Managers take a lead in Polish football

Forbes.pl has investigate the field of business side changes in Polish football. "Boguslaw Biszof, President of , has started cooperation with media-giant. Owing to that Polish clubs may become more richer. Biszof has a chance to give a new lease of life to club football in " - writes Forbes.pl.

MP & Silva agency is a tycoon on market of media agencies which are interested in sport. This global company with 650 million dollars revenue can be proud of cooperation with top leagues of football world like English Premier League, German Bundesliga, Spanish Primera Division, but also Formula 1, NBA matches and tennis tournament Roland Garros. In 18 offices of MP & Silva around the world are taken decisions about broadcasting the most popular sport events in the globe. However, they also think about these smaller like Polish Ekstraklasa.

Such a situation was impossible a few years ago. Fortunately there are experienced managers and businessmen who took care of Polish football recently. Today we can say, that they have an idea, how to attract big money to it. Boguslaw Biszof is one of these people and he is in charge of taking up the cooperation with MP & Silva. He has worked for years in brewing companies, mostly in “Kompania Piwowarska” (part of SABMiller) and then in Heineken. He was marketing vice-director of its Russian branch before he became President of Ekstraklasa in 2012.

Bogusław Biszof acts as a President of Ekstraklasa since September 2012

- We had eight breweries in Russia, from Kaliningrad to Khabarovsk. Despite the fact I liked this job, I was tired of continual travels. My family was far away, so I started to plan my comeback to Poland – says Biszof.

He was near joining Ekstraklasa in 2007, before leaving the country. However, it was Andrzej Rusko who was elected a President of Ekstraklasa. Robert Pietryszyn, former director of one Ekstraklasa’s club joked, he would start in that election If he had known about candidacies of Biszof and Rusko.

- Today I can pay tribute to President Biszof. He has created strong team with himself as a leader. Biszof set clear targets and has vision – says Pietryszyn. It was Maciej Wandzel, who figured out Biszof for Ekstraklasa. Chairman of its Supervisory Board recognised marketing manager of Russian Heineken as a better protection of business of Polish football clubs. Wandzel is the biggest stockholder of Black Lion fund which is the owner of Soho Factory and Prochnik. Moreover, he has just become co-owner of Legia (with Dariusz Mioduski and Boguslaw Lesnodorski). He seems to be one of the most influential player in Polish football next to Zbigniew Boniek who reforms Polish Football Association (PZPN) and got Wandzel’s support in election of PZPN’s President two years ago.

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Biszof’s greatest success is starting cooperation with MP & Silva. However, we will notice its positive effects in the beginning of next year. Italian firm sells media rights on international markets, mainly in Asia. MP & Silva is to distribute TV, mobile and internet rights of Ekstraklasa for the nearest six years in Poland and abroad. This is the third case in Europe when media agency got all media rights.

- There is guaranteed sum in agreement with MPS. We will get it regardless of financial results of sale. It’s much more than we are getting now and we will be earning more and more after every next season. However, it’s not our main benchmark. We negotiate with MPS final sum, which will be bigger than guaranteed one – explains Biszof and adds, that agency can earn only on crossing guaranteed sum.

Ekstraklasa’s President doesn’t want to blurt the profit of Polish clubs. It’s said unofficially, that Ekstraklasa will earn 25% more than on current agreement with nc+ which is worth 110 million zlotys, but the league will probably cash in much more. Tomasz Wlodarczyk, the head of football journalists in “Przeglad Sportowy” says even about 180 million zlotys after the first year.

It’s nc+ platform, which will be likely winner of the nearest auction. The 19-years old experience and quality of the transmissions are its main assets. From the other hand nc+ platform has got very small coverage (2,2 million clients) which got 35% smaller in this season because of the disagreement between nc+ and other broadcasters who were interested in sublicense to Polish league.

- The best quality of broadcasting shouldn’t be the main priority of Ekstraklasa. Its partners would put their attention also to the coverage of transmissions. This is Ekstraklasa’s business too – says Adam Pawlukiewicz, content manager in Pentagon Research which studied media achievements of Polish league.

It’s possible that Ekstraklasa would attract attention of foreign broadcasters. Biszof started talks with them before the agreement with MP & Silva. There are top broadcasters in the world which can become the partners of Ekstraklasa: FOX International Channels (which plans setting in Poland channel Fox Sports), Al-Jazeera which starts European expansion and Discovery Communications (Eurosport’s owner). Ekstraklasa is also able to broadcast its game on its own thanks to set Ekstraklasa Live Park company which produces TV signal and got permission from authorities for leading TV channel. Biszof admits that Polish league will perhaps follow Dutch league and set its own sport channel.

- I expect the tv rights would be distributed to many broadcaster like it took place In Belgium league. Owing to that we would be able to watch Ekstraklasa even on a few channels in the same time. Needless to say the coverage of Polish league would be tremendous – adds Wlodarczyk.

Author: Krzysztof Domaradzki, forbes.pl

Read full article HERE (Polish)