6th June, 2012
Globacom’s English Premier League partner and19 -time English Premier League winner, Manchester United FC, have been adjudged the world’s most popular club, according to a global football follower survey by leading market research agency, Kantar.
The survey, ranked as the largest global football follower-survey ever conducted, gathered 54,000 respondents from 39 countries, found that Man United have 659 million followers worldwide, even as football remains the world’s most popular sport, with 1.6 billion followers globally.
The result, which reinforced the results of a recent FIFA survey showed that the club have 71 million fans in the Americas, 90 million in Europe, 173 million in Middle East and Africa, 325 million in Asia Pacific and 108 million in China alone, almost half of all China’s football followers.
In summary, the number of Manchester United followers is larger than the combined population of the USA, Brazil and Mexico globally and has grown by 98% since the previous survey in 2007.
Commenting on the result, The Club’s Commercial Director, Richard Arnold, said that it is the club’s long-term strategy that has made Manchester United the number one club in the world’s number one sport.
“The growth in our followership since 2007 is partly the result of our new approach to reaching fans: including the increase in television viewership from two to four billion last season, media partnerships, and the promotion of the footage of Wayne’s overhead kick, which echoed around the world on several channels including the social media. Manchester United have built on a tradition of iconic players, iconic teams and iconic achievements over the years”, he said
On February 18, 2010, Globacom unveiled a unique partnership of giants with the English team.
The partnership provides developmental and entertainment opportunities to Glo subscribers through a series of promotional activities including the-“Recharge and Go To Old Trafford” promo in which subscribers have been traveling to England in an all-expenses-paid trip to watch Manchester United Premiership home matches.
The Glo partnership was the first Manchester United ever entered into with any corporate organisation in Africa.
Kantar, a world class research agency, also produced the 2007 global football followership survey, which indicated that the respondents came from 39 countries, which together comprise 75% of the global adult population and 85% of global GDP.
The number of respondents was more than double the number in the 2007 survey. It’s 35 questions analysis include demographics, age, gender, socio-economic background, interest in Manchester United products.