Hours before the Kings league Infojobs final, PSG’s Neymar ‘kidnapped’ Gerard Pique and demanded that in exchange for his release, he would be able to oversee a team in the competition’s expansion league, which is set to launch in Brazil 🇧🇷 ⚽️

Here's why it matters 👇

This expansion league in Brazil is set to follow in the blueprint of the highly successful Spanish edition of the league, which launched at the start of the year 🚀🔥

sportspundit.substack.com/p/kings-league-the-circus-will-go-on

To understand just how successful the leagues has been...

👉 Packed out Nou Camp for its Final Four with more than 92,000 fans in attendance 🏟

👉 Peak live viewing figures for the event topped 2.16, people and a reported average of 1.38m viewers 📈

It has done this through a mix of whacky rules and a mix of football and influencer ‘owners’ for each of the teams, including Aguero, Casillas, and Ibai Llanos

This is something set to be emulated with the Brazilian edition too with Ronaldinho and now Neymar confirmed

There's no doubt, they'll be able to expand into other Spanish-speaking countries too... 🇦🇷

With time outs between the games, Argentinians Lali Espósito and Tiago PZK stole the show with their performance

Lionel Messi was also in attendance at the event and cheered by the fans

However, before moving to Argentina, rumours are that Mexico has already been lined up as next in the queue 🇲🇽

There are also plans to create a Champions League where the best teams from each country meet and compete against each other

Essentially, the point is, this model works ✅🔥

With this much traction, traditional football leagues should ignore the @KingsLeague and Pique at their peril

As it also points to a huge opportunity…

I believe this ‘entertainment’ format of the game can live symbiotically with the ‘performance’ version of the game

🥊Similarly to how both KSI v Jake Paul and Fury v Joshua could potentially draw in huge PPV audiences. They are both boxing, but they are different products

An alternative analogy would be FIFA and FIFA Street both appearing in the same video game

So, whilst the Kings League is conquering the Spanish-speaking world, there is a huge opportunity IMO for content creators to set up something similar in the UK or US, and expand to other English speaking countries 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🇺🇸🇦🇺

Think: @MisfitsBoxing but for football

Alternatively, Less likely, could a league such as the Premier League or MLS see this traction and create its own semi-pro/ celebrity five or seven-a-side league and leverage their enormous reach and audience as well as bringing in celebrity ambassadors and content creators?

Either way, I’m really excited to see how the Kings League continues to explode and I’m also really excited about the possibilities that this ‘entertainment’ format could open up for attracting younger fans to the game

Exciting times ahead!