THE CLUB

With the richness of Disney War and the verve of Game Change or Hatching Twitter, this pacey, spirited business and sports narrative takes readers inside the history of the most-watched sports league on earth: England's Premier League - a powerhouse that has become the prime innovator, packager, and exporter of the world's most popular game.

How the Premier League accomplished its success is a story of a business empire built in a helter-skelter fashion (often by accident and in some cases in spite of itself), a universe that teems with Russian oligarchs, Arab Sheikhs, Asian Tiger Titans, and American Tycoons, not to mention a media ecosystem fueled by Rupert Murdoch, cult-of-personality coaches, ruthless agents, some of the world's most talented (and well-compensated) athletes, and legions of supporters & fans in cities and towns across England, and indeed the world.

The league's growth since its formal creation in 1992 has been astonishing. Its revenues have increased by 2500%. The cumulative value of its teams has increased from $100 million in '92 to $15 billion today. Every summer, while making offseason moves, the 20 clubs in the Premier League combine to spend over a billion dollars on new players. It has become a case study for licensing, marketing, and sponsorship deals that pull money in from nearly every corner of the globe. Its TV contracts alone over the next two years are worth $10.4 billion; its audience lives in 185 countries with a total reach of 4.7 billion people.

THE CLUB is the perfect business narrative for our globalized age. For as much as the league has expanded and universalized its appeal, it has become somewhat alien to itself, straining its ties to its own history, supporters and regions. As the league's commercialization has increased, a new set of economic imperatives raises the possibility that its successes may eventually warrant its destruction.

Jonathan Clegg and Joshua Robinson have been at the Wall Street Journal for nearly a decade. In that time, they have covered pretty much every major sport and sporting event, but they have had a particular focus on soccer, which the paper began to cover regularly due to the sport's growing stature in America. Their pieces have frequently led the sports section, have often appeared on Page 1 itself, and have garnered millions of views & reads. With international pedigrees themselves, deep familiarity with English soccer, and unparalleled access and connections, they are the perfect people to write this book.