‘We are encouraged by the performance of IPL on Jio’

LaLiga, the second-most popular European football league in India after the English Premier League, recently unveiled a new brand positioning. José Antonio Cachaza, managing director for LaLiga in India, tells Christina Moniz how he plans to popularise the league — available currently on Sports18 (linear TV) as well as on JioCinema for free —in the country and boost female following for the sport. Edited excerpts:

Considering the English Premier League is the most followed football property, how will you build LaLiga the brand and its viewership in India?
We compete with the English Premier League, which is bigger than us in terms of audience and revenue from broadcast rights in India. The pie however, is big enough for both of us and that’s the good news. Globally when it comes to international broadcast revenues, the English Premier League leads at €1.5 billion annually while we are at a healthy second position at €800 million annually and the German Bundesliga is third at €180 million. But, we definitely want to close the gap between us and the English league.

We have been growing year-on-year in India, and this is most evident in our social media following. We started at 300,000 followers across social media platforms eight years ago to reach 7 million today. Our strategy for India is simple — create stronger connections with viewers, increase the number of fans and thereby, increase our commercial and brand value. Over the past few years, we have built strong relations for the league with Indian brands like BKT Tires, Hero Vired and Dream11. It is a positive sign when brands want to be part of LaLiga. It means we are moving in the right direction.

What prompted the recent rebranding for LaLiga?

A number of things have happened in LaLiga in the last 10 years. We went from being a national football league to a world corporation, growing our presence to reach 41 countries through 11 offices. With the rebranding, we want to showcase a brand that reflects the new reality of LaLiga, which now also hosts various competitions such as LaLiga Promises (the league’s football competition for children) and LaLiga Genuine, a tournament for those with intellectual disabilities. This is our effort to widen the reach of the brand, and strengthen its commitment to diversity and inclusion. Further, the trigger for our rebranding move was also led by the change in title sponsor from Santander to the gaming platform, Electronic Arts (Sports FC). We decided to go a step further and give LaLiga an overhaul with a modern brand image. From the 2023-24 season onwards, the 42 clubs in the league will sport our new logo, which will also be visible in stadiums, broadcast and the digital universe.

LaLiga signed Rohit Sharma as brand ambassador in 2019. How has that association worked out in a cricket-crazy market?

As the captain of the Indian cricket team, our partnership with Rohit Sharma has worked well, especially as he is a big Real Madrid fan. Our messaging is not so much about asking fans to move from cricket to football but simply to give the sport a chance and experience what the LaLiga has to offer.

Football fans in India are still overwhelmingly male. What steps are you taking to boost female viewership?

Yes, this is definitely a concern and focus area for us. As per some surveys, women make up 45% of the football following in the country. However, that has not been our observation. Whenever we host football events on-ground or attend watch parties, the gathering is nearly 90% male. So if the surveys we read are correct, there may be a good number of women football followers, but for some reason, we don’t see them represented at on-ground events. We are exploring ways to increase our engagement with female fans and get them to join watch parties and match screenings. One heartening piece of news is that the Indian women’s football team has been performing very well, and is actually closer to qualifying for the World Cup than the men’s team. Success in Indian women’s football may also encourage more women to take an interest in the sport. We need to support the development of women’s sports with the revenue that men’s sports generates.

Any special plans to address football-crazy markets such as Kerala, Goa and West Bengal?

There is a lot of love for the sport in these markets but they are more difficult to crack than you think. The new fandom of football in India is largely in the metros, and tier-I and II cities.

Working in the cities also helps build stronger connections with corporate India. Honestly, I would love to host an El Classico (Real Madrid versus Barcelona fixture) beach watch party in Goa, but it doesn’t make commercial sense.

We are hopeful that with our broadcast partners Viacom18, we will grow and reach more viewers and in the future, increase our engagement with new markets.

The success JioCinema saw during this year’s IPL is encouraging. Our ambition is to eventually grow our viewership to match cricket numbers.