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Strategic challenges in the football business: a SPACE analysis
Author(s) -
Cross John,
Henderson Steven
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
strategic change
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.527
H-Index - 16
eISSN - 1099-1697
pISSN - 1086-1718
DOI - 10.1002/jsc.654
Subject(s) - football , rigour , football club , club , business model , hobby , marketing , space (punctuation) , business , subject (documents) , public relations , political science , computer science , law , medicine , geometry , mathematics , library science , anatomy , operating system
The football business has been transformed from a tawdry pastime to a major industry that is scrutinized by city analysts and is the subject of important take‐over bids. Yet as Grundy observes in an earlier issue of this journal, there are few serious attempts to examine the industry with strategic rigour. This paper reports on and analyses data from professional football clubs and uses SPACE analysis to generate strategic positions for individual clubs and a prognosis for the overall industry. This evidence enables Grundy's model of the industry to be contextualized and shows that in most respects, his ideas are supported. The paper also reveals that environmental factors play a significant role in the business success of a club. This identifies the paradox that success on the football field can have a deleterious effect on the strategic future of the club. The paper also concludes that the structure of the industry would not support reasonable business expectations and suggests that we are observing a corporate hobby rather than modern business activity.Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.