Optus Sport’s Clive Dickens on his role leading content for the Women’s World Cup

Liam Watson
Image provided by Optus Sport

Even before the FIFA Women’s World Cup was on the horizon, Optus Sport had already made its mark in Australian football.

At this point, Optus have cemented themselves as the place to watch all major events and leagues, including the men’s and women’s Premier League, Spanish LaLiga, Japan J. League and Korean K League.

Fully supporting the Matildas in the upcoming Women’s World Cup, you’ll be able to see every game of the national team live and on demand.

It’s this commitment that has seen FIFA name Optus as an Official Supporter of the Women’s World Cup, adding to the confirmation that Optus is the Official Broadcaster of the tournament.

Clive Dickens, Vice President, Television, Content and Product Development of Optus, spoke with Soccerscene about Optus’ growth as an organisation, the buzz around the World Cup, how to leverage the viewing audience and plans for the future.

Tell us about your thoughts leading into the World Cup itself?

Clive Dickens: The Women’s World Cup was awarded to Australia two and a half years ago and we have a deep history at Optus Sport of broadcasting World Cup content.

We were the only place to watch all games from the 2019 Women’s World Cup in France, and we were also the partner of SBS in 2018. We’ve also broadcast the FIFA Club World Cup as well in the past. So, we bid for those rights when Australia and New Zealand were nominated as the host countries and through a very aggressive tender process.

We’ve invested enormously in the product and platform and team to become the official broadcaster. We’ll have brand new studio facilities, production facilities, hundreds of people working on that coverage, five remote teams across two countries collecting content from all the 11 cities where there are games being held, and see all 64 games live on demand with highlights, goals, mini matches etc.

As Optus itself is an official supporter, we’ll leverage all the fantastic tournament tickets, content, imagery and intellectual property across all of our 400 stores and thousands of channel experiences. A bit like some of the other official supporters and partners, this is an incremental investment in the sport.

What’s your take on how the viewing audience consumes content?

Clive Dickens: A lot of fans won’t sit down and watch the entire game or the whole second half or even a replay or long highlights.

But they will see amazing goals, athletes and content stories across social platforms. Whether it’s across TikTok, Snapchat YouTube or Facebook, or whether it’s on LinkedIn or Twitter, we’re confident that our content will reach 20 million of the 25 million Australians.

That’s really what will benefit the women’s game enormously. It wasn’t that long ago when the women’s game was a minority sport. Being a host nation and an official broadcaster and supporter of a telco and digital business, we will be able to bring this to not only our 10 million customers, but we confidently predict 20 million Australians will see at least five minutes of our coverage of the event, making it by far the biggest event in this country since the 2000 Olympics and prior to the Brisbane 2032 Olympics.

You started with Optus in May 2019, what have you observed from when you started?

Clive Dickens: Each year, there’s been 40% growth on the prior year in terms of engagement and subscribers. This is the beautiful world game, it is the fastest growing game in the world, even though it’s one of the oldest. There is no sport in the world that’s growing faster. And we’ll see that over the next five years with the 2026 Men’s World Cup in USA, Canada, and Mexico.

One of the big watershed moments was the Euro 2020 Championships. Here in Australia, that still holds the record for the largest ever live streamed event in the history of the Australian Internet, where 675,000 devices connected to our origin service to watch England lose to Italy between 4am and 7am in June 2021. No single sporting event has ever had a larger online audience than that in Australia. Not a Grand Final, not Ashes Cricket, not an Australian Open.

Part of the reason for that is because all those events I mentioned are also carried on broadcast TV, whereas the Euro 2020 tournament that was played in ’21 was exclusively online. But if you think that number of 600,000 to 700,000 concurrent devices peak, that was England versus Italy with not a single Australian playing there. And it was at 4am to 7am. Now fast forward, we’ve got the Matildas playing the Republic of Ireland and hopefully going through from the group stage or the finals. This is a prime-time event. No Matildas games are before five or six in the evening. Before we had to get up early, but we won’t need to in Australia. You’ve got this confluence of factors that have never been seen before in football.

How do you assess the international appeal of Australia?

Clive Dickens: In Sydney they’re currently building the Fox Sports America Women’s World Cup Studio, a huge construction that’s going on just under the Harbour Bridge, because NBC, Peacock, Telemundo and Fox Sports are the combined official broadcasters of the tournament in America. What this means is that the tournament is going to be a huge platform for Australian tourism across all those networks. The world champions, America, are going to obviously do very well, even if they don’t go all the way. This will create amazing platform of inspiration for our country, following on from the pandemic, where we will be able to showcase the best of Australia to a huge global audience.

I go past this studio construction every day and they are building one spectacular set right with the Harbour Bridge as the backdrop. For 10 to 12 hours a day, Sydney and the whole of Australia and New Zealand is going to feature as a backdrop to British, European and American broadcasting. This is an incredible moment for the country’s tourism industry as well off the back of the pandemic.

What is Optus Sport doing to help promote the tournament?

Clive Dickens: We’ve got hundreds of licensed venues where you can watch all 64 football games, including clubs, pubs and casinos where you can watch it with other fans in the warmth of the indoors, because it is winter in Australia and a little bit cooler. A lot of this shared experience is going to be in venues. We’ve also got dozens of FIFA fan zones – public parks where councils are applying for free licenses to stage fan zones. For example, in one Sydney council area alone – the Inner West Council – there will be infrastructure set up in six parks to watch games. That’s six in just one Local Government Area. There will be other councils in other cities doing the same. It’s a daytime event, the first game kicks off at 11am, and the last game whistle blows at 11pm. What could be better? No staying up late at night, no setting your alarm early.

One of the big differences you would notice as a football fan is the profile difference in the type of supporters. Women’s football has a much, much younger supporter base than men’s because men’s football is steeped in history. In the UK, it’s like 180 years. The average club in Premier League is 100 years old. To get even football in the major leagues, it’s quite expensive. You’ve got to be a member and got to buy a season ticket. That tends to favour people who have handed down their team from granddad to dad, to son or to family. And it’s expensive to go and watch big flight teams across Europe. It’s less expensive with the A-League, but it’s pricey. Whereas women’s football is typically much younger audience and is much less male. For example, over 80% of our subscribers are male, but we’re predicting 55 % of our FIFA Women’s World Cup audience to be female. So, you’ve got a younger, more female fan base.

Whether that’s in the stadium or elsewhere, the atmosphere is completely different. The chants are different. The songs are different. Because you put 60 % women in one place versus 80 % men, it feels very different. Like going to a concert is different. You’ve got a rock act or you’ve got a pop act. Therefore, not only is a game a little bit different on the pitch, but the audience is very different. So that’s one of the reasons why it’s going to be so enormous. For example, my 21-year-old daughter and her friends are not really interested in men’s football at all, but they’re all on my case about getting tickets for the FIFA Women’s World Cup because they see themselves on the pitch. They see this as a leveling up and a real difference around how the women’s game is played.

How do you think the Matildas will fare and thoughts on the tournament overall?

Clive Dickens: We have one of the best players in the world, if not the best, in Sam Kerr. When you couple that with the team on form and home ground advantage, this is the moment.

Just imagine if Matildas can make it to the final. I don’t want to tempt fate, but I think they can even get through to the quarter finals, which will feel like a final for Australia. A quarter final World Cup, something that no Women’s or Men’s team have ever achieved – anything after that is a bonus.

The thing about this event is that when we’re watching these incredible athletes, whether they’re American or from the Philippines or from New Zealand or Australia, it’s going to inspire millions of people, particularly young Australians.

That’s what sporting tournaments and amazing athletes do. They inspire people to go off and do amazing things, beyond just going outside to kick the ball around. As a high participation sport, football is the beautiful world game that’s growing faster than any other in the world.

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GIS Industry Masterclass highlights pathways for women’s sport.

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Image Credit: Soccerscene

This month, the Global Institute of Sport (GIS) held an industry masterclass with guest speakers discussing the future of development in women’s sport.

The masterclass panel had two key speakers:

  • Chantella Perera, General Manager of Sport at KOJO.
  • Yael Reed, a sports marketing consultant who has worked with Newcastle Jets, Football Australia and Netball NSW.

These two industry experts, representing different areas of the women’s sporting world, delved into answering the event’s important goal of growth and sponsorship in women’s sport.

The role that media and commercial partners have in elevating women’s sport was a key point. Discussion was centred around the importance of encouraging broadcasters to invest in women’s sport directly and not just through male sport avenues.

Yael Reed spoke about the importance of media revenue being invested into women’s sports.

“Media partners with broadcast and commercial revenue is ultimately what is invested in the sport, and you need to invest to grow,” she said.

“Broadcast and commercial revenue also contributes to paying the players

“Media and coverage revenue is what is invested into the sport and their support is needed to help sports to grow, but also to benefit from, Women’s sport is no longer the steak knives.”

Chantella Perera, a former professional sportsperson and with KOJO a big leader in women’s sports events, outlined the position of women’s sports:

“From grassroots we see more equity with facilities and infrastructure for girls now. From my field in the event world lens, the investment from clubs and leagues is improving year on year. The disparity is still huge,” Perera said.

“There must be money invested to grow it. Yes, it is changing—a lot more females can do it as a job.

“But I feel we are still talking a lot but not doing a lot. People can make action, and it doesn’t have to be huge actions. Making those small steps towards that change is where we move forward.

“The Matildas’ success at the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup has sparked a rise in interest towards women’s football in the country.”

Perera, however, commented on the slow impact it has produced:

“It did have an impact with the eyes and traction, but we are still waiting for the influx of cash,”

“I’d challenge the effect and ask: two years on, have we seen enough from it? I just want to see if we can get more from it.”

A key point regarding investing in women’s sport and central to the discussion was how to invest in the differences between men’s and women’s sport.

Reed expressed her key ways in which this step can be tackled:

“It’s important for brands to consider Who they are trying to connect with? The benefit of women’s sport is it’s fresh and new (compared to men’s sport). There’s a lot to be unexpected. There are amazing people playing the sport and their story needs to be told,”

“I think when you can connect with athletes, with clubs, and harness that promotion and opportunity that’s there with women’s sport.

“The opportunity in women’s sport is to expect the unexpected.” Reed highlighted.

The important question of brand alignment became central to the discussion, with the equation for branding being relevance multiplied by emotion equals impact.

To harness the sponsor’s relevance to the team and the sport, harnessing that emotion and being relevant to the fans and showing up for them and having an impact promotes any brand.

An example presented by Reed was the Suzuki partnership with the Swifts:

“By putting players in their content and in the car the swift has been really positive,”

“The business case is there. We now have a greater asset in women’s sport to take your brands to the next level

“To have a women’s demographic is such a good asset for business branding.”

Women’s sport has faced challenges in gaining support and funding to expand and delve into the ever-growing popularity of the women’s game.

Sponsorships and businesses trying to grow their portfolio and market shouldn’t underestimate the power that women’s sport and football have.

It is unique and it is unexpected, as was discussed centrally in this masterclass.

The ways to grow women’s sport are there, and the benefits are evident. Sponsors need to take the necessary step and will undoubtedly reap the rewards if they do so.

“It’s about growing the game and encouraging kids to play” – Bentleigh Greens President Gregoriou on $2.4 Million Investment in New Women’s Pitch

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Image Credit: Bentleigh Greens

Bentleigh Greens Soccer Club has announced a $2.4 million investment to build a new pitch at Kingston Heath Soccer Complex, dedicated to growing women’s football.

The project is jointly funded by the Australian Government’s Play Your Way grant ($1.5M), the City of Kingston, and the club itself.

The announcement was supported by Mark Dreyfus MP, Councillor Tony Athanasopoulos, and Mayor Georgina Oxley, marking a major step forward for female football development in the region.

Abraam Gregoriou, President of Bentleigh Greens spoke with Soccerscene to discuss the big announcement for the club.

“The Play your Way grant program is all about funding for women’s sport and we always thought it was a no brainer for the club to get involved. We’ve always wanted to expand and we thought why not expand the women’s game at the same time.” Gregoriou said to Soccerscene.

Bentleigh Greens President Abraam Gregoriou (second from right). Image Credit: Bentleigh Greens

Bentleigh Greens have always been a club with a big juniors and specifically junior girls presence in the South-East, and this investment in a new pitch is at the forefront of their major plans to continue that growth.

“We’ve had some pretty great milestones in the women’s game. A couple of seasons ago we merged with Bayside United FC which has been fantastic and has given our girls an elite pathway where they can progress,” he said.

“We’re up to 700 juniors players this season which is a record for us and of course we want to keep that growing.

“We’ve been developing our community girls programs at all levels from MiniRoos up to the older age groups. We’re getting to a point where space is limited and we don’t want to turn girls away so this pitch allows us to keep growing and focus on encouraging girls to take up the sport.”

Bentleigh Greens 14C Girls. Image Credit: Bentleigh Greens

The focus for the club has always been footballers first and Gregoriou believes the money from council and government is best spent on its players.

“You see other clubs investing in grandstands and stuff like that but for us that’s not what it’s about. It’s about growing the game and the only way to do that is by encouraging kids to play,”

“If you don’t have a pitch to play on, then what’s the point so I’d rather spend the $2.4m on a ground for the kids then spending it on a grandstand that we fill once or twice a year.”

Gregoriou also thanked the sponsors who invested in helping make this upgrade become a reality.

“I’d like to give a huge thank to our amazing sponsors: Zaparas Lawyers, Metricon, Metro Projects, Bamtec and Guzman y Gomez,”

“They support the women’s game and have put their hands in their pockets to help the growing program.”

Construction is scheduled to begin in 2026, with the pitch expected to be ready for the 2027 season.

The ambitious project, backed by government, council and sponsors, will expand opportunities for girls and women across Melbourne’s south-east.

Bentleigh Greens cement their commitment to female player development and it ensures the club can keep growing without turning eager young footballers away.

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