The Athletic - US sports site

[Poznan34]

2 hours ago, TeaMen Tom said:

I took advantage of this offer myself. Tells me they're struggling but the price was good. But so far I'm underwhelmed by their football/soccer coverage. Nothing that I could find on the Maguire transfer as an example. To work with a paywall you need to offer something better than what's available for free and so far I'm not seeing it. They don't even cover MLS all that well.

Well, they've only just formally announced all of their UK writers this morning, so I'm expecting lots more to come. 

 

Re the price, they are doing the same as Netflix/Spotify, lure you in with a cheap price then bump it up after a while. Our £11 a year subscriptions will go up to £60 a year next July, by which time they are hoping we'll be hooked on their content. I can see it being pretty successful. 

[Voll Blau]

I'd say the fact he's landed an exclusive interview with Perez is a pretty decent indicator of what we can expect from Rob Tanner. Will be interesting to see how his stuff differs now maintaining a good relationship with the club in order to keep matchday access isn't as essential in this job...

 

Are people seriously moaning there are no transfer stories on there? The whole point of this project seems to be to offer articles a cut above all that bollocks.

[CosbehFox]

I'll be honest and this morning said I won't bother taking out a subscription. 

 

However the type of the articles I am seeing advertised look like it may be worth it - for example, there's a hugely interesting article on transfer market. 

[funkyrobot]

38 minutes ago, Poznan34 said:

Henry Winter of The Times...which is behind a paywall?

As I stated it’s always possible to get their stuff for free. You’re not looking hard enough if you think his articles only appear behind a paywall. Anyone paying for online subscriptions for news is proper old school???

[brucey]

 

[Tanya]

3 hours ago, funkyrobot said:

As I stated it’s always possible to get their stuff for free. You’re not looking hard enough if you think his articles only appear behind a paywall. Anyone paying for online subscriptions for news is proper old school???

Christ. People like you will drive proper journalists/media companies out of business. With that kind of attitude, all we will be left with is Google and Facebook (who hoover up around 80% of online revenue between them) and hollow, click-bait sites like the Mercury. Least you could do is find one outlet you like and pay for it.

 

I've signed up for my free trial, and I'm curious to see if the content is good enough for me to renew it.

[MonkeyTennis?]

I signed up for this today, and it was £30 for 13 months, which seemed reasonable on the basis of the excellent content they have dumped on there so far (the piece on the transfer market was fascinating) - but let's see how it goes. Looks like its more expensive if you try to purchase directly through the app though. 

[CosbehFox]

2 hours ago, Cardiff_Fox said:

I'll be honest and this morning said I won't bother taking out a subscription. 

 

However the type of the articles I am seeing advertised look like it may be worth it - for example, there's a hugely interesting article on transfer market. 

yeah signed up - the article regards the Maguire transfer deal is already far more detailed than we've been privy to so far. 

[Rusko187]

I'll hold off, I'm unconvinced this is going to be significantly better then what's already available for free in most other places. Appreciate journalists need a source of income but I've always felt informed on footballing matters and not had to pay for it previously.

[Jon the Hat]

Some good stuff already, I have signed up.  I can afford it, and I like the idea of supporting proper journalism.

[TeaMen Tom]

4 hours ago, Poznan34 said:

Well, they've only just formally announced all of their UK writers this morning, so I'm expecting lots more to come. 

 

Re the price, they are doing the same as Netflix/Spotify, lure you in with a cheap price then bump it up after a while. Our £11 a year subscriptions will go up to £60 a year next July, by which time they are hoping we'll be hooked on their content. I can see it being pretty successful. 

I just received an email today announcing the ramped up coverage which is great.  So I'm looking forward to it.  Regarding the subscription a year is a long time to be giving away your product but I guess they have a long range strategy. As I said I've been underwhelmed to date with the content but hearing this definitely has me intrigued.  Looking forward to checking the new content out. I would absolutely pay full price for great English football coverage.

[KingsX]

My problem is the price.  $120/year here    It costs me $20 less for both NBC Sports PL Pass and ESPN+, which allows me to see every PL match, and lots of Championship and top European football.  More than that, to read at most a couple dozen articles a month, doesn’t seem value.

 

I’m going to handle this like I handled Sirius/XM radio years ago.  Go for the intro price, cancel at renewal time, and see what kind of “we want you back” offers they come up with.  And if, like satellite radio, that becomes bothersome and the content turns to crap -- bye.

[TeaMen Tom]

2 minutes ago, KingsX said:

My problem is the price.  $120/year here    It costs me $20 less for both NBC Sports PL Pass and ESPN+, which allows me to see every PL match, and lots of Championship and top European football.  More than that, to read at most a couple dozen articles a month, doesn’t seem value.

 

I’m going to handle this like I handled Sirius/XM radio years ago.  Go for the intro price, cancel at renewal time, and see what kind of “we want you back” offers they come up with.  And if, like satellite radio, that becomes bothersome and the content turns to crap -- bye.

To me it depends on whether the coverage is better than what you get for free on the internet.  Yeah the costs do add up as I also subscribe to the services you mentioned (though I pay the $60 so I can watch all LCFC matches). I remember the first couple of years the NBC pass was free.

[UpTheLeagueFox]

7 hours ago, Voll Blau said:

I'd say the fact he's landed an exclusive interview with Perez is a pretty decent indicator of what we can expect from Rob Tanner.

I spoke to Perez last week for talkSPORT, will upload the full interview when I get a chance.

Won;t be in the same style as Rob's but some might find bits of it interesting.

[funkyrobot]

7 hours ago, Tanya said:

Christ. People like you will drive proper journalists/media companies out of business. With that kind of attitude, all we will be left with is Google and Facebook (who hoover up around 80% of online revenue between them) and hollow, click-bait sites like the Mercury. Least you could do is find one outlet you like and pay for it.

 

I've signed up for my free trial, and I'm curious to see if the content is good enough for me to renew it.

I pay significant sums to sky and I buy physical copies of spreadsheet papers at the weekend. I’m not signing up for an American based online news subscription service just to ensure a hopefully well paid journalist who has moved jobs for a better income (paid for by people subscribing) is ok, particularly when the information is readily available for free and when there a still a whole number of good journalists who haven’t moved still to access. It’s my choice but again I will get the good leicester articles on here because someone will post them on foxestalk (like the Perez article today -and I’ll be able to listen Uptheleaguefox’s talksport Perez article too!)

[CosbehFox]

Well another nugget of info from them Barnes was due to Leeds on loan last season 

[Mehrez]

Interesting article on there about the inner workings of transfers, particularly one section talking about how agents will force players to go to a particular club because they pay higher agency fees. Apparently we had a case of this last year:

 

I heard last year one player was on the brink of joining Leicester but instead was told to go to a club abroad. He didn’t enjoy it at all, found out the truth and was absolutely furious. We can’t live with agents but we certainly cannot live without them.”

 

Any ideas who that might be?

[vanity]

17 hours ago, funkyrobot said:

I’m not subscribing to an American site to get information about the EPL and Leicester. We have John Percy, Geoff Peters, Henry Winter etc providing excellent coverage and it’s always possible to get their stuff for free. 

Obv do what you like, but you can get a week free, plus their promo deals are for 50-75% off the first year, that's like ten quid for a year's worth of the best sportswriting around. If you ever decide to give the free week a try, you should report back, we all know you are anti at this point, see if they have the EPL coverage to change your mind.

 

Or not. I will def say Leicester Mercury articles are complete garbage compared to what these guys put out on a daily basis, so it will be interesting to see how Tanner does. Their NBA content is f'ing insane. But it is admittedly deeper level stuff, much more analytical than the usual dross, which I suspect some people won't actually like. No idea what the Prem stuff will be like so I will have to take a look.

[vanity]

10 hours ago, TeaMen Tom said:

I just received an email today announcing the ramped up coverage which is great.  So I'm looking forward to it.  Regarding the subscription a year is a long time to be giving away your product but I guess they have a long range strategy. As I said I've been underwhelmed to date with the content but hearing this definitely has me intrigued.  Looking forward to checking the new content out. I would absolutely pay full price for great English football coverage.

Man, I'm gonna sound like a shill for the Athletic, but their NBA stuff quickly went from good to amazing as they ramped up. I'd be especially keen if they have subscriber-only EPL pods like they do with NBA.

[funkyrobot]

The best ‘news’ you’ll ever get about a club is by investing in a season ticket/members card/match ticket and go and watch the matches yourself.

[lfu]

Reposting this because the server crash deleted the last day and a half - reply to a comment about the Athletic lacking journos for international football (only one for Germany and that's about it)

 

I think we have a few people on this forum qualified to be writing about Belgian football if they're hiring in that department!

[CosbehFox]

1 hour ago, lfu said:

Reposting this because the server crash deleted the last day and a half - reply to a comment about the Athletic lacking journos for international football (only one for Germany and that's about it)

 

I think we have a few people on this forum qualified to be writing about Belgian football if they're hiring in that department!

Just to add some of the expected journalists to join have yet to come across because of their notices being served. They'd be fools not have a writer in each of Europe's main leagues. 

[Ian Nacho]

Some of the stuff Tanner posts on twitter is just like a pornstars posts. Teases you but you have to pay 10 quid a month for the full whack. Bad move imo, looks tacky. 

[Voll Blau]

23 hours ago, Ian Nacho said:

Some of the stuff Tanner posts on twitter is just like a pornstars posts. Teases you but you have to pay 10 quid a month for the full whack. Bad move imo, looks tacky. 

Yeah, how dare he tried to get paid for doing his job.

[MarriedaLeicesterGirl]

On 19/07/2019 at 13:40, Detroit Blues said:

They want to attract/retain more US subscribers that follow soccer. Most Americans that are passionate about soccer follow the Premier League, and most of them have a Premier League club that they support. 

 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-08-20/an-upstart-sports-news-service-is-thriving-amid-media-layoffs

 

This article confirms the fact it was more about retaining US subscribers ... and points to their business model, e.g. if they get a good initial bump in the UK they will pour in resources to retain the subscribers, probably by covering other sports (rugby cricket formula 1), more Championship clubs (promotion and relegation will do this a bit by natural selection) and hiring more journalists to cover the more popular teams.