The hangover from a World Cup is a familiar condition, though one that has historically afflicted American sports fans less acutely than their counterparts abroad. That may be changing.
The English Premier League, which returns to play on Friday with Arsenal defending its championship, is betting that the considerable audiences who tuned in to this summer's World Cup can be persuaded to keep watching when the tournament banners come down and the club season begins. The vehicle for this persuasion is a new campaign carrying the tagline "It's All Here," which positions the league as a permanent home for the quality of play that casual viewers sampled during the tournament.
The pitch is not subtle: the Premier League has the players, including the Norwegian striker Erling Haaland, and the storylines, and Americans should feel welcome to participate in following them. (Whether "everyday Americans" — the league's preferred construction — were waiting for permission is another question.)
The campaign represents a continuation of the league's long courtship of the American market, an effort that has included Friday morning kickoff times, preseason tours through American cities, and broadcast agreements that have moved the matches from obscure cable channels to mainstream sports networks. The results have been measurable if not yet transformative; the Premier League remains a niche enthusiasm in a country where the National Football League still commands the calendar.
Still, the timing is opportune. The 2026 World Cup will be played on American soil, and the Premier League plainly hopes to harvest some of the attention that tournament will generate — a kind of agricultural approach to audience development, planting now for a crop that won't fully mature for another two years.
Arsenal, for its part, opens against the field on August 21, which is either a typographical error or a remarkably confident scheduling philosophy.
Original story published in adweek.com: "The Premier League Looks to Score World Cup Audiences With US Campaign"