A digital ethnography of association football fandom responses to corruption

Rationale: Despite the extant literature on sport fandom and the prevalence of corruption in sport, fans’ responses to it remain widely understudied. This study focuses on fans and examines how football fans experience and react to corruption. Design: The context is Blackpool Football Club, an English league team, which following the owners’ corruption allegations, saw the fans leading a large-scale boycott of the club’s matches. Qualitative data generated through cyber-ethnography are used. Findings: We found that in response to corruption, some fans begin engaging with other football teams, while some can move away from football entirely and focus on other aspects of their lives, unsure if they would return. Practical implications: The study shows that fans can lose contact with fellow fans as a result of not inhabiting the same space in the stadium or due to disagreements centring around the protest action, while also noting that new relationships can be built around the boycott and the protests. Research contribution: In view of the findings, we propose an extension to the supporter’s matrix to encompass the newly observed activities of fans following corruption, so that these martyr fans can be accurately reflected in future studies on the subject.