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As scary as it might seem 2018 is only just around the corner. Due to this, Business Of Sport has looked into our crystal ball and come up with predictions of three stories we will see happening next year.
1. An Online Platform Will Win Premier League Rights
The rights for the English Premier League are up for grabs next year and we’ve already heard murmurings that Facebook and other platforms may make a strong big for a portion of these rights.
Expect this to finally happen as the top tier of English football finally gets dragged into the digital era in 2018.
2. There Will Be A Technology Scandal At The World Cup
FIFA will be employing Video Assistant Referees (VARs) at next year’s World Cup in Russia. This is where an assistant referee reviews match decisions, such as offsides, using video footage. The technology has already been trialled in Germany’s Bundesliga with a number of prominent gaffes already.
Expect some clanger to be dropped, or the technology to fail during the tournament.
3. TV Ratings For Major Sports Will Keep Dropping
This past football season, Sky TV suffered its biggest drop in viewers for English Premier League games for more than seven years.
Despite the money in the game and more games than ever being shown, simply put, people aren’t watching full games like they used to. Due to this, we’ve seen a huge rise in “near live” highlights, which share the latest action of game on social networks. It enables fans to dip in and out of games, while being full up to date.
I expect ratings for a variety of sports to suffer in 2018 as online streaming (legally, or illegally), keeps growing in popularity amongst fans.
