to stream something. They want to take part. And this is where football is headed.
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Football’s stadium war – Sport Langlesing
