Liverpool FC Research Articles

PENGARUH SPONSORSHIP DALAM MENINGKATKAN BRAND AWARENESS (Studi pada Sponsorship Garuda Indonesia Terhadap Liverpool FC sebagai Global Official Airline Partner)

Garuda Indonesia is the first and the only airline in Indonesia that implement sponsorship programs with international soccer club, Liverpool FC. This study uses sponsorship dimension consisting of target audience reach, compatibility with the company’s or brand positioning, and message capacity. This research applies quantitative approach and involves 83 respondents as samples collected by non-probability and snowball sampling techniques. The results suggest that sponsorship has a strong effects towards brand awareness. Futher, multiple regression analysis also indicates that the dimensions of sponsorship compatibility with the company’s or brand positioning have the biggest influence towards brand awareness than the other two dimensions.

Loss, Protest, and Heritage: Liverpool FC and Hillsborough

This article examines the Hillsborough disaster of 1989 that led to the deaths of 96 people and the long protest by the Hillsborough families in the search for justice. In April 2016, a special Coroner’s Court ruled that the Hillsborough dead had been unlawfully killed and a campaign for justice that had run for well over two decades was concluded. The paper argues that the protest and justice campaign centred on the Hillsborough disaster was essentially a battle against agencies of the state who had withheld the truth from the families. The paper also highlights the acquisition of Liverpool FC by the Fenway Sports Group and their embrace of the Hillsborough disaster as part of the club’s heritage which further added to the uniqueness of the Liverpool brand and how the club, the disaster and the justice campaign have become synonymous with each other.

FOUR WORDS (January, 2016)

Abstract FOUR WORDS was curated by Alan Dunn in collaboration with Metal Liverpool as part of their series of January urban provocations. FOUR WORDS presented 100 ten-second text animations on Europe’s largest digital screen opposite Lime Street Station in Liverpool. Contributions came from local community and youth groups, alongside more recognized practitioners including Gerhard Richter, Shaista Aziz, Douglas Coupland, The Andy Warhol Foundation, Paul Morley and a priest, retired seafarer, radio station and David Fairclough (Liverpool FC striker, 1975–83). See www.alandunn67.co.uk/fourwords.html for documentation of the project.

Cultural consumption through the epistemologies of the South: ‘Humanization’ in transnational football fan solidarities

In 2014, Boaventura de Sousa Santos awoke the global sociological community to the need to privilege ‘humanization’ in the exploration of transnational solidarities. This article presents the cultural consumption of a football club – Liverpool FC – to understand the common ‘love’, ‘suffering’, ‘care’ and ‘knowledge’ that fans who are part of the ‘Brazil Reds’ or ‘Switzerland Reds’ (although not all fans engaged in such communities are ‘from’ Brazil or Switzerland) experience. The argument is that the global North lexicon of social class, ethnicity, gender and, especially, nationality is less significant as starting points for analysis than humanization through shared love, which consolidates Liverpool FC fans’ transnational solidarities. Accordingly, the article calls for the epistemologies of the global South to be used to understand the practices of cultural consumption that constitute activities in the sphere of everyday life, such as those involved in ‘love’ for a football club.

Social Media Strategy in Professional Football: The case of Liverpool FC

Social Media Strategy in Professional Football: The case of Liverpool FC

Beyond Tippekampen: the origins and maintenance of Scandinavian support for the Liverpool FC

Professional sport is a highly marketable product, whereby favourite teams often become ‘overseas sweethearts’ for millions of satellite supporters and their imagined community of like-minded fans. Scandinavia has historically proven to be a fertile market for English football and is home to some of the largest supporter groups for English clubs, in particular the Liverpool FC. This article examines the origins of Scandinavian identification with the Merseyside club and how satellite supporters in the region maintain a connection with the famous brand. Scandinavian supporters highlighted the importance of the media, especially the popularity of state-run television programmes such as Tippekampen, the team’s playing style and the presence of star players in their initial support for Liverpool FC and explained how they had turned to a virtual ‘third place’ to regularly connect and engage with fellow fans and the brand in cyberspace. In a global marketplace, satellite supporters are critical for the future of many brands and this article offers a valuable case study for those who seek to exploit these markets, monetize these consumers and build equity for their team brands.

Something is stirring in Anfield: Elite Premier League football and localism

The Localism Act 2011 has provided the right for community organizations to nominate local buildings to be listed as an Asset of Community Value. In England a number of inner urban neighbourhoods host elite Premier League football stadia, their physical presence often visible from afar. Two in particular stand out, both recently listed as an Asset of Community Value, the globally renown football clubs of Liverpool FC and their Anfield stadium and Manchester United and Old Trafford. Three aspects of this are noteworthy. First, the capability of a community group to organize and agitate in such a way as to ensure a local asset is listed. Second, the extent to which the legislation is providing substantive rights for community activists thereby challenging those who would suggest localism is more rhetoric than real. Third, by reviewing a single case of Anfield, we can see how the role of elite professional football club in a low-income neighbourhood can be challenged for the benefit of local residents as plans for social and economic development are shaped.

An inspiration to all who knew her

Editor An inspiration to all who knew her During the course of putting together this issue, the sad news reached us of the untimely death of helen Bromley. Our thoughts are with, and our deepest sympathies go to, helen’s family and friends. Their loss overshadows everything else. The early years sector has lost a shining light, a true star. Anyone who was privileged to have been trained by helen will count himself or herself as fortunate. She was an inspiration, one of those people who just ‘got’ children and childhood. Listening to helen talk about her work in settings made you realise just how simple the early years should be, and by that, i do not mean that it is easy or that anyone can do it. What i am trying to convey is just how natural someone like helen made it seem. You could tell that children would enjoy being in a setting with her, because you can easily imagine helen having just as much fun as the children, following their interests, sharing their experiences, healthily disregarding policy and frameworks as and when necessary, which i imagine was fairly often! it was this no-nonsense approach that really appealed to me. Do what’s right for children, not what’s right for policy makers. use children’s interests, rather than pre-planned themes and resources, whether that be football, superheroes, monsters, railways, knitting... As an editor, handling copy from many different contributors, with vastly different experiences of writing, helen was a dream. her words needed hardly any editing, and there was rarely anything superfluous. Knowledge poured forth. helen had become an editorial board member of eye before i joined (that’s almost nine years ago) and was a regular contributor, often writing a series of six or 12 articles at a time. They taught me a great deal, and i imagine they have taught practitioners a great deal also. recently, i found myself thinking about the last time i had met helen, and to my shock i realised that, in all the time we had worked together, i had only ever met helen twice, both at early years shows. We e-mailed regularly, and i enjoyed our exchanges immensely. They pretty much always followed the same format: A line or two about the work at hand; a paragraph or two, sometimes more, and often followed by further e-mails, about football. namely, the fortunes of helen’s beloved Liverpool FC. i did try to sneak in the fortunes of my own team, Wolves, occasionally, but generally we talked about Liverpool. These days, i tend not to look too much further than League One, but it would be great to see Brendan rodgers, and his team, mount a title challenge this season. We have lost a true champion of children, but helen leaves a legacy, through her training, through her articles, through her personality and beliefs, that we must all try and pick up on and take forward. We owe that much to children. i plan to run a larger article in next month’s issue and would welcome contributions so that we can share your memories and tributes to helen. if you would like to share your thoughts, please send your contributions to me at neil.henty@markallengroup.com by December 11th. Editor Neil Henty MSc eye@markallengroup.com

Not a Matter of Life and Death?

‘Come on, it's not a matter of life and death’, said some Job-like comforter, following a defeat in a football match. ‘No’, replied Bill Shankly, the granite-like Scot who was manager of Liverpool FC during their days of pre-eminence, whose team had just lost, ‘it is more important than that’.

Football’s grobalization or globalization? The lessons of Liverpool Football Club’s evolution in the Premier League era

In the last two decades, the percentage of foreign players and managers in the English Premier League has increased markedly. In addition, advances in satellite technology have created a global fan base for England’s biggest clubs, with global entrepreneurs vying for club ownership. Previous academic studies highlight these changes focusing on the excessive commercialization of football while mostly ignoring clubs, which are increasingly global sociocultural, political and economic agents, yet historically the source of intense local identity. Adopting Samuel Huntington’s definition of institutions as ‘stabled, valued, recurring patterns of behavior’ and focusing mainly on the last two decades, this essay analyses how Liverpool FC as an institution dealt with the myriad challenges of globalization. Relying on qualitative interviews and archival documentation, it also tests George Ritzer’s concept of grobalization, which predicts that the effects of globalization will result in all clubs becoming increasingly similar. The study reveals through a new conceptual framework called ‘localism anew’ that globalization’s effects are not uniform but depend on institutional capacity and the local-societal setting.

Beating thy Neighbor: Derby Effects in German Professional Soccer

Summary It is widely acknowledged that derbies between two teams from the same city or region catch more public attention than “normal” soccer matches. Terms such as “Old Firm” (Rangers vs. Celtic), “Merseyside” (Liverpool FC vs. Everton FC), “Superclásico” (Boca Juniors vs. River Plate), and “Revierderby” (Dortmund vs. Schalke) are well-known even to people outside their respective countries of origin. Using data from the German Bundesliga from 1999 to 2009, we test whether derbies differ from other soccer matches with respect to the number of goals scored by each team, match results, and referee evaluations. The results are very surprising given the enormous amount of public attention that derbies with their special character attract: we find that there are no significant differences between derbies and “normal” matches. Despite the importance of derbies for fans and the public, they turn out to be “normal” soccer matches in all other respects.

Reclaiming the Kop? Analysing Liverpool Supporters’ 21st Century Mobilizations

For at least the past three decades, the sociology of football and its supporter cultures has been responsive to the social issues which have emerged within it. Today, the fact that fans rejoice and protest at overseas purchases of their club means that the time has come for research to reflect on elite-level English football’s position in a transnational space. In this context, this article focuses on the football supporters’ protests connected to Liverpool FC, centring on the Spirit of Shankly mobilization, and uses Manuel Castells’ theories to understand them. The argument that emerges is important for sociologists understanding the contemporary world because it illustrates the connections between local sites around the world, the internet as a tool through which collective action takes place, and discusses what ‘power’ means in these contexts.

Foreign fandom and the Liverpool FC: a cyber-mediated romance

Globalization and advances in communications technology, notably satellite television and broadband Internet, have greatly expanded the potential marketplace for professional sport teams. As a result, many team brands profit from millions of satellite supporters worldwide. This study is the third in a series that explores why, and how, these foreign consumers support their chosen team. Through a mixed methods case study, satellite supporters highlighted the importance of seven primary antecedents in their initial identification with the English Premier League’s Liverpool FC: media coverage, style of play, presence of a particular player(s), team success, history of success, participation in the highest division and stadium. They also actively sought opportunities to support the team (and engage with the club and fellow fans) throughout the year, not solely during football season. Furthermore, satellite supporters expressed intense loyalty for, and appeared to derive psychological benefit from their support of, the foreign-based team. As such, satellite supporters present an opportunity for sport marketers to tap into a lucrative fan base and enhance their own team brands.

Introduction

It can be said without fear of exaggeration that the split of Everton Football Club in 1892 represents one of the most important events in football history. It brought Everton into the modern era as a limited liability company and Liverpool FC into existence, and gave football one of its most enduring domestic rivalries. Given the importance of the Everton split for the future of the game, therefore, it is surprising that a dedicated and detailed investigation of this event has never been attempted.

‘Over here’: ‘Americanization’ and the new politics of football club ownership – the case of Liverpool FC

This paper focuses on arguments concerning sport and Americanization, especially in relation to English Premier League football clubs. The central case study here is of Liverpool football club in the north-west of England. The recent economic trajectory of football in England is analysed, as is the current attractiveness of the English game to foreign investors. The specific history and traditions of the Liverpool club and the city of Liverpool is offered as a means of contextualizing the initial response locally to the leveraged buyout by Tom Hicks and George Gillett Jr early in 2007. The paper considers the almost complete breakdown of relations between the new owners and Liverpool fans between autumn 2007 and spring 2008. It concludes that in attempting to maintain core aspects of the Liverpool club's organic traditions the Liverpool board, paradoxically, paved the way to the excessive commodification of the club and the alienation of many of its own supporters.

The allure of an 'overseas sweetheart': a Liverpool FC brand community

The media’s reach and influence has exposed many sport teams to millions of fans worldwide. Muniz and O’Guinn (2001) claimed that brands now transcend geography, and this has led to the rise of the brand community, or “a specialized, non-geographically bound community, based on a structured set of social relationships among admirers of a brand” (p.412). Although there are now global team brands, little attention has been paid to the existence of a community focused on ‘non-traditional’ brands such as the sport team. This article concludes that a brand community exists for the English Premier League’s Liverpool FC. A worldwide network of supporters exhibited a shared consciousness, rituals and traditions and a sense of moral responsibility, and derived psychological benefit from their fandom. A team’s brand community can fuel its brand equity in foreign markets (Kerr and Gladden, 2008), and so confirmation that this community exists, and might be exploited, is welcome news for sport marketers who battle in a competitive global marketplace.

‘We all dream of a team of Carraghers’: comparing ‘local’ and Texan Liverpool fans' talk

There are strong grounds upon which it can be argued that the English Premier League holds global appeal. This article carries out a semiotic analysis on the role that Liverpool FC's Bootle-born defender Jamie Carragher holds amongst two spatially disparate supporter communities, one principally based in Liverpool and the other in Texas. Despite the historical influence and connection with locally born players, evolving European migration patterns and continental football philosophies have limited the progression of ‘Scouse’ players at Liverpool. Jamie Carragher is a contemporary exception, who has become a focal point for the ‘local’ supporters' affections. His status has been propelled by his interpretation and implementation of the core working-class values of the city and the club, displayed through his conduct off the pitch and his performances on it. Drawing from the perspectives of ‘local’ and Texas-based fans, this paper expands upon these issues, and examines Liverpool supporters' evolving heroism of Jamie Carragher. A mixed-method qualitative approach was adopted, involving ethnographic techniques, participant observation, interview methods and podcast analysis.

‘You only sing when you're winning’: football factions and rock rivalries in Manchester and Liverpool

The cities of Liverpool and Manchester, urban centres with quite different stories, have been rivals over the last two centuries in the realms of commerce, then sport and culture. This article considers the footballing and musical pursuits of the two cities with particular reference to the last 50 years. It addresses the entwined histories of these cities – one a port with a mercantile focus, the other inland and with manufacturing at its core, but goes on to focus on the intense competition between the teams Liverpool FC and Manchester United, a rivalry expressed on occasions, by the fans at least, in venomous terms. The piece goes on to describe the popular musical histories of the cities, particularly in the wake of the Beatles, and contemplates whether the enmity felt on the soccer terraces – specifically in connection with the two red teams – is echoed in the relationship between Mancunian and Liverpudlian bands. The article concludes that while commercial tensions are buried in the past, the footballing contest remains as passionately felt as ever, often furious and sometimes callous, yet the musical rivalry between the two places appears to have a more friendly, fraternal and even supportive character.

Justice for the Ninety‐Six: Liverpool FC fans and uncommon use of football song

Recent scholarship concerning football supporter song has largely focused on its common uses, such as identity construction and performance, particularly during the match and in relation to opposition fans. This article examines two unusual uses of football song by supporters of Liverpool Football Club that transcend that usual sort of singing. It argues that in singing for justice for the victims of Hillsborough for six minutes at the beginning of a high profile televised match, and in using the same song to sing down Andy Burnham, the then minister for Sport, at a memorial, Liverpool fans sang beyond the normal bounds of their sporting performance. In musically unifying their protest, they created a cultural object of significant power, able to resonate through the media in unusual ways and in doing that, they colonized space beyond the stadium with their collective identity and ideology. These two exceptional uses of song by Liverpool football fans reveal a fundamental shift in both the scope and the cultural resonance of football supporter singing.

Beating Thy Neighbor: Derby Effects in German Professional Soccer

Derbies between two teams from the same city or region catch more public attention than normal'' soccer matches. Terms such as Old Firm (Rangers vs. Celtic), Merseyside (Liverpool FC vs. Everton FC), Superclasico'' (Boca Juniors vs. River Plate), and Revierderby (Dortmund vs. Schalke) are well-known even to people outside their respective countries of origin. Using data from the German Bundesliga from 1999 to 2009, we test whether derbies differ from other soccer matches with respect to the number of goals, match results, the number of scoring chances for both teams, and referee evaluations. We find some evidence for derby effects, for example, the home advantage of the home team with respect to the number of goals scored, the match result and the attempts vanishes whenever the match is a derby. With respect to the evaluation of the referee, we find evidence that sending-offs are associated with a lower referee performance grade in derbies. We conclude that referees make a greater number of wrong decisions in derbies with regard to sending-offs. However, when considering the overall marginal effects of a derby on our dependent variables, we find no significant differences between derbies and normal matches.