Adelaide Crows ramp up esports push ahead of annual high school competition
The Adelaide Football Club’s annual high school esports competition kicks off tomorrow as the club continues to tap into the burgeoning global video games industry.
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The Adelaide Football Club’s annual high school esports competition kicks off tomorrow as the club continues to tap into the burgeoning global video games industry.
This year’s tournament, which has been renamed META High School Esports, has expanded into New Zealand where more than 70 schools have already signed up.
In 2017 the Crows acquired Legacy Esports, becoming the first traditional sports club to secure an esports team in the Oceania region.
Months later it launched its annual high school competition as a way to engage with young gamers across the country.
The Crows’ chief operating officer Nigel Smart said the move into esports had allowed the club to tap into a lucrative Asian marketplace.
“It’s been challenging but rewarding,” Mr Smart said.
“It’s a new area and we’re partnering with businesses that normally wouldn’t partner with AFL, so we’re growing that partnerships and sponsorships business.
“If you go to south-east Asia, 50 per cent of their population is under 30 and then you go to China, Korea, both with large populations and large numbers of young people gaming.
“For the Adelaide Football Club our lens as an AFL team was primarily within the borders of South Australia, but with esports we’re now looking internationally.”
This year’s META event will include competitions across popular video games including League of Legends and Rocket League.
“It’s a grass-roots esports engagement strategy,” Mr Smart said.
“We probably will have close to 3000 to 5000 participants by year’s end across Australia.”
Under the Legacy brand, the Crows contract close to 20 esports players across Australia and New Zealand, backed by a team of coaches, analysts and content specialists.
“A lot of our talent, if their good enough, will go and play for global teams so we’ll trade or transfer, or their contracts will be bought out by international teams,” Mr Smart said.
“In our first year in esports we probably had contract buyouts and transfers over $50,000.
“The big esports organisations overseas are valued at ten-to-15 times earnings so the assets that we’re developing, they have a value and quite a significant value - so we’re quietly confident that we’re building value in what we’re doing.”
Mr Smart will speak about the Crows’ diversification strategy at a business breakfast on Wednesday ahead of the Queen Sirikit Cup at Glenelg Golf Club.
The Queen Sirikit Cup – named in honour of Thailand’s Queen Mother – is an annual golf tournament supported by the R&A, which together with the USGA, governs and promotes the sport globally.
R&A Asia Pacific director Dominic Wall, who will also speak at Wednesday’s event, said the sport was evolving to capture a bigger slice of the growing Asian market.
“Traditionally business people have used golf as a way to get together with their peers, and I think that’s very much key with Asian golf,” he said.
“We have introduced new rules and one reason was to speed up the game and to encourage new formats of the game.”
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