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Is the UK a Relatively Untapped Market for the NHL?
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It’s no secret that the hierarchy within the ‘Big 4’ Sports Leagues is interested in continuing to explore international expansion. The NFL and NBA are both doing this aggressively, continuing to expand the number of games and the scope of games to other countries, notably European markets. The MLB is perhaps not as aggressive, but it does not lack ambition. Of course, the NHL has traveled abroad, and it has been doing so for decades. Naturally, the league has been concentrating on countries where ice hockey is mainstream, such as Germany, Czechia, and the Scandinavian countries. In recent years, the UK has been an auspicious absentee from the list of NHL international games, and it may be a missed opportunity.

Back in 2007, the NHL opened the regular season in Europe for the first time. London was the chosen venue for a double-header between the Kings and Ducks. The league has not been back in an official capacity since. Some of the reasoning makes a lot of sense. After all, despite the UK’s relatively big market size compared to other European countries, you might argue that there is more fertile opportunity for growth in places where hockey is already highly popular.

Ice hockey interest is small but not insignificant in the UK

That said, the UK has potential. The Elite Ice Hockey League (EIHL) has grown in stature since its inception in 2003, although challenges remain in terms of revenues and broadcast partners. It has a growing network of amateur and junior leagues, with plenty of support at grassroots level. As to the latter, rinks can sometimes serve as community hubs for youth in some of the UK’s northern cities, fostering an interest in the sport. Great Britain has also had some success on the international stage in recent years.

Nonetheless, challenges remain. Hockey must vie for the attention of sports fans and is up against established sports like soccer, rugby and cricket. There is also the competition from the NFL, which we will discuss a little later. There are also challenges with broadcasting. The NHL broadcast rights are owned by streaming platform Premier Sports, a relatively minor player in the market. You can, of course, see NFL clips on social media, and even watch live hockey games on some online betting platforms. Yet, the league lacks a mainstream broadcaster, and that counts for a lot. Indeed, we should also point out that the EIHL recently lost its broadcast partner, although Premier Sports did pick up some of the game toward the latter end of the season.


The NFL offers a blueprint for success and a challenge

We should, of course, address the elephant in the room – the NFL. It has really targeted the UK market over the last decade or so, with the three-game London Series now a fixed part of the NFL regular season. The growth has been remarkable, something that we can chart in the volume of television coverage and social media activity. It does not mean that there isn’t room for the NHL, yet it does represent a challenge nonetheless.

However, we somewhat get the sense that the various leagues have zones of interest across Europe. The NFL concentrates on the UK and, to an extent, Germany. The NBA is really going for it in France, something that has been bolstered by the emergence of French basketball stars like Victor Wembanyama. And the NHL, as mentioned, tends to focus on Nordic countries and the Central European region.

Yet, the NFL’s influence is somewhat London-centric, just as the NBA focuses on Paris. The allure of the UK capital is plain to see, but it’s worth noting that the “regions” – Yorkshire, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland are also the hotbeds of ice hockey support. The most prominent and successful ice hockey teams, including the Belfast Giants and Sheffield Steelers, in the UK come from these regions, and one would argue that it is no coincidence that they are based away from London. The point, as such, is that there may be an opportunity to target areas away from the capital.

In the end, though, it is a huge challenge. We spoke of grassroots ice hockey earlier, and it is evident that the infrastructure (ice hockey rinks) is not in place across the country. Government investment in sports tends to follow a strategy of backing disciplines with which the UK has already had success. It would clearly be a gamble for the NHL to expand its focus away from other European countries, but sometimes those gambles pay off.

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