Here’s an unscientific hypothesis: if you’re over the age of 30, you’ve probably heard about esports – competitive video gaming usually for a cash prize – but you haven’t appreciated how big a deal it is.

The numbers tell quite a story. The market intelligence company Newzoo estimates that the global esports audience will hit 380 million people in 2018, producing total revenues of £700m, an increase of 38 per cent year on year. And the momentum is only picking up. Last December, the world’s first dedicated esports arena, in China, hosted its first event and, in March, a similar proposal was unveiled for North America: a $10m (£7.7m) purpose-built stadium in Texas. At the time of writing it was announced that Dota 2’s “The International” tournament would have the biggest esports prize pool ever, $25m (£19.3m), making this the seventh year in a row that the tournament has broken its own record.

While esports is well established in North America and Asia, where players such as South Korea’s “Faker” (aka 22-year-old Lee Sang-hyeok) have become global stars, netting millions a year, in Britain the scene is relatively underpowered. That’s why two years ago Chester King set up the British Esports Association, appointing former culture secretary Ed Vaizey MP as its vice chair, to “promote esports in the UK, increase its level of awareness, improve standards and inspire future talent”. King is a veteran in the world of traditional sports – he runs the golfing country club Stoke Park and has worked for the FA, Lord’s and the Rugby Football Union – and he wants to create British esports champions. “What we need is heroes. It’s a bit like tennis: I’m sure in ten years’ time there will be a whole load of Scottish kids who want to be the next Andy Murray. [But] no one’s doing a good enough job promoting the heroes in esports.” And there is talent to be nurtured: in 2017 a Brit, Spencer Ealing, won the Fifa Interactive World Cup. The ambition is that British players will also start to dominate in more popular esports titles, such as League Of Legends, in which players battle it out in a virtual arena, or Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, where terrorists and counterterrorists take on one another with grim realism. And when all this is poised to take annual revenues of $1.6 billion by 2021, well, why not?

This much seems certain: sports culture is changing in a profound way, and if you’re smart about it, there’s money to be made

Yet there are murmurings. Some in the industry worry about the speed at which money is pouring in – and where it’s coming from. Could we, they ask, be in an esports bubble? Newzoo’s 2018 Global Esports Market Report says that 59 per cent of esports income is from sponsorship and advertising deals. Compare that to the Premier League, which, according to Deloitte, attributes only 26 per cent of its revenues to sponsorship and other commercial sources. That makes esports vulnerable to the whims and demands of third parties. And then there’s the issue of traditional sports teams making forays into esports. The German football team FC Schalke has acquired a League Of Legends squad, for instance, and the NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers owns Team Dignitas, which competes across a variety of titles. This has injected significant money into the sector, but if those sports teams don’t see a return on investment they could decide to withdraw just as fast as they plunged in. The British Esport Association’s content director, Dominic Sacco, speculates that if this were to happen – noting that it may well not – it might create a wider problem. “It could create a domino effect where other sports brands think, ‘They’re getting out, we haven’t seen good traction, we’re going to get out as well.’”

So what should esports do to safeguard its future? While Newzoo senior market analyst Jurre Pannekeet does not foresee sponsorship drying up, he does believe that it’s vital the industry finds ways to directly monetise viewers. “Right now, most content is freely available to watch, [while] merchandise and ticket revenue is still relatively low,” he says. The elephant in the room, though, is the lack of women on the major teams. A 2014 study by the Internet Advertising Bureau showed that 52 per cent of UK gamers are female (never believe the clichés), yet all of the 90 competitors at the aforementioned record-breaking Dota 2 tournament were men. There may be hard-to-tackle reasons for this esports-wide imbalance – perhaps most significantly the misogynistic bile spewed at female players online – but as long as half of the global population is left out of esports culture, the chances of improving ticket sales and securing major broadcast deals are surely hampered.

But let’s say it’s not a bubble and it keeps on growing. What does the future of esports look like? Pannekeet believes that one major shift over the next ten years will be the growth of local competition. “Firstly, top-tier teams will have their own venues that they’ll play their league matches in, similar to traditional sports teams,” he says. “Secondly, there will be more national competitions, which will allow for esports to tap into local marketing budgets.”

In the tech world, the future is hard to gauge because behaviours change so fast. Consider the famous clip from 2007 of Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer laughing out loud at the notion of someone spending $500 on an iPhone. But this much seems certain: sports culture is changing in a profound way, and if you’re smart about it, there’s money to be made.

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