Summary

• The women’s sports paradox: Record TV viewership but half-empty stadiums—what’s going on?
• WSL attendance drops 10% despite Sky Sports’ £60m expansion bet—can broadcast deals sustain growth?
• 76% of women’s sports fans stay casual: The challenge of converting viewers into stadium-goers.
• YouTube triples WSL viewership while physical attendance lags—digital engagement vs. real-world fandom.
• Should women’s sports break free from men’s teams and build their own distinct identity?
• The sustainability question: Can women’s sports turn online hype into long-term stadium sellouts?

Transcription

Welcome to The Attention Shift,

a podcast where sports media gets debated like a VAR decision,

passionately, longer than it should,

and with none of us fully agreeing on the outcome.

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Look, there’s been a 10% decline

in attendance of people watching women’s football.

Is that a worry for women’s sports in general?

And is it a shift that is showing a decline?

Isn’t all the narrative around how successful it is, though,

and how revenue it is,

that revenues are going through the roof?

It is.

What’s going on in stadiums, Lee?

I can give you some facts.

I think that will help maybe set the scene.

Look, $1.8 billion in revenue projected in women’s sports for 2025.

But the attendance in the women’s Premier League,

or Women’s Super League (WSL), as it’s formally called,

has declined by 10%.

And there’s some big clubs for that.

There’s a couple of big reasons.

So, one, last season, Bristol City got relegated.

Their average attendance was 6,974 people,

whereas they were replaced by Crystal Palace,

whose average attendance is 1,779.

The other big call-outs here are Aston Villa and Man United

saw their biggest decreases,

33% down on people attending.

But there is some positives, I would say.

Arsenal is obviously still smashing it

in terms of numbers,

in terms of, you know, obviously they do a lot at the Emirates.

Another club’s growths, which was helped,

so Liverpool, up 54%,

helped by hosting games at Anfield,

and Tottenham also up 24%.

So, look, I think there’s lots of money, as we know,

in women’s sports, as clearly it’s there.

But I do worry, is there a fear with going down?

Is this a sign of a game in decline?

Or a worrying metric if you’re investing in women’s sports

that people aren’t showing up?

I think the sample size is just too small,

to be honest, to extrapolate anything from that.

And I think, if you look at Arsenal have announced now,

I think they’re going to play all the games at the Emirates

in the season that is about to come.

Like you said, you know, you get certain teams come up

and certain teams come down.

I think the reality is, look, the men’s game’s been around

for 140 years now, and the women’s game,

I know it’s been around a while,

but it’s not had the attention that it’s getting now, right?

It’s only in the last 10 or 15 years,

and even in the last five years,

where you’re really starting to see,

not just the investment round,

but the attention that people are starting to look at

the women’s game and say,

no, you know what, this is a viable game.

This is a game that people will pay to go watch.

And similarly, like, look, look,

I’m not going to keep going on about Burnley.

I’m not on Man United, for that matter.

But last season, when my wife and daughter,

Man United, were playing at Old Trafford against DAZN,

I think there was 35,000 there for that game.

Do you think playing it in the stadium

where the men’s game’s played has an effect, then?

It made us go, to be honest, because we thought,

oh, yeah, great, because I think they’re playing

Leigh Sports Village normally, I could be wrong,

which is not far away, but it made us go…

It feels like more of an event.

Yeah, it made us go, we thought, let’s go along and look.

And it was a different experience.

There was a fan zone there as well.

To be honest, we’d been to see the women’s Euros

at Old Trafford as well, and we enjoyed it.

Yeah, it was different, right?

But we went along, and I remember just walking around,

and it was amazing seeing families and dads saying,

“God, this is a completely different experience

to go into the men’s game, because I feel safe.”

I’m not have to worry about any idiots or…

And he did, it felt like a really fun…

And we were right next to the band as well,

which my daughter loved.

A bit noisy throughout the game,

but it just felt like a completely different experience.

And I think having never been to a game before myself

and always going and watching men’s football,

not knowing what to expect,

I just realised that it’s not going to be the same as that.

It’s a different thing,

and when you get your head around that, it’s fine.

And it’s a bit like winning the men’s in The Hundred, right?

And we’ve done that as well.

I remember hearing Tammy Parlour speak, actually,

and I think, is she chair of Women in Sport?

And she was… I’m probably going to reference it wrong,

but they’d done some analysis around attendance

for Arsenal women’s games.

And they were saying that the crowd, to your point,

much more family type of attention…

Less visceral.

Less visceral, yeah.

But also tended to turn up a lot earlier

for the men’s game.

And then spent…

Yeah, spent a load more on food and beverage.

So a completely different way of experiencing football

than, obviously, the men’s game.

I’m interested to…

I mean, playing it at Anfield,

yeah, I get it, or at the Emirates,

but does that then put pressure on fixture scheduling?

Because then if it starts just nudging it into awkward times,

that’s going to hold it back as well, right?

I mean, they get shunted around in the schedule

because the men’s game comes first.

Which makes it hard.

Obviously, I mentioned Arsenal then, Everton next season,

the women’s team are going to play at Goodison,

and they haven’t shut the upper parts of it

because leaving it open would be cavernous.

It just needs time to develop.

And I think, like you say, those…

I wouldn’t…

Like I said, the attendance thing, I wouldn’t massively…

I think it does make a difference.

The women’s… I think it’s the Conti Cup final,

which is Chelsea versus Man City,

wasn’t held at Wembley,

and it was, I think, at Derby County’s stadium,

which is 33,500 capacity, you know, over, right?

And the attendance of that was just over 14,000.

Now, you know, if that was Wembley,

you know, you see it when the Lionesses play.

You know, they do a good job of filling this area.

So I think that does make an impact.

And that’s why the big driver from the stats,

which was why Anfield made such a big difference to this.

If attendance… You know, I think we all agree that,

you know, having people…

You know, we remember Covid and watching sports

where there was no attendance.

And you do need some level of atmosphere.

So I think you have to have a…

Wherever it’s a full stadium,

I agree that maybe you might not get that.

But, you know, what does that mean then for viewership overall?

And I think we’ve talked about viewership generally

and looking at different platforms.

You know, there’s a big deal that happened with Sky.

And they’ve just signed a five-year deal.

It’s another 65 million.

And I think about 60 million of that’s going on to production

and other services.

I think, what does that mean in terms of the commitment?

I guess showing the commitment from Sky,

but also what’s it mean in terms of viewership?

We talk about the attention and engaging younger fans.

You know, doing it with Sky, how does that raise…

Yeah, I mean…

I was so heartened when it went on YouTube.

When you could go on to the Barclays Women’s Super League channel

and you could see all of the games on there.

Just because that opens it up to all of that addressable audience.

You know, we talk about the Attention Shift.

We talk about how younger audiences are social first.

And now it’s been… It almost feels like it’s reverted to type.

Because they’ve taken the money and they’ve done a deal

and they’re putting it on Sky and some games on the BBC.

So it’s shrinking that potential pool again.

And that makes me a little bit sad.

I know monetisation is really hard on YouTube.

It’s not really clear yet.

But it felt like it was such a good…

It was such a good start. I think you made a good point.

It looked like they were committed. I got really excited.

It looked like they were committed to YouTube and they’ve done it for one season.

Yeah.

Look, and we were talking about self-camera as well, weren’t we?

Should live games that are produced for mass consumption on linear

just be put on YouTube as they are anyway?

Well, there’s an argument that it doesn’t necessarily translate.

It tripled their viewing figures, right?

Piling, they get pulling…

But can it help them to get that next step?

Look, and Sky have talked about it themselves, right?

Look, they’re investing in the women’s game

at a level that no one else is investing in the women’s game.

And they’ve done that with other sports before as well.

If you look at what they’ve done with darts,

they started out with darts when darts were a pub game

and they’ve stuck with it for a long, long time.

And they’ve…

BBC and Sky together, they’ll say that they’ve actually helped each other to grow

and it’s one of the most popular sports now.

What’s to say that Sky can’t do a similar thing for women’s football

over a long period of time?

They’re still going to put up…

They said they’re going to still put the championship on you,

all the live games and the championship.

And then, you know, the overall…

That would be really interesting.

Teams coming through the championship.

And some big teams, well, big clubs, sorry.

Like, because obviously the women’s team won’t be as big as the men’s,

but they’re coming from a club that have got big followings

and can they transition from the men’s game to the women’s game?

But these teams coming out now through the north and the south,

which is the third tier, who now, you know, the women’s game is growing.

You know, I know some Burnley are going professional next season as well

because they’re making a real put to try and get into the second tier,

which will become WSL 2.

You’ll see these natural, you know,

unfortunately these teams from yesteryear,

like Doncaster Belles and stuff like that,

who were the trailblazers,

who unfortunately, the reality is these big clubs come in

and it pushes them down a bit,

but I guess that’s part of the evolution of the game.

It’s sad in a lot of ways, but the game’s evolving all the time.

But, you know, again, look, you look at some of the players now

who play the women’s game and, you know,

who are earning real livings out of it,

going and playing in different countries.

You couldn’t do that 10 years ago.

It happened a big ball.

Yeah, I mean, you couldn’t support yourself.

No, that point you made about putting live games on YouTube

is interesting, though, because I’ve often argued

that actually the live product is not what is valuable on YouTube.

It’s the other stuff around it.

We know it’s that thing.

It’s the story.

It’s in and around it.

So whilst I think it’s a shame that they’ve gone from putting live games

on YouTube to doing this deal with Sky Sports,

I accept in all your arguments,

does that mean that they’re still going to create content,

bespoke content that’s going to sit on YouTube

for those social first fans,

for that whole generation for whom they go to YouTube?

Does it put more ownership or responsibility on the players

to create their own content?

Because a lot of these players are very good, you know, if you take…

Outside, you know, rugby, the Black Ferns, Ruby Tui,

she’s probably the most popular people on TikTok.

There’s a lot of creators who…

A lot of them here as well.

Yeah, they’re amazing.

Does it put the responsibility to them?

And do they, I guess, do they have the freedom to enable them to do that?

Because that’s the thing, right?

That’s going to build the fandoms, right?

There’s a few podcasts that are now female football podcasts, right?

And I can’t remember if there’s two or three now.

And I know for a fact that they’ve been created

because brands are saying there are no female sports personalities

that we can really get behind.

It won’t do the same numbers,

but the brands feel like it cuts through in a way that the men’s game doesn’t,

so they’re willing to invest in it,

which ultimately then helps give that leg up to…

So, you know, these Lionesses are now becoming creators.

So, and hopefully that’s the start.

I don’t think we’re seeing a lot of these, you know,

actual creators starting in the bedroom,

from a female’s perspective,

even around sports that are getting real traction.

And I don’t know what that is.

I don’t know whether it’s because…

In general, there don’t tend to be as many, even across games as well.

There’s some real…

Men can be a bit more shock-jock about it and a bit more extreme,

and women tend to not do that.

Yeah, do you know what? I don’t know.

That’s generalisation.

Yeah, no, but I do think it will happen.

I just think it will be slower.

But you see in gaming,

there are some huge female gaming creators.

There are many more men,

but there are some really big gaming creators that are females.

So, I don’t think it will come through.

Yeah, is that because of the challenges they get facing being a woman,

being a woman creator, and the comments you may get, and the hate?

There might even be bias in the algorithm, you know?

I’m sure Google and YouTube have never acknowledged that,

but it could be. It could be inherent in it. Who knows?

But I do think that, particularly now,

women’s… The WSL is going to Sky Sports.

Again, that’s why Mark Goldbridge became Mark Goldbridge.

So, where’s the female version of him then?

If it is behind a paywall,

who’s going to be the creator that’s going to do that watch

along with the alt-commentary for younger audiences,

in the absence of it now being available on YouTube?

Well, you’ve also got Champions League right now,

Women’s Champions League on Disney+.

So, that’s a big deal.

And is that going to help?

Because, arguably, Disney is tailored for a family-based audience.

They’ve got the reach, they’ve got the people, they’ve got the time,

they’ve got the effort they can put into this,

and you can do some very clever collaborations with Disney characters

and really do some enablements of this.

Do you think you’ll do it, though?

No.

I don’t know.

I think that’s the shame, right?

I think they’ve looked at it and probably, you know,

it’s relatively cheap right for them to start doing something live

in sports on Disney+.

And, you know, I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that,

but they don’t really do that.

They’re more like Amazon have been doing what they’ve been doing,

Netflix have been doing what they’ve been doing,

and it’s kind of like, me too.

Like, they need to do something, right, and they’re starting there,

and it’s a starting point, which is great for the women’s game,

and they’ve chosen that as a starting point.

But generally, you say they’re big call-ups, though.

We’ve reverted to type and gone for football as the biggest thing.

But we should just talk about other sports.

I mean…

Women’s rugby.

Yeah, women’s rugby.

And when Ilona Maher came across to play for Bristol Bears

for that stint, I don’t really watch rugby at all.

I started watching rugby on YouTube.

I watched…

I didn’t even know Bristol had a team.

And they had to move to a bigger stadium.

Talking about stadium attendances in decline,

that was going the opposite way there, to move to a bigger stadium.

I watched one game on YouTube where she was playing.

And as I do, I had the comments, scroll in, reading the comments.

What was brilliant about it?

And I was sending screen recordings and screen graphs to people

that I know I sent one to Roger Mitchell.

It was…

The commentator was commentating in a very considered way,

intentionally, being a bit more explanatory,

and then it started coming through in the comments.

“I’m watching from ex-country” or “this”…

“I don’t really understand rugby,”

but they were there because of Ilona Maher.

But they were going,

this commentator’s great, because now I’m beginning to understand it.

It was brilliant,

because it was a masterclass in something being on YouTube,

actually being…

They were driven to YouTube because of that one athlete,

slash creator, which she is the creator.

Creator first.

The brilliance of the commentating team to acknowledge

that we’re going to be getting a lot of newbies there.

So, changing the commentary style accordingly.

And then just seeing the immediate response.

I now am interested in this.

I’m understanding it more.

I’m here because of Ilona Maher, and now I know Bristol Bears.

And they were watching from Morocco or wherever.

It was brilliant. So, I wish there was more of that.

You get that instant feedback, though.

That’s the great thing about something like YouTube,

is you get the comments so you can see it’s resonating.

That works so well for creators,

because they can instantly change how they’re doing things.

I always joke about it. It’s almost like that QVC model.

If you keep selling it, and if it’s not selling,

we won’t have the next product or change it up.

They’re usually savvy and clever enough to be able to do that.

So, I think that’s why it really suits.

I think the reality is there’s always that world of

coming back to, like, what is WSL going to do?

We’ll come back away from football.

OK, so it’s going on Sky now.

So, there’s lots of opportunities.

They’ve got close to 300,000 subscribers now on YouTube.

How do you continue to build that? Looking earlier.

There’s lots of content on there.

Look, the live games, some were quarter of a million,

some were like 10,000 viewership, right?

It depends on the team.

I think there’s lots of other content opportunities around that.

There will be players now that…

You know, some of the players who’ve retired

who were at the top of the game are doing Sky and the BBC.

But there’s plenty of others who are not.

I think some will pop up and start going,

“I could start creating content in and around this.”

And then I’m like, OK, so if they create their own creator channels,

that’s where WSL needs to be partnering with them

and giving them access and doing things that Linear World do,

because the scheduling is just…

Yeah, allowing them to curate some of the content.

Yeah, it’s what? The NBA…

The NBA has opened up 2,500 hours

of live footage per creators.

The NBA team, the New York NBA team did a deal with Pinterest,

and that was all about specifically around lifestyle creating.

It had a huge impact, huge numbers and huge conversions

off the back of their…

Do you think part of the issue then is that women’s sport

doesn’t really know how to market itself?

Or those involved in it have come from the men’s game

and are still using an old playbook?

Well, I’m going to take it one step further

and ask the controversial question that everyone always asks.

Should women’s sport be played the same as men’s sport?

If we’re going to change the rules in terms of how we market it,

you’re going to try and change how you content…

the type of content distribution to make it more different,

because do you change the rules in women’s sport?

Look at what Baller League has done.

And again, I’m going to refer to Roger Mitchell once said,

make them 30-minute halves. Change it up.

There’s no reason that it has to be a carbon copy.

It could be consumed in a different way.

Now would be the time to do it.

Exactly. Do you lower the net

so you get more slam-dunks in basketball?

Do you shorten the game of football?

Do you make the pitches smaller?

It might just be too much change for me.

Is that the question? Are we trying to…

Is that part of the block?

Can’t we try to shoehorn it into a box?

Or are we expecting too much too soon

and we just need to let it… It’s growing.

It’s growing really, really fast.

But sport doesn’t tend to be a patient industry, does it?

There’s one thing I’ve learned in my short career in sport

that it’s not very patient.

Look, and it’s really, really hard to do as well,

but I love what The Hundred‘s done

where you get a women’s game and a men’s game on the same day.

And I know it’s cricket and it’s not the same as football

and you’re moving fans in and out,

but is there a world where if you have got a men’s game,

you could have a women’s game?

That’s really smart. That’s really smart.

And look, you’re not going to get the same attendance right.

It’s kind of like you get both.

Now look, the challenge you’ve got is that the Premier League

or the football league is separate from the women’s league.

And I still don’t understand for the life of me why,

in a lot of ways, the Premier League didn’t take on the women’s league

because it became one entity

because then you would have had the whole juggernaut working together

from a media rights perspective, from a marketing perspective.

I know that the women’s game is a women’s game.

We want our own game.

That might have grown it faster.

And we’ll never know, right, because the horse has bolted on that.

But that idea, you know, could you do it?

Could you stage it the same day in the same stadium?

Is it possible?

And there’ll be loads of people telling me it’s not

because of pitches.

Well, I’m sure there’s a million reasons,

but I really like that, like they’ve done with The Hundred.

I just think it’s a really smart idea.

It’s a really good model.

Because again, there’s so much sport content out there.

How does women’s sport even hope to get a share of voice

when there’s so much sport?

Well, if you put it together,

and again, I mean, you know, we’re talking about The Attention Shift.

You know, we talk very often,

people say attention spans have shortened.

They haven’t. It’s interest spans.

If you can extend interest, then you extend attention.

Well, that is exactly how I would do.

Extend interest because you’ve got two games.

Put a concert in the middle.

It might not be every club, right,

but clubs that do own the men’s and the women’s team,

even though there’s plenty of different leagues,

could in theory be in control of that situation

and say, like, my team Burnley could in theory say,

we’ll have a women’s game and the same day we’ll have a men’s game

because they’re in control of both sides.

Whether the leagues will want them to remains to be seen.

But it’s doable and it’s possible.

I’m sure there’s a million reasons that someone will tell me

that they can’t do that.

But I mean, I think that’s my idea.

Yeah, but is that the, you know, we talk about,

like we said, The Attention Shift

and engaging younger fans and audiences.

And we talked about previously about, you know,

football and super fans getting older and aging out.

And, you know, you’ve got these, arguably newer,

you know, women’s games been around for a while,

but these newer professional leagues,

you know, these newer investments,

you’re trying to grow the audience base,

is that they have the advantage right now.

And I think that’s, you know, when we start this off,

we’re saying, does attendance, you know,

lowering of attendance concern?

Now, arguably, they will probably get a bump

from the big Euros and the things like that.

Something we’ve heard about that without a doubt.

Yeah, and you do, and also it was the season without a Euros.

We’ve got Euros coming up.

So it’d be interesting to see if there’ll probably be a bump

next season, right?

That’s what women want in the Champions League as well.

Is that going to have a halo effect for the league as well?

Because that’s a suggestion that, okay, then,

the women’s sibling now is competing at the top table.

But is it, and that’s the question, right?

Is do we need, that’s why I asked the, you know,

the controversial question everyone asks is like,

do we need it in a different format?

Because we’re trying to target people in a different way.

And we’re trying to engage people.

They have an advantage at the moment, right?

I think that’s, I think we’ve all said that they’ve got eyes,

as in money, people looking to invest.

You know, there’s a lot of money that’s,

even from Sky, 65 million pounds is a lot.

And yes, we may say that we want to grow on YouTube

and actually, is it making it more sustainable

to grow your fan base first rather than going for the big money?

But not only that, wealthy investors investing in the teams as well.

Obviously, Serena Williams and her husband (Alexis Ohanian) have invested in Chelsea, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, $200 million.

Yeah, so there’s also a reason that they’ve done that,

that they believe in the, you know.

And Angel City as well.

Yeah, I mean, they’re massive, right?

Yeah, yeah.

But what’s interesting is who, I mean,

Willow Bay, the wife of Bob Iger, who runs Disney,

who are masters of building brands and franchises.

And I do think that when you look at them, again,

you know, we’ve spoken before about how sports in America

is very much treated as a media business,

less so over here,

that Angel City FC will be treated as an entertainment media franchise.

I think the one thing you’ve got with female sports personalities

compared to male sports personalities is,

certainly in European sports,

females tend to have more personality than,

like the men end up being media trained, scared of saying anything,

who’s like, they tend to say something slightly out of turn,

everyone piles on.

I’m seeing more and more now,

like the Millie Brights and people like that,

that they’re quite happy to say when they’re having issues

and talk about it all the way

and talk about what they do in their personal lives.

And they’re not afraid what people might say.

Look, and I’ve got no doubt they get tons of abuse

and noise around it.

They do, yeah.

But whenever you hear them talk,

there’s a real sort of sense of confidence

about a lot of the female sports personalities.

I think that they generally have very interesting sort of private lives

that they’re quite happy to share and talk about their interests.

I think that’s where they can lean into their culture.

Their personality’s not been managed out of them like that.

No, I think they’ve been leaning to their culture and their lifestyle

in a way that men’s games generally don’t.

I mean, I look at Coco Gauff.

And again, I look at her because she’s a mad anime fan.

And every once in a while,

she comes out in a tennis kit that’s inspired by Sailor Moon.

And it’s just brilliant.

But again, I was watching her on TikTok last week

after her win at… Was it the US Open?

Yeah.

French, yes.

Yes, sorry, French.

And she basically went to all the ball boys and girls

and she took her trophy.

And they got the photo, yeah.

Big selfie.

And I don’t feel like you see that as much from male athletes.

Actually, Carlos Alcaraz did it.

I didn’t.

Yeah, he did.

Carlos Alcaraz, he went with all the ball boys and girls

and he celebrated with all…

Because it’s probably close to his age

than most of the people that’s on the tour.

He’s a young guy, right?

But yeah, you’re right.

Like, I think these…

Almost feels like they’re more liberated to do more things.

It’s just more authentic, more accessible.

That is an opportunity for women’s sports in general.

Again, not hampered by the legacy kind of shackles.

Everything, over those 140 years in football

or in established men’s sports

have just been there, shaping it, squashing it.

You do this, you don’t do that.

It’s this kind of very formulaic way that you grow.

But ultimately, you need a return on money, right?

That’s that.

And I think that’s the question is like, you know, where…

They say this is a massive opportunity.

What’s it say? $1.5 billion women’s sports in 2025.

You know, that’s why things like attendance are going down.

That’s revenue, right?

There’s not many places a club can make revenue, right?

You’ve got media rights deals, hence why they always try to…

You know, although we advocate YouTube.

What could replace attendance, though?

Well, that’s it, isn’t it?

Or is attendance still a significant enough revenue driver

that there has to be a focus on?

There are three big things that make money for a club, right?

They’re only real free revenue drivers for a club.

It’s people turning up for match day.

It’s media deals and it’s commerce, right?

So that’s people buying shirts, people buying stuff.

And that’s it, right?

And they are your only real free drivers.

And that’s why I think you’re right.

There’s a massive opportunity with the commerce and the collabs

and telling the authentic stories and doing all the right stuff.

You look at how much merch women buy through TikTok shop.

That’s a massive opportunity in women’s sports, in my view.

And Roblox.

I mean, we’ve not even touched on Roblox yet.

That’s an episode in itself.

But the amount of women’s sport massively leveraged on Roblox.

It’s an economy in and of itself.

Massive potential to develop a commerce and an e-com play from Roblox,

which I think, again, if women’s sport embraced it,

they’d be way out ahead.

And that’s what they have to do, right?

That is the opportunity.

Because ultimately, all this money that’s going to be invested

and there’s a lot of money at the start,

the returns are, if you’re an investor,

the returns are low at the moment, right?

So you have to look at this as a sustainable strategic view.

Like, this is not going to happen in three years,

not going to happen in five years.

It’s going to be a 10, 20-year play.

Do you think the investors are that patient with it?

No, well, that’s the question, right?

I think they will be.

I mean, they’re right to do a five-year deal as well.

That was a five-year deal, yeah.

Because it’s only the last year that they’ve effectively reconstituted

the leading creditors in UCO.

I think, like Lauren was saying earlier about how, like,

this sample size was too small on the attendance,

I think you’ll have to look at it over a five-year period

to see if what they’ve done has been a success.

I think it’ll be just too hard to say

whether what they’re doing is right or wrong.

So when you see declines in attendance,

are we panicking over nothing then?

Well, yeah, I think there’s lots of movement in there as well.

Like I said, next year now,

you’ll see with Arsenal playing at the Emirates more often,

and Arsenal obviously are probably one of the, you know,

that will bump up their attendance.

So you might see a big increase next season because of that.

And the Euros.

And the Euros as well,

and you always get that halo effect going into it.

So to wrap this up then, inclusions,

what is your viewpoint on this then?

Do you think that is a worry for you

in terms of their attendance?

But also, is there one thing you think they should be doing

in terms of to increase the, I guess, the scale of the women’s game?

Yeah, I think…

Well, no, I think it’s definitely

a signal that says without having a major tournament,

whether it’s a Euros or a World Cup,

there is… How big does that halo effect have?

10% grand scheme of things is not really that bad, right?

But ultimately, if you want to increase the attendance,

you have to play in the best stadiums, right?

You have to play… It shouldn’t just be in the sort of…

And that’s a scheduling thing, right, as part of that.

But I think, you know, like we said,

we use The Hundred a lot because I think it is a great example.

I think there are good examples of people doing some good stuff out there

in terms of making these events.

There’s got to be events.

Because there’s so many other calls on your time.

Exactly. It’s got to be a day out, right?

It’s got to be accessible.

It’s got to be cheap enough to take a family out,

you know, in this day and age where things are…

Cost of living is a crisis and things are expensive.

Like, it’s got to be accessible. It’s got to be cheap.

You make it a day out.

But I also think, like we talked about earlier,

you’ve got to play on the story to the athletes themselves.

There’s a lot of emphasis on them to create their own content

and be more… You know, they already do.

We’ve talked about some great examples.

But I think more of that…

It’s not more of that.

The club’s looking at other monetisation opportunities,

which is if it’s not going to be match-day attendance,

then we talked about it’s going to be commerce,

then you need your players,

you need to look at these short shopping experiences in collab labs.

But I think that’s it. You made a really good point.

It’s still… The sample size is too small.

It will really make a real impact.

And I think, aside from the attendances

and what clubs are doing on match days as well,

I think from a content perspective,

now I think there’s an opportunity here.

Now, look, Sky will do a really good job

of how they’ll produce and distribute the women’s game, right?

And I know that their digital team in the world

do a really good job in terms of highlights

and what they’re doing with all of that.

I think what you have got now is the clubs

and the league itself has to step up with the content

in and around the games themselves.

And really lean into the… Invest in it.

Really lean into the personalities,

the players and the sport and just the cricket.

Exactly. And just be via their own channels as well.

And support women creators.

And support, yeah, exactly.

And find some women’s creators

that can be modern-day commentators on the game itself.

I mean, obviously, we’re talking a lot about football here as well.

And the same applies to any other sports, right?

And I think, like I said, rugby had its day with Ilona Maher as well

and hopefully they’re going to do more things like that.

Cricket as well. You can see it growing all the time.

And I know that the ECB have invested heavily

in making sure that the women’s game has real support

and some kind of parity.

You know, it’s happening more and more now.

I know, for one, father of a teenage daughter,

if she was that way in terms of wanting to play professional sport,

there’d be opportunities now that weren’t there 15, 20 years ago.

What do you think, Jo?

Same. I think it’s a mixture of things.

I do think it needs to be marketed in a different way.

I don’t think that that cheapens it or sullies it.

I think it just needs a different approach

and there’s an opportunity to do it.

I think, to your point,

I think particularly on platforms like YouTube and TikTok,

it’s a completely different media experience.

And that should be allowed to find its own audience there,

using creators, using athletes.

And I do think, you know,

even if the actual live product stays the same,

maybe wrap it up in a different way.

I love that Hundred double-headers, men’s and women’s.

That would be brilliant.

That would make me want to go and stay a whole day

and watch both games.

So I think there’s just an opportunity.

I think it just needs a bit of courage.

It’s time to be a bit braver.

Yeah, be bold, be brave

and target the right audiences like they’re doing.

So if anyone thinks that’s a really bad idea,

obviously we’ve got an email address.

hello@attentionshift.media.

Yeah, it was me who said it.

So, you know, email me and abuse me for that.

Thank you both of you.

That’s it for today’s episode of The Attention Shift.

Remember to like and subscribe and listen in next time.

Like I said, if you do want to let us know what you think,

totally disagree with what we’re saying

or have any suggestions of things you’d like us to talk about,

you can email us at hello@attentionshift.media.

That’s hello@attentionshift.media.

I’ve been Ed Abis.

I’ve been Lee Rabourne.

And I’m Jo Redfern.

Thank you. Bye.