(BU) So, you have had a football-dominant career. Then, you moved to an executive role in basketball. I’m sure you, as a Greek, were into basketball even before you were on the business side of it. When you became an executive in the world of basketball, what were your first impressions, in terms of weaknesses and opportunities?
I think this is a very interesting question, the one that I asked myself before making the transition. As a Greek and a person that loves sports in general, I have been following the sports industry closely. So, certain elements were no surprises to me. I think the biggest surprise was what I mentioned before, the discrepancy between popularity and market share. Where I come from and in countries like ours, basketball is prominent. Our clubs have had extensive success in European competitions. We’ve seen thousands of people jump up and down in the streets the moment our clubs and national teams have success. I sense this great passion for basketball in so many countries around Europe. But when it comes to the numbers, you see that something’s going wrong. It seems that the approach to the club competitions has not produced results in line with the popularity.
I do take into account that one factor between basketball and football: UEFA Champions League remains the top club competition in the world, whereas the top club competition in basketball is on the other side of the Atlantic. That’s a significant difference. We are operating in the same continent with similar formats, but all the money in basketball is in the NBA. The NBA has a turnover twice as large as UCL. Basketball has a market, but in Europe, we cannot capitalize on this, while one out of four NBA players comes out of Europe.
The Rise of Basketball in Poland
I think there is an element European basketball needs to take into account, and that is the discrepancy between delivering, developing, and generating. That, to me, is an observation that poses all the right questions, at least in my mind. This is where we come in because it’s easy to observe, but everybody’s going to ask for the answers. I’ll give you an example.
In the Basketball Champions League, we have Nymburk, the champion of the Czech Republic. And we have the best teams from Poland. Nymburk is the eternal champion, but in Poland, they rotate. The champion plays in BCL, and it gets the exposure, as well as [the opportunity] to grow its players. What we saw in China last summer was these two countries were the biggest surprises in the World Cup. Now, we suddenly see a great interest in basketball in these countries. In Poland, football is number one. Volleyball, for a long time, was the clear number 2. Basketball was a little bit behind.
Now, if you go to Poland, everybody’s talking about basketball. It hasn’t eclipsed volleyball but has taken its rightful place. Why? Because they see the Polish champion play in a great club competition such as BCL every week. Also, its players became part of the national team, and the NT got spectacular results in China.
As BCL, we have managed to put the basketball in the front stage in a very important market. This was made possible because we gave the Polish champion the opportunity. Now, Polish teams are fighting to win the league to compete in BCL.
I gave you a micro example, but we believe this is the right model. We need Polish clubs; we need Polish investors. That’s what I call an organic growth.
How Leicester City is an Example for Basketball
In football, I always use the example of Leicester City. Leicester City came out the most prominent, competitive domestic league in football as champions. That gave them automatic access to UCL. Since then, every small club in the UK is having a cue of investors, because everybody wants to be the next Leicester. The system allowed [them to win]. Before BCL entered the market, the equivalent of Leicester could not go and play against Barcelona or Real Madrid. These spots were fixed. For me, this is the observation: A sport has to include everybody.