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news
Sir Bradley Wiggins on TalkSport (via Twitter)‘Backward’ cycling will be worse off for Sky’s departure says Wiggo
Sir Bradley Wiggins can’t envisage Team Sky finding a replacement sponsor of similar stature and says he believes the sport as a whole will suffer as a consequence.
Sky last week announced that it would cease to sponsor the team that bears its name at the end of the 2019 season, so ending its nine-year involvement with professional cycling.
Speaking on TalkSPORT, Wiggins said of his former team: “People need to be careful what they wish for because if Sky go now the sport will be worse off for it, and it’s whether [cycling] will ever get back to those heights.
“The sport may just – well it won’t disintegrate – but it maybe won’t have the profile it has enjoyed now.”
As well as providing a weighty budget of around £30m a year, Sky’s sponsorship has also been unusually long by the standards of professional road cycling.
Alluding to this, Wiggins said: “This day was always going to happen because the sport is so backward in some ways – the people that run it. It’s not corrupt but it’s so backward. There’s no money in the sport, really.
“I mean Sky brought money but I’m talking about sponsors of the sport in general aside from Sky. Rather than be grateful for a company like Sky coming into cycling, people just hammer it.”
The 2012 Tour de France winner also said that he didn’t believe Sir Dave Brailsford is likely to find a like-for-like replacement.
“I can’t ever envisage them getting a sponsor like Sky. You know, a UK company – or whatever they’re owned these days, but based obviously in London – the size of the company, coming in and doing that for cycling.
“To replace them, in order to carry on and cover the wage bill and the budget for the next years is going to be quite a tough thing to do and a tough thing to find.”
He added: “It’s the end of an era in some ways. That’s not to say the team can’t carry on but it’s whether they can find a sponsor with that much money and that much weight to cover the wage bill so they can keep everyone there.”
“If Sky does go, I think the sport will be worse off for it.”
“The sport won’t have the profile now that it’s enjoyed in the last few years.”@SirWiggo on the news Sky will be ending their team’s sponsorship in 2019. pic.twitter.com/PXeWtHEAq4
— talkSPORT (@talkSPORT) December 20, 2018
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
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14 comments
The Cycling Podcast covered it very well in this weeks episode. Emirates pay similar money to Sky to sponsor Arsenal's stadium and shirt. They get huge levels of worldwide exposure all through the season as a result. Sky get exposure through association with stories about doping, jiffy bags and, admittedly, Grand Tour success at a sustained level in a sport that their core market is largely indifferent to (except for SPOTY).
Interestingly, none of the team managers they talked to in the podcast saw it as a good thing that Sky were leaving the sport. Personally, I've never been a particular Sky fan, and I'm hoping that the playing field may be levelled a little in the Grand Tours, although it may also lead to a drop in coverage of the sport in the UK.
Wiggins remains a putz.
Good riddance to The Death Star.
He's right though, people just blindly criticise, rather than focus on positives like revolutionising same day delivery of "decongestants".
Says Mr negative himself
Big money was good for football, it'll be great for cycling and its profile at top level.
Yeah right, even people who like football know premier league football is a sham.
no comment
ha ha was thinking the same thing. No longer dynastic teams will reign like LFC or MUFC of old, as money changes hands very fast. Cycling is better without Murdoch.
ha ha was thinking the same thing. No longer dynastic teams will reign like LFC or MUFC of old, as money changes hands very fast. Cycling is better without Murdoch.
[/quote]
Not sure I agree with you on the football front. What we have now are sub-sovereign teams (like Man City - owned by countries); those owned by utilities (Chelsea - or at least the proceeds of major Russian utilities); followed by a few big cross-border commercial franchises (MUFC, Liverpool); the next tier owned by billionaires (Arsenal); and then Spurs (owned by a millionaire); and then the rest which are loss-making in the main, but supported by Sky and TV revenues (with chump change coming from gate revenues, merch sales, and advertising...
Cycling is a massive sport - but we (the punters) generally don't - or can't, to be honest - support it with revenues: how would you do it? Subscribe to Sky TV? Well, yes. Buy a Qucik Step Floor? A Segafredo coffee machine perhaps?....But the odd shirt (terribly uncool, but would only net a few pence for the team)... Like i said earlier. Needs reform. Quick.
Interestingly I've just been reading up on revenue streams for cycling as I am about to embark on the process of getting the company I work for involved in sponsorship of a cycling team. Not an easy job as the MD will need some convincing.
So anyone with a serious interest in team sponsorship, get in touch an we can have a serious chat. I've worked at Federacion level previously, so let's get a plan out there.
It won't be anywhere close to Team SKY and I'm a clean rider anyway. Ouch!
He's right though. Some of fans attitude has been 'boo Sky, outspending rivals', rather than seeing that a sponsor like Sky shouldn't be an anomaly.
F1 teams are spunking £200-450m a year each. Team Sky's is £30m+. Quite ironic given literally anyone can get on a bike and cycle but you need to spend loads of money to even learn to drive but yet cycling as a sport can't get any decent sponsors.
Armagedon is upon us, earthquakes, volcanos, the dead rising from the grave, human sacrafice, dogs and cats living together, yorkshiremen talk of spending lots of money (other peoples mind) - mass hysteria.
But ultimately, what's (at least perceived to be) the 'prize'?
The global car industry's worth something like 1-2 trillion USD. The bicycle industry is about 40bn: 25-50 times less.
I have no idea whether Sky spending that amount as a non-manufacturer paid off for them, but a few years ago it seemed to be doing their reputation no harm. The team's started to smell a bit over the last couple of years, though.
He's absolutely correct. Lance Armstrong has pretty strong views on financial distributions (or the lack of) in cycling... Seems most of it goes to the major tour organisers and there is no distribution... the rest is just advertising: unlike, say, the EPL where the owner (EPL) sells advertising rights, generates revenues and distributes them (and the teams also generate their own revenue streams). It needs a major overhaul. Fans pay nothing to see these major races (unlike football) and many don't even pay to watch it on TV. This means that the owners/ sponsors are just charities or philanthropists and all they have left at the end of a sponsorship deal are the old team kits and a few bikes....