Soccer tourism is usually seen at English Premier League stadiums such as Old Trafford, Anfield and the Emirates, so fans of Harborough Town, who compete in the seventh tier of the English soccer pyramid, were stunned when 100 Spaniards arrived at Bowden Park to watch them take on St Ives Town.
The Spanish fans, who turned up on April 12, were subscribers to a Spanish YouTube channel, La Media Inglesa, focused on English soccer, which has now started arranging trips abroad for its followers.
“Some of the local fans were quite surprised, probably wondering what 100 Spaniards were doing there,” said Alvaro Sanz, a Harborough Town fan from Madrid.
Photo: Reuters
More than 80 million fans attended professional sports in the UK in 2023, with soccer making up 33 percent of the total, with Premier League matches accounting for 20 percent (15.8 million) of all sports attendances, data compiled by marketing agency Two Circles showed.
Ilie Oleart, from Barcelona, founded La Media Inglesa, which has covered soccer matches in England for Spanish-speaking fans around the world since 2011.
The channel has attracted nearly half a million subscribers, and in 2018 began offering trips to the UK so fans could experience the English game.
Oleart, who supports the Catalan club Espanyol, who play in La Liga, the top tier of Spanish soccer, said he aspired to not only arrange trips, but to be involved in a club in a more meaningful way.
“Our aim was to transform a small local English club into a small local club with a global fanbase,” he said.
Harborough Town FC, nicknamed the Bees, emerged as the fans’ choice after Oleart consulted his subscriber base. La Media Inglesa has brought its subscribers along to watch matches at the grounds of Brighton and Hove Albion, Sheffield United and Wycombe Wanderers.
“I met people at the club in September [last year] to get to know their history, the town and the facilities,” Oleart said. “We thought they were the perfect club with the right values to share with our audience.”
Soccer matches at Harborough Town, which take place in the Southern League Premier Division Central, would now feature live on the La Media Inglesa YouTube channel, allowing Spanish speakers an opportunity to become “virtual supporters” of the club.
Harborough Town chair Peter Dougan said the partnership with La Media Inglesa was an “opportunity to grow our fanbase and our income” through a global audience and could open the door to sponsorship deals.
“It was being in the right place at the right time,” he said. “La Media Inglesa liked what they saw, and we decided they were right for our club too.”
Harborough were defeated 2-1 by St Ives Town, but the result did not dampen the spirits of Oleart’s group, who were “very happy” with their experience.
“It wasn’t just any club any more, it felt like our club,” Oleart said.
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