(updated 13-mar-09 13:24 )  

PSA – A new day

The Professional Squash Association just announced a record-setting prize money commitment, by the NEXT group in the Netherlands, to host the World Open in 2011 in Amsterdam.

This is an important and significant announcement for the health of squash in general and the PSA in particular on several levels.

With the weakness in the world economy, any announcement of growth like this is very good news.

For squash, to bring the World Open, at this record prize level, to mainland Europe has particular significance.   Most of the very large prize money events in the past few years have been migrating to the Middle East, which is good for the financial support of the players and the diversity of the game, but not strategic from a world media and attention point of view.  The ability to achieve a major European city venue is terrific and a good sign.

Tommy Berden (photo: ©2009 T Berden)

Is this simply the result of the hard work and vision of the local promoter, Tommy Berden, or is it a broader signal?   There is no doubt that Tommy Berden has drive, ambition to promote, creativity and the necessary local contacts in Holland.  But an agreement like this also takes the cooperation of the PSA and a level of openness.

Other positive signals from the PSA have included statements of intention to organized the world tour regionally (so that the pros can to some extent stop yo-yo-ing around the globe from continent to continent week to week) and to look at the structure of the Superseries Finals, so it becomes more than a non-ranking exhibition and some fresh management blood.

There are still some areas of concern about the foundations of the tour, from the point of view of close observers (whose debates on the subject can be found on any number of internet chat rooms and message boards).   So we asked the PSA to answer a few questions for us.  We asked these some weeks back, right after the Tournament of Champions at the beginning of February, and, in another very positive sign, got immediate and complete answers to our questions from Chairman Ziad al Turki [we haven’t published them until today, for which we apologize to Ziad and the PSA board].  

Ziad al-Turki (photo: ©2009 Fritz Borchert)

SquashTalk:  The global sports scene is currently beginning to see fallout from the world economic downturn.  The most recently highly publicized actions involves AIG intending to pull back from sponsorship of professional football in the UK, and CITIGROUPs negotiations with the New York Mets to withdraw from their sponsorship contract to name the NY Mets stadium.   With many of the PSA events worldwide being sponsored by financial institutions, capital funds groups and the like, what are you seeing in terms of the impact on the events calendar over the next 24 months?

PSA: Other than the ToC, I don’t know of any tournaments sponsored by financial institutions. In a conference I attended by SAMENA Capital the CEO said that in order to survive these times you can’t work on fixing the past, but rather destroy it, innovate, and do things in a completely different way...the JP Morgan add said that sometimes “you have to think inside the box”...the days of throwing millions of dollars in advertising at traditional avenues has ended...look at how many sponsors have pulled out from Formula 1...I think BMW lost about $33 Million in sponsorship....funds are still available, but they are spent wisely...we feel that Squash, when presented correctly, provides sponsors advantages not seen or matched in any other sport....look at where we were, the ToC; where can a sponsor have such exposure to daily people? A sponsor can “reach out and touch” his potential customers in such venues, offering probably the best value for money in any sport...this can also be well measured, as apposed to seeing adverts in football stadiums or on Formula 1 cars...at Emirates Stadium in London the adds read “Fly Emirates to Perth”, “Fly Emirates to Shanghai”, etc...but it can’t tell you why! In a squash venue you can...you have your customers there, and ready to be reached for almost a week...I think squash sits in a very good position in these turbulent times...so while we have seen some cancellations, we are also negotiating new events.

SQUASHTALK:  What actions or contingency plans are you taking to combat any major loss of sponsors?

PSA: Our efforts to reshape the tour, its media exposure, and its marketing are actions that we hope will loss of sponsorship, and attract potential new sponsors.

SQUASHTALK:      By any definition, the USA sports market is a key one in the quest of any sport to emerge in to some sort of prominence.  One of the challenges that the PSA continues to face in the USA is the lack of any  North American players in the top echelons of the sport.  A: The US squash structure is not set up to support some of the fledgling US players such as Julian Illingworth, Gilly Lane, Chris Gordon and the like.   Does the PSA have any ideas in this regard?

PSA: Not entirely true...football, cricket, and rugby are examples of sports that are very prominent around the world, yet have not emerged in any sort of prominence in the US. With that said, the US is a very important market for the PSA, and we are hoping in raising the level of tournaments there. We eventfully will concentrate on developing squash from the grass routes, but for now we need to reshape the tour, raise its level, and with that we hope that squash becomes more attractive and grow around the world.

SQUASHTALK: The PSA gives the perception of being a very UK – centered organization.  What measures are you planning to take to understand the North and South American perspective better, and put forth a product that will catch attention in this part of the world?

PSA: 2 of our board members live in the US...we have a US based consultant that has been developing new markets for us, including South America....please look at the tour calendar, and ask why you think it’s a UK-centered organization?

SQUASHTALK: John Nimick has tried in several different ways to create a North American nucleus, in the form of a US-sub tour cup over the past several years.  Will you be supporting these initiative to lend support to a group of events in the US?

PSA: Any quality event relating to squash is a welcome initiative in exposing the sport to wider audience...we however can only endorse a PSA sanctioned event that relates to our tour.

SQUASHTALK:   The pro squash media is not self sustaining financially at this point in time.  Does this concern you?   Do you have any plans to provide encouragement for media from beyond the UK to attend and cover events in Asia , the Middle East and Europe, or at least provide the main regular squash media with “premium content” (i.e. photos and the such as is provided as a matter of course by WISPA)?   

PSA: We do not encourage any media to attend from the UK....we do not tell any promoter who to use for media, photography, etc...you and others are welcome to request contact details of Tournament Directors and offer your services.  

SQUASHTALK: The current system seems to heavily favor supporting a small group of UK-based journalists ?  Although this does not directly concern the PSA, it is our understanding that one of the weaknesses squash has in the eyes of the IOC is lack of # of media outlets covering major events.  Does PSA agree this is an issue requiring attention?

PSA: Yes we agree, but not on the UK part...squash needs exposure....promoters can do more for the sport by getting the attention of non-squash media...our sport needs to be in the papers, on the news on TV, etc...squash fans will always go to the traditional route and get their info...we need to expose the sport to world...that’s what we’re trying to break into.

SQUASHTALK: We are interested in the PSA’s initiatives to work with strategy and marketing consultants.  Is there an opportunity to involve members of the media such as Squashtalk in this process?   Is there a plan for ensuring worldwide perspective, specifically including American, Canadian, Mexican, Korean and other similar perspectives in the process?

We engaged KHP...they did not speak to any squash media, but interviewed key people from all around the world, including John Nimick, and others they thought necessary...the 1st part of the initiative is now finished...we don’t influence the consultant’s research any form..

SQUASHTALK: Do you intend to share the outcomes of these consultant studies?

We have mentioned already some of the outcomes...the study is the property of the PSA...we don’t think that it is appropriate to share with anyone other than WISPA and the WSF.

SQUASHTALK: Squash being an individual sport, its popularity rides considerably on the appeal of the individual stars.  Does PSA have any plans to train the touring pros in how to conduct media interviews and present an interesting personality to the media?   It is our impression that most current squash pros are very naïve in this context, have no such training, and therefore often don’t have much to say, beyond bland statements about how they and their opponent played, that would catch the public interest.  Does the PSA have any plans in this area?

Yes....both Saatchi and Saatchi, and GREENSPACE advised us on this...we need to package the players like any other sport...the players need to be professional as well...in the next AGM will bring a very well known speaker that will coach the players as you mentioned.

iThis interview is highly encouraging, in SquashTalk's view. The speed of PSA's response to SquashTalk's query indicates they had already been thinking about all these areas, and have a coherent vision of where to go.

And the inclusion of Amr Shabana (as PSA president) to the "management team", is to us a very important development - not just because Shabana is from other than the UK squash heritage, but because he is a creative and clear thinker.

There are some areas where we are still cautious and take a "wait and see" approach. These areas are ---

1) The USA market. (see above for PSA's comment). We fully recognize that this is not at all under the control of the PSA. But we feel that first, it has been extremely clearly demonstrated that John Nimick is the promoter with the best feel for and understanding of how to succeed in the US Pro Squash market. A closer working relationship with him would, we feel be beneficial to everyone. Second, US Squash has created a mis-step in the men's professional US market through the movement of the US Open away from John Nimick's successful formula. After making that move under the publicly-stated guise of wanting the event permanently in New York, they are now in serious discussions about moving the event to Chicago. This makes sense from the point of view of the very capable and motivated (via Imran Nasir and others) core team there, but less sense from the point of view of availability of a sizeable, knowledgeable inbuilt squash audience; and Third, there is a continuing problem of the lack of strong program to help incubate successful touring pros from North America - maybe providing some formal backing from PSA to the likes of Martin Heath, John White, and David Palmer to build a success program. It is not sustainable for US budding pros to have to go to the UK or Holland to find a conducive environment.

2. The continued UK-centricity. (I feel very strongly about this). My professional background is in the hi tech industry. It is well known in that industry (based on dozens of case studies) that there have been countless, wonderful technology innovations from Cambridge, Oxford and Nottingham, but that from a marketing point of view, global marketing rarely succeeds when originated from the UK. I believe the same applies in sports.

3. The confused conflicts of interest in the sport. This is the most pervasive problem. Squash is a small sport (relative to other global sports). It is unavoidable, therefore, at present, for the business of squash to involve a variety of cross-interests by those with the financial resources to make businesses go in the sport of squash. But those people, then, have a strong responsibility to make sure those conflicts of interest don't handicap the progress of the sport. The PSA has an important role to play there. Will they? That jury is still out. And it is the most important one. Conflicts between the tour itself, the players interests, individual player representation, event promotion, media and broadcasting, venues and clubs, and sports equipment are have become extremely complicated and cross linked in squash. That all comes to a head at the PSA. So far the 'new PSA' has shown an understanding of those issues. We hope they can progress them.

So it's a new day for the PSA. So far, in early 2009, a fairly sunny one. Let's see if the new pro tour leaders can keep the clouds far on the horizon.

 

 

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