The sixth edition of the Red Card report into how European clubs fare in the Chinese fan market has now been released.
The report looks at how 50 European clubs perform and can be said to have an influence on China’s social media platforms, WeChat and Weibo.
As well as looking at the performance of clubs, individual players are also assessed.
On the club front, Manchester United replace Bayern Munich in top spot in the table and although the German Bundesliga remains the most influential online, Arsenal and Liverpool are joint third with Manchester City coming fifth in the table.
For players, Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo is in top spot with Wayne Rooney and Anthony Martial from Manchester United featuring in the top five. Arsenal’s Mesut Ozil is in second, with Gareth Bale sitting in third place but Barcelona’s Lionel Messi doesn’t feature simply because he doesn’t have a social media presence in China.
Head of Sport at Mailman which produce the report is quoted by the BBC as saying.
‘The Premier League is complacent. Its clubs have decent numbers of followers on Weibo, but not as high engagement. The Bundesliga clubs are far more active. The German league tells its clubs what to do, whereas the respective Premier League clubs are in control of what they do.’
With United taking top spot for the first time from Bayern, he added.
‘There was a gap between following and engagement. United were the most followed, but Bayern were a country mile ahead regarding activity online. But United have taken big strides with fan events and a tour last year.’
For anybody interested in the full report please Click Here.
|
Club
|
Points
|
Followers
|
Weibo
|
WeChat
|
Live Streams
|
Presence
|
|
Manchester United
|
87
|
8.8m
|
32
|
30
|
5
|
20
|
|
Bayern Munich
|
84
|
2.8m
|
32
|
22
|
5
|
25
|
|
Arsenal
|
79
|
4.2m
|
28
|
26
|
5
|
20
|
|
Liverpool
|
79
|
2m
|
28
|
26
|
5
|
20
|
|
Manchester City
|
71
|
8.2m
|
28
|
18
|
5
|
20
|
|
Real Madrid
|
70
|
2m
|
28
|
22
|
0
|
20
|
|
AC Milan
|
64
|
400k
|
17
|
22
|
5
|
20
|
|
Tottenham Hotspur
|
60
|
1.4m
|
16
|
14
|
5
|
25
|
|
Borussia Dortmund
|
59
|
1m
|
20
|
14
|
5
|
20
|
|
Barcelona
|
59
|
5.5m
|
28
|
11
|
0
|
20
|
|
Chelsea
|
50
|
2.7m
|
16
|
14
|
0
|
20
|
|
Schalke 04
|
50
|
1.1m
|
9
|
11
|
5
|
25
|
|
Paris Saint-Germain
|
40
|
1.2m
|
9
|
11
|
0
|
20
|
|
Juventus
|
39
|
20k
|
5
|
14
|
0
|
20
|
|
Inter Milan
|
36
|
480k
|
9
|
22
|
0
|
5
|
