Tag Archives: Premier League

How many Twitter followers does your club have?

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In November 2013, I did a little analysis to see who was the most followed football club on twitter. Arsenal came out on top, but what was surprising was that, at the time, Mesut Ozil had more followers than any Premier League football club.

As it is quite at work in my industry with the lead up to Christmas, I have decided to review the blog and update the figures.

To get a proper provisional analysis, the above is a list of teams who were in the Premier League in 2013, and are in it now.

The first interesting analysis is just how much Twitter has grown over the last 4 years. On average, Premier League sides have increased their following by 552%.

Secondly, Manchester United, who in 2013 were the 4th most followed side in the Premier League, are now topping the table.

In 2013, I noted that I was surprised to see Man U in 4th place as they are easily the most supported club in the UK, and one of the most supported in the world. It shows how poor their media team probably were back in 2013.

The growth of Manchester United aside, Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City and Liverpool have shown a similar growth pattern.

With regards to Liverpool and Arsenal, it shows how strong and historic the clubs are, that they have been able to continue to grow their support without league titles at a quicker rate than the likes of Manchester City and Chelsea who have won league titles. It shows success is not everything.

Saying that, Spurs now languish a long way behind Manchester City. I wonder how many of those fans that follow City had heard of the club when Twitter was first launched back in 2006?

City’s growth over Spurs does highlight that success is very important, especially when it comes to gaining new fans, and foreign fans.

Spurs have not much bigger a following than Everton, an equally unsuccessful side over the last 20 years. It perhaps shows that Spurs fans claim that there has been a power shift, and that they are a massive club, are false.

In terms of Twitter following, Spurs are the 6th most followed in England. They are probably also the 6th biggest club in the country.

It probably also shows the brand of the Premier League that the biggest growers (bar Manchester United) were smaller clubs, lower down the table. I feel a lot of their followers are general fans of the Premier League, rather than fans of the clubs they follow.

The second table is the clubs who were not in the Premier League in 2013, so I have no original data on them. What is interesting is Leicester City.

At 1.1million followers, they would be placed just behind Newcastle. It would have been interesting to see their 2013 data in comparison. I imagine it would have been not too much higher than Southampton. Leicester’s does show just how much success can increase support.

Like success has boasted Leicester, relegation is also clearly damaging.

Those clubs who went down have still grown their twitter following, but at a slower rate than those who stayed in the Premier League.

The 6 teams who are no longer in the Premier League have increased their Twitter following by, on average, 398%. The bottom 6 teams in the Premier League by followers have increased by 557%.

And finally we come on to how the Premier League sides compare to the rest of the world

The first observation is that Real Madrid have overtaken Barcelona since 2013. Although by the time you include alternative languages for both, Barcelona are still ahead.

One interesting thing to note is the Spanish version of Real Madrid’s twitter is followed by more than the English version, but the English version of Barcelona is followed by more than the Spanish version.

Perhaps this indicates that Real Madrid are more popular in Spain, whilst Barcelona are followed more by foreign fans. I know what I would prefer.

Another interesting thing to note is once you remove the English sides, the rest of the world has only grown by 293%. That against the Premier League’s growth of 522%. It shows that in terms of leagues, the Premier League is still the most popular in the world, even if Barcelona and Real Madrid are streaks ahead in terms of individual club.

The last thing to note is how small Celtic are.

With just 551,000 followers, they are not much bigger than Norwich City, and are well behind the likes of Crystal Palace, WBA and Swansea. They might be a big side in Scotland, but it certainly shows they are a big fish in a small pond. And if they ever did join the Premier League, they would be a very small fish in a big pond.

Until next time

Keenos

Are Arsenal actually in the middle of a glory period?

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In researching for responses to yesterdays blog on how things at Arsenal are actually not as bad as what they seem, I ended up asking myself a question:

Are Arsenal actually in the middle of a glory period?

Now before you spit your tea out all over your monitor, hear me out.

Arsenal have won 3 FA Cups in 4 years. That is 3 trophies, 3 bits of silverware. Now some of you will already be saying the FA Cup is not enough. Well done for being brainwashed by Sky and UEFA to think that the only thing that matters is the Premier League and the Champions League.

I remember the days of the 90s, when we won the domestic cup double and then the European Cup Winners Cup in 1994. I could not tell you where we finished those years.

3 trophies in 4 years is a success, especially when you factor in that Arsenal’s hit rate since 1900 is just under a trophy every 4 years (give or take a bit of time for the World Wars). Interestingly, prior to 1996, it was a trophy every 5 years. So 3 trophies in 4 years is clearly well above our going rate.

Now I looked into it further, to try and establish what our most successful periods in our history are, and how does the current period compare:

What is clearly missing from the current successful period is a league title, but what is clear is when you look at the bigger picture, that over the 125+ year history of the club, we are in one of most successful eras. Don’t believe me?

Despite our reported demise, only 4 previous era’s have shown a better years per trophy period than the era we are currently in.

The above 5 eras span 37 years between them. That means that outside of these eras, we have had nearly 90 years of either no success, or just the single trophy.

Whilst we might all be a little bit despondent about the current era, history will show it in a good light, that we are in one of the more glorious eras of our history.

Embrace the success.

Keenos

Are things at Arsenal as disastrous as some are making out?

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I always think sometimes it is worthwhile taking a step away from something and looking at it from afar. That way you can often get a better perspective of what you are looking at.

Now Arsenal’s Premier League form – especially away- has been poor in 2017. We are already 16 points behind Manchester City, which is a gap that is too far to bridge. Man City are as short as 1/25 to win the title, Arsenal a massive 150/1.

But then on Sunday, during the Liverpool v Everton game, I got a bit of perspective of the situation we are in.

Arsenal are awful, apparently. The majority of the time during the game against Southampton and after, everyone was slagging us off. Highlighting how bad we are. The poor run we are on. Much of it was justified.

During the Scouse Derby, the commentator said Liverpool have been an irresistible force this season. I dropped this into a WhatsApp group and most people seemed to agree with the commentator. The

Liverpool had been brilliant this season. Their free flowing attacking football was superior to our turgid play that was not bringing us any results.

But then I posted up the league table. The brilliant Liverpool were just a single point ahead of Arsenal, and had only scored 4 more league goals. It bought some perspective to our thinking.

Yes, we are out of the title race, but everyone bar Manchester City is out of the title race.

We sit in 5th place, ahead of another irresistible force in Tottenham. We are just 3 points behind Chelsea. In fact, just 4 points separates Chelsea in 3rd and Spurs in 6th.

I am very much of the opinion that Manchester City are awesome this season. Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal and Spurs are all fairly average.  And Manchester United sit somewhere in between the two groups.

This was highlighted this weekend by Man U, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool all failing to win.

The result against Southampton was a disappointing one, but some perspective needs to be used. We are not as poor as people are making out, likewise Liverpool, Spurs et al are not as good as people are making out.

Whilst we are talking about Liverpool, I have seen the Jurgen Klopp interview from Sunday. He looks a man under pressure.

People go on about him like he is a great manager. That he has transformed Liverpool. But again, if you take a step away and look from afar, what has he actually achieved?

In the two seasons Klopp has been at the club, Liverpool have finished 8th and 4th – the last two seasons of Brendan Rodger, Liverpool finished 2nd and 6th.

On top of this, Klopp is without a trophy in his first 2 seasons. A failure to win a cup this year will make it 3 seasons without a trophy.

How long will the media and Liverpool fans continue to gloss over his failures?

It is a bit like Tottenham. Everyone talking about how great they are, how great Pochettino is. But they have also won nothing.

Meanwhile, look at Arsenal. 3 FA Cups in 4 years and people say Arsene Wenger is not doing a good job.

Now I am not saying he is doing a good job, but he certainly is not doing a poor job. We have perhaps become trophy snobs. The FA Cup no longer deemed good enough. Deemed enough.

But then looking through history, this is the 4th most successful period in Arsenal’s history (1930-37, 1987-1993, 1998-2005). 3 trophies in 4 years.

Things may not feel great at Arsenal at the moment, but we are still in with a chance of winning 3 competitions.

Have a little positivity in your life. It is Christmas after all.

Keenos