Hungarian football faces many challenges. We are therefore grateful to Jagoditis Rómeó who runs a football website in Hungary for translating out of Hungarian for us an article on some recent developments. The original contribution has been edited because of its length.
Hungarian football faces many challenges. We are therefore grateful to Jagoditis Rómeó who runs a football website in Hungary for translating out of Hungarian for us an article on some recent developments. The original contribution has been edited because of its length.
On July 6, 2010, Sandor Csanyi, successful businessman, banker, and millionaire, was appointed as the new leader of the Hungarian Football Association. Some others might hope that this new leadership will bring solutions to all the problems of Hungarian football— and while such an immediate “resolution” would certainly be convenient to many, it is highly unrealistic. In recent years, the HFA and local football clubs not only lacked co-operation, but these various entities also often competed against each other, to the detriment of football on a national scale. The HFA and local clubs must now work together, or success will be unattainable. The HFA must take on the role of a communication generator, while club owners and managers must clearly recognize their need to fit in with the changing work climate. If they fail to do so, they will surely continue to walk in circles with current issues.
The HFA and all other members of the national football scene must accept that they are not doing people a favor by existing; rather, it is the people, those who go to games, the stay-at-home fans, the media and various other social groups that are doing them a favor by remaining interested in the sport despite its current state of affairs. The HFA must spearhead a paradigm shift in the football-business by placing fans’ and consumers’ interest in the center of their attention.
Professional football is a part of the entertainment industry. Therefore, rulings such as changing the date of a game only three days in advance should not happen. Repeated schedule modifications put an impossible burden on fans who wish to see their team play live, but cannot accommodate such changes due to work or family obligations. These disappointed fans might then lose their sense of loyalty to their team and even to national football on the whole. For the HFA to show more sensitivity to fans’ needs in such instances would not cost the association a penny. All it would take is some basic courtesy and professionalism.
Although some stadiums in Hungary have been restored and remodeled in the last decade, the condition of football venues throughout the country is still abysmal. It is primarily due to the state of these venues that no championship games can be held in this country for at least the next three months. To remedy this situation, the HFA could place more emphasis on grant research and lobbying as part of its operational profile.
Today’s Hungarian football has to be motivated to be more business-oriented. That is, decisions should not be made based on petty dealings and compromises but rather real economic processes. Club license procedures have to become transparent, and the professional content of the club licenses has to be strengthened. It is absurd that business concepts and long-term strategic elements are not part of the licenses, that licensing is an administrative procedure only, in which form is more important than the subject-matter. For example, it is not enough if cash flow, balance, and profit and loss plans are made, their content is what really matters.
As things stand, the clubs must simply present their contracts to prove that their financial background is guaranteed– this is a purely legal approach and as such is very incomplete. As the existence of a contract does not guarantee success in itself, those efforts that are aiming for business achievements should be rewarded and brought to book. If the owner gets tired of producing losses and decides not to finance the club any longer, it will be a loss for the whole football society. Therefore, the HFA has to push the business process of the clubs towards sustainability and ask them to give account of those actions that are vital to achieve efficiency – even if the clubs do not feel that these actions are necessary (such an example is marketing, which clubs seem to neglect nowadays.).