Foreign Cardiff Supporters

Well, quite some bit of the rebranding discussion consists of the concept of foreign fans.
As you can read in this ( viewtopic.php?f=2&t=825&p=433318#p433318) topic, I'm a lifelong Cardiff supporter. Since I'm one of the few non-British Cardiff supporters, maybe my opinion could add some new perspective on the whole issue of Blue vs. Red.

First of all, the Malaysian owners have told the supporters that they want to open up new markets to the club. Foreign fans or sympathisers should buy the merchandise of Cardiff City F.C. and that would bring in more money. Let's forget the question who'll make a profit of this and what guarantees do we have that the Malaysians will invest this money back in the club. But let us just look the whole idea of 'converting' new fans.

Here on the mainland of Europe, you see quite often people in football shirts from the 'big country's'. In the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark and even in Germany shirts from clubs like Manchester United, Chelsea, Barcelona and Real Madrid aren't that rare. Most of these people support teams in their own country, like Borussia Mönchengladbach, FC Kopenhagen, Club Brugge or Ajax, but they have sympathy for one of the major clubs in another country and are willing to express this sympathy by wearing these foreign football jersey's.
These foreign clubs are fortunate enough to get some extra income out of abroad fan bases. The one thing these clubs have in common is that they can all rely on huge amounts of money and regular international succes in sport. Please bear in mind that we're talking about the absolute top. So the clubs right underneath this top can't even reckon on the slightest bit of fanbase abroad. Clubs like Tottenham Hotspur, Valencia or Newcastle United wouldn't dare to compete with the 'big boys' on the abroad marketing.

Now we're talking about Europe. A place with a football culture and quite a lot of people that like tradition and the 'old football feeling'. So if the little ones would like to open up a market somewhere, Europe gives them the best opportunity. And even here they can't succeed in selling their merchandise. Asia is even worse, if there's one place full of gloryhunters, it's Asia. The only football jersey's you see over there are the ones from club with several big prices and still counting. For clubs of the likes of Tottenham to succeed over there is virtually impossible.

So why do some of you really believe the prospect of selling any Cardiff tops in the far east? We're a championship club that doesn't count too big international prices. If the people over there have never heard of clubs like Sunderland or Celtic, because they're 'too small' what makes you think that they'll buy Cardiff tops? The dragon? The colour red?

I really wonder why people still believe in fairytales.

Out of interest what makes you think money to be gained via the Far East market is purely from shirt sales?

And do you think any marketing over there is solely designed to sell a few shirts?

Spot on.

Exactly how I feel on the subject.

Out of interest, why and how did you come about following the city?

"I really wonder why people still believe in fairytales".

I have been saying this since it begun!,they have all been sucked in and time will prove that.If you want to make money invest in players that can get us to the PL and we will have an instant return on the investment,not throw money at colour changes and all that superstitious nonsense.

Out of interest what makes you think money to be gained via the Far East market is purely from shirt sales?

And do you think any marketing over there is solely designed to sell a few shirts?

Of course it's about TV rights too. But the very same arguments I made above go for TV Rights and other parts of the merchandise plan.

Spot on.

Exactly how I feel on the subject.

Out of interest, why and how did you come about following the city?

When I was a little kid, there was hardly any foreign football on the telly here. Just once I saw one Cardiff game in some special broadcast and I loved it right away. The stadium, the atmosphere, it was great. I've been supporting Cardiff ever since.

There's only one club for me: Cardiff City.

Out of interest what makes you think money to be gained via the Far East market is purely from shirt sales?

And do you think any marketing over there is solely designed to sell a few shirts?

Of course it's about TV rights too. But the very same arguments I made above go for TV Rights and other parts of the merchandise plan.

TV rights are collectively bargained for the league.

Next guess at where the real money is?

Spot on.

Exactly how I feel on the subject.

Out of interest, why and how did you come about following the city?

When I was a little kid, there was hardly any foreign football on the telly here. Just once I saw one Cardiff game in some special broadcast and I loved it right away. The stadium, the atmosphere, it was great. I've been supporting Cardiff ever since.

There's only one club for me: Cardiff City.

Well done mate great to see you support our club, what some don't see on here is that you must cast the net as wide as you can, and hopefully you will get some supporters who will start to follow the club, I am in regular contact with a fan in Bulgaria and he knows as much about the City as I do, unfortunatly he can't get to games but follows games through the internet and press, I suppose some idiots will call them plastic, but who gives a shit, if they support Cardiff that is good enough for me

Out of interest what makes you think money to be gained via the Far East market is purely from shirt sales?

And do you think any marketing over there is solely designed to sell a few shirts?

Of course it's about TV rights too. But the very same arguments I made above go for TV Rights and other parts of the merchandise plan.

TV rights are collectively bargained for the league.

Next guess at where the real money is?

I know the Premiership have a collective foreign TV deal, but is that true of the Championship?

If so what countries do they sell our games to and how much do we get?

Good post Jordy. Fairy tales indeed! No happy ending in sight for this one.

Out of interest what makes you think money to be gained via the Far East market is purely from shirt sales?

And do you think any marketing over there is solely designed to sell a few shirts?

Of course it's about TV rights too. But the very same arguments I made above go for TV Rights and other parts of the merchandise plan.

TV rights are collectively bargained for the league.

Next guess at where the real money is?

I know the Premiership have a collective foreign TV deal, but is that true of the Championship?

If so what countries do they sell our games to and how much do we get?

Both the UK and worldwide TV broadcasting rights are covered by a collective deal.

While Premier clubs get a minimum of £37m a year , Championship clubs currently get £3m a season.