It is common practice for the North American professional sports leagues to hold exhibition matches and even league games in foreign countires to promote their business overseas. The NFL played their opening match in London, the MLB will play two matches in Tokyo and the NHL is considering to send some teams to Europe for promotional purposes. So it comes as no surprise when the English Premier League announced that they are thinking about having regular season matches played in foreign countries to expand their fanbase. What will be pleasant news to the millions in foreign countries seems to be a rather bad idea since it has to be kept in mind that long travels are not very good for the form and fitness of a team. One can always hear the Champions League winner complaining about their late autumn trip to Asia to represent Europe in the FIFA World Club competition. So personally I don't think that the game will actually benefit from matches played abroad. In Baseball the officials went so far as to set the date of the season opener between World Series winners Boston Red Sox and the Oakland Athletics so early that both teams will go back to the states to continue their spring training and allow the to acustom themselves to home soil once again.
Sure, the promotional value will be immense and once the League is able to reap the benefits of such trips other European leagues will follow that example and will try to set up their own overseas matches. But the fans back home won't be as pleased as the ones in Asia, I think. You want to support your team and season ticket holders pay a lot of money to be able to watch their club play. Are those people supposed to follow the team wherever the league sends them? And what about local derbies? A match like Schalke vs Dortmund, Milan vs Inter or Arsenal vs Tottenham makes no sense if it is played thousands of miles across the globe.
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