What does it mean to run a football club in 2020?

«Both on and off the field the club wants to identify itself as an outsider, a team that plays to win with a modern approach».

These are the words that Andrea Raddrizzani, president of Leeds United, used to synthesize the absolutely modern storytelling that, between wise media communication choices and the coaching of Marcelo Bielsa, has made a triumphant return to the Premier League since last July. Andrea Raddrizzani's career has expanded long and wide in the world of sport: as well as a consultant to Suning in the negotiation for the acquisition of Inter, he was also the co-founder and vice-president of MP & Silva (FIFA media partner; MLB, F1, Premier League, UEFA, Arsenal, Roland Garros and NBA), president and founder of Eleven Sports and director of Whistle Sports. For three years, he has also been the president of Leeds United, an English club whose recent history, culminating in its return to the Premier League, has been told by the Amazon Prime Video series Take us home.

Raddrizzani's approach is a different approach from that of the traditional president, much more media-savy and open to innovative forms of storytelling. That's why nss magazine asked the entrepreneur a few questions, getting his philosophy and his plans for the future told. 

What do you want to take abroad from Leeds? What are the characteristics of your brand that roc nation think can best enhance?

Leeds are, as you know, back in the Premier League this year and it is very important for us to position themselves immediately as an innovative club and brand, which I like to call "underdog". Both on and off the pitch the club wants to identify as an outsider, a team that plays to win with a modern approach. A club that wants to position itself immediately after the great Premier League teams, we want to give a fresh image. 

From this point of view, the partnership with Roc Nation is very important, because Leeds have been out of the Premier League for 16 years, they are back in 2020, we need to call the attention of this new young audience, who did not see the great Leeds of 2004. We need to get into the culture and language of these young people and RocNations and TAPSports are two agencies that accompany us in marketing and content distribution activities to attract the attention of new generations. By the way, another aspect not to be overlooked, is that Leeds has become for many the second team in the UK.

Your career and Leeds have become very famous thanks to the documentary on Prime Video, which, on the other hand, is one of the best examples of sports storytelling of recent times. Can this new way of communicating - documentaries, TV series - be the way to tell the sport over the next decade? Can the extra field become more interesting than field stories? 

More than stories on the pitch, because we have a team that plays offensive football that can entertain, it's about the interest of the fans to know the behind the scenes. This has always been there, I remember when I was a little boy that I couldn't wait to open the new number of Hurra Juventus to read the interviews of Baggio and all the champions, but also to know what was happening in the club, to have more information than the youth teams. 

Today we say that teams and technology have opened up many possibilities to produce content and teams are more "open mind". It was my initiative with Leeds to create documentaries. I wanted to do that, to tell the reconstruction of a club like Leeds, which was the sixth most important in the world until 2004, but also that he was for 16 years out of the Premier League. I thought you might be interested not only in our fans, but also in reaching a wider audience. The documentary is designed for fans and not fans, it tells the true stories of many people who are part of the life of the Club, the story has arrived all over the world. Today I have people writing to me from India or California who have seen the documentary and who have been affected. This year we decided not to do it, to focus exclusively on the field, and then think about something innovative for next year.

The streaming platform LIVENow, a digital entertainment hub that aims at the global market, was also recently launched. At a time when there is a lack of fans in stadiums and audiences at concerts, how can technology be the entertainment tool of the future? 

LIVENow is an idea conceived before the covid crisis with the idea of distributing entreintement, music and sports events directly to the consumer, with flexibility of purchase, without subscriptions.. Then the covid crisis created many constraints of not being able to be at the events directly and the concept of LIVENow has become even more important and in fact in a few months we are already operational in Asia America and Europe. In the meantime Covid has created more competition but we are unique in the type of offer with exclusive content both in fitness, sports and music with DuaLipa, Andrea Bocelli, Gorillaz, and many others in 2021. Technology can create a pontoon of interaction between the virtual world and the real world by improving entertainement even remotely. 

Leeds United is doing very well in the Premier League and also have important players (Kalvin Phillips, Rodrigo), but when they took the team the technical level and the corporate situation was quite different. What did the construction of his turnaround in Leeds focus on? 

I certainly focused my investments by investing in the team, on a good coach capable of growing players. Sporting success is the basis of everything. In addition to sporting success, we have had a great impact by changing the culture of the club, improving facilities, facilities, services and hospitality at the stadium, training center and much more. The first step was, however, to change the culture, give an imprint of modernity and ambition in all club areas making everyone participate and responsible for change and protagonists in achieving the goal. 

You have designed the third Leeds shirt, a revolutionary operation when you consider the historical figures of the presidents, usually unattractive to these situations. What value do you give to aesthetics in football?

Since I've been at Leeds I've drawn all the Leeds jerseys, it's my hobby. I am already working on those of the 2022/23 season together with adidas. We have surpassed all sales records with pink and silver jerseys (from last year), this year we have improved even more with the new adidas uniforms. The third shirt I created thinking about the shirt of the club where I played when I was a child in the province of Milan (the barbaiana sports club). Instead the second jersey, it's a vintage Leeds jersey from the 2000s, we already had a jersey of this color and we did it again. The first jersey is that of white adidas with blue stripes, but next year the models will be even more beautiful, I can announce that we would have different colors that I thought together with adidas.

Do you think that given the growing relationship between football and fashion, luxury brands can invest directly in technical material? Would you like to see Leeds sponsored by an Italian haute couture brand? 

The investments of brands such as Nike and Adidas in sportswear is still very important, I think it is difficult for fashion brands to bring similar technical products that require development and research in materials and are created ad hoc for team needs. More likely to think about these capsule partnerships as PSG did with Nike Jordan or Juventus with Palace Skateboard. I would like to work with Palm Angels here, who are very good Italian entrepreneurs in fashion street and established in the world. 

Between FIFA and PES, teams are working hard to ensure some visibility into the gaming world. What are the goals that a club wants to achieve when it decides to cede the exclusivity of the rights to a video game? Is it just marketing or is it also a strategy to talk better with fans? Right now it's more marketing, but I think we need to better manage these rights as teams and players. All leagues and federations should better protect these rights, which are currently sold at prices too low compared to the revenues they create. We should tie our royalties to game sales turnover. We're not doing that today. 

What are the problems of Italian football seen from England? 

I wish that Italian will be able to find leadership in its management with an important delegation and the total support of presidents and clubs. It is important to have a unity of purpose around a management class. This was the basis of the Premier's success. Teams must be united. Having the support of presidents is crucial.