Abstract des Autors

Football, like many other sports, has its own and complex regulations, operating rules, institutional structures and policies. This chapter presents a discussion on three dimensions of this pivotal area of European football, such as club ownership structures, level of fans’ participation and engagement in the clubs’ and leagues’ management, and fans’ perceptions on the above two matters. It does so by drawing on the case of the recent transfer of the Brazilian striker Neymar Jr. from the Spanish LaLiga club Barcelona FC to the French Ligue 1 club Paris Saint-Germain for the astonishing record figure of €222 million. The argument put forward is that such cases are likely to have direct consequences on the structures and policies as well as on the economic and financial viability of the European football industry for years to come.