10 years from now, who will still watch football on TV?

The next generation is approaching sports differently, in an era where the internet reigns supreme and users are not limited in their choice of content.

Journalist Matt Slater of The Athleti c believes that the way people watch football is changing rapidly. Unlike the last two generations, who still came to the round ball through big screen TVs and commentary from mainstream broadcasters, Gen Z and Gen Alpha follow sports in a completely different way.

“My kids and I will still watch games together, but not as often. They will often spend as much time on their phones as they do on the TV. While I listen to Roy Keane and the pundits during halftime, they put on headphones to watch their favorite KOL,” Matt Slater describes the generational difference in how they watch football.

Speaking about this, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said that the world's favorite sports are gradually shifting to highlight format. At the same time, the way of watching football on television, as it has been for decades, is gradually disappearing.

“It’s become the norm for Gen Z to watch TV and use a second screen at the same time. But that doesn’t mean they lack the patience to watch something in its entirety. If it’s really interesting, they’ll watch it,” Matt Stagg, former chief technology officer of major broadcasters EE and BT Sport, said of how young people watch sports.

Content overload

Two Circles, a sports marketing company, believes that sports content consumption is growing rapidly, tripling in two decades (2014-2024). The specific figure is 1,300 billion hours of viewing, becoming 4,000 billion hours in 9 years. Last year, the organization measured about 3,000 billion hours of sports content consumed on digital platforms.

People are no longer just watching one sport, and their interests are expanding. And with that comes an expanding library. Two Circles estimates that 114,000 years of content were uploaded last year, up from 15,000 years in 2008. Much of it was created by clubs and athletes, not broadcasters.

Social media channels provide additional outlets for content distribution for the players themselves. Photo: @leomessi.

Peter Hutton, Meta’s head of sports partnerships from 2018 to 2023, believes that content output from stars is more important, and that their contributions will lead the post-match discussion, not traditional commentators.

“If a player posts something after an important game, it has more power than a TV station or a club,” Hutton said.

Personalize the experience

It is taboo in traditional broadcasting for a commentator to show favoritism towards their favorite team, a sign of unprofessionalism. However, such a phenomenon will become more common.

Amazon Prime surprised everyone by allowing commentators to be muted when they acquired the rights to the EPL in 2019. More options are being offered, with broadcasters offering more than one option to their viewers. It could be a commentary stream, a HUD, or a favorite streamer.

“A hardcore fan will want a stream with dense data, heatmaps and xG metrics. But a more casual group might choose to follow the same YouTubers they like,” says Matt Stagg.

Users have the right to choose how football content is provided, without being tied to the broadcaster. Photo: Dolby.

Hutton agrees. Traditionally, viewers watched what the network wanted them to watch. But young people expect choice.

With all the glitz and the choice comes the price tag. The average consumer is less likely to be affected. Broadcasters and platforms cater to this group with a variety of free services. DAZN, with its oil wealth, broadcast the entire Club World Cup for free. The Saudi Pro League also shows highlights on YouTube.

But viewers are increasingly paying more to get the full experience, with UK users spending as little as £174 a year to access BBC content.

Along with that comes the pirated audience. Even though they don’t pay, they are a customer base that companies will have to adapt to and find ways to exploit. “Illegal audiences are valuable fans too. Sports will have to accept the reality of their existence and build monetized content around them,” Hutton said.

The L-shaped ad format is becoming more and more popular. Photo: Ginger Media.

Companies are now placing L-shaped ads around streams, taking up most of the screen space. The content is distributed to pirated groups for commercial exploitation. Videocities is being hired to use AI to track all pirated streams. They are helping the NBA count the exact audience size to sell ads more effectively.

Like playing a game

EA, the company behind a slew of popular sports games, recently teamed up with NBC’s Peacock to air a football game between the Baltimore Ravens and Cincinnati Bengals. The main camera angle was high above the quarterback, the direction most likely to be used by Madden NFL Cast players, rather than the traditional broadcast angle.

Likewise, the game company has also brought many MLS soccer matches to EA Sports FC. With the support of the Saudi Public Investment Fund, EA has the potential to bring the most attractive leagues into their game and unify the two experiences.

AR/VR glasses will change the sports viewing experience in the future. Photo: DAZN.

Virtual reality (VR) headsets are also expected to grow in popularity. The solution has been in development for years but has not yet reached the level that Apple or Meta hoped for. On the upside, this could be one of the best ways to watch sports when the technology is fully developed.

The services give users the experience of sitting in the front row of a football or basketball game, and they also offer the option to see more information without the need for a second screen.

Despite the many changes predicted, experts still believe that in the next decade, the above solutions will not be popularized. AR or AR will not be able to reduce the amount of content watched on TV or mobile. The difference will come from information and data personalized to the audience and the trend of watching short clips vertically.

“Watching live sports is still a very communal experience. If you can’t go to the stadium, be with friends or family. I think in 20 years, when no one has linear TV, the last thing we’ll watch together on a flat screen, live, will still be sports,” Stagg said.

Source: https://znews.vn/10-nam-nua-con-ai-xem-bong-da-tren-tv-post1606048.html