Baller League — a new six-a-side football league that has attracted support from legends like Ronaldinho, Gary Lineker, and Luis Figo — has raised $25mn from EQT Ventures as it looks to initiate a “new era” for the beautiful game.
German entrepreneur Felix Starck co-founded the Baller League last year alongside former players Mats Hummels and Lukas Podolski. The founders wanted to change the way younger audiences engage, view, and interact with the world’s most popular sport.
The league, which is now expanding from Germany to the UK and the US, comprises shorter 30-minute matches that are available to stream on popular digital platforms such as YouTube, TikTok, and Amazon’s live-streaming service Twitch.
“Sport is no longer as easy as just saying ‘look, we’re here now, come and watch us,’” said Starck. “That’s just not how sport works any more. It needs to be exciting, and it needs to be authentic. Those are the two words that we always use at Baller League.”
Alongside some of the game’s biggest names, influencers Darren Jason Watkins Jr (KSI) and Olajide Olatunji (IShowSpeed) are also working with Baller League. The pair have a whopping 58 million YouTube subscribers between them.
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KSI and IShowSpeed are set to lead the league’s newly set up UK and US chapters, respectively. Ronaldinho, Lineker, Figo and other prominent ex-players like John Terry, Alan Shearer and Freddie Ljungberg will serve as team presidents.
The Baller League live-streamed its first matches from a repurposed aeroplane hangar in Cologne. It has rapidly amassed nearly one million followers across digital platforms. This has made it Germany’s top Twitch channel and one of the global top five.
Baller League UK is set to debut on 3 March 2025, with games held every Monday through 19 May. Matches will be live-streamed, with YouTuber Chunkz hosting a weekly show. Twelve teams will compete, with the top four advancing to the playoffs where they will battle it out to decide the season champion.
The Baller League drafts players from various backgrounds, including former academy players, free agents, and recently retired professionals or semi-professionals. Player trials will take place in London and Manchester.
Baller League is confident that the fast-paced gameplay will resonate with fans worldwide, many of whom grew up playing small-sided football on playgrounds and streets.
“Baller League is bringing a loved sport back to its roots,” said Ashley Lundström, Partner at EQT Ventures, the Swedish venture capital firm that led the funding round.
Baller League is part of a new cohort of upstarts that are using influencers and social media to reach global, mainly younger, audiences. Earlier this year, former FC Barcelona defender Gerard Piqué raised €60mn for Kings League, a seven-a-side football competition.
As upstarts like Baller League and Kings League garner more fans, it remains to be seen how football’s establishment will react. The old guard may innovate within their own structures to retain younger audiences, a bit like how traditional banks responded to the rise of digital-savvy challenger banks like Revolut.
Either way, this “new era,”, looks to be here to stay. Let the games begin.
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