Why Gerard Pique's New Kings League Is The Craziest Football Competition On Earth
Not content with his bonkers trophy haul, former Barcelona stalwart Gerard Pique has taken to the entertainment business to set up the King's League – but what's it all about and what do Sergio Aguero, giant dice and a tightrope walker have to do with this?
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00:00A catapult that launches dice onto the field, a ball firing cannon to start the match, a
00:09tightrope walker to instigate the kick-off, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Gerard Piquet's
00:15Kings League.
00:17The 7-a-side football tournament, which features legends of the game, social media stars and
00:22every daft idea you could possibly think of, has become a massive hit in the Spanish-speaking
00:28world since its launch on January 1st.
00:31Less than three months after that, though, it had grown so enormous that 92,522 spectators
00:39crammed into the Camp Nou to watch its first finals day, this despite virtually all the
00:45players on the pitch being total unknowns.
00:48And a few months later, the Metropoliano was close to capacity for an eight-hour, six-match
00:53epic, including performances from pop stars and a penalty shootout with Iker Casillas.
00:59It's all in probably the brainchild of Barcelona and Spain legend Gerard Piquet.
01:05Not content with a World Cup, a European Championship, four Champions Leagues, nine La Liga titles
01:11the lot, the 36-year-old has ploughed his focus into Cosmos Holding, the company he
01:16founded in 2017 with Barcelona's shirt sponsor at the time, Rakuten.
01:22After controversial moves to turn Tennis Davis Cup into an 18-team tournament and Spanish
01:27Football Super Cup into a four-team contest played in Saudi Arabia, as well as the launch
01:31of… the world's first balloon World Cup, the project gained some credibility when it
01:38bought FC Andorra and took them quickly from the Spanish 5th Division to fighting for promotion
01:44to La Liga.
01:45But it's the Kings League that has become the real story.
01:48Devised with help from Piquet's pal Ibrahim Llanos, Spain's most famous social media
01:53influencer with 15 million followers on Twitch, the seven-a-side tournament has been an overnight
01:58phenomenon in Europe.
02:01With fixtures streamed live on YouTube, the first matchday on January 1st saw a dozen
02:05games at a Power League-type indoor arena in Barcelona.
02:09There was only a tiny stand for spectators, but online, it attracted a peak audience of
02:15780,000.
02:17The second matchday peaked at 945,000 when one team fielded a masked player known only
02:26as Enigma.
02:28Described by Piquet as a La Liga player who didn't want to reveal his true identity,
02:32fevered speculation and guesswork had him identified as anyone from Isco to Denis Suarez.
02:38On matchday three, viewership reached 1.3 million.
02:43Part of the reason for this is the league's unusual rules, voted for on social media,
02:47which help to draw attention.
02:49Matches are two halves of 20 minutes on a small-sided pitch.
02:53Normal league fixtures start water polo-style, where each team lines up on their goal line
02:58before charging towards the ball on the centre spot.
03:01Teams can also play one secret weapon per match by picking a card at random.
03:06Options for those range from an immediate penalty kick to an opposition player being
03:10removed for a few minutes, or even just all the goals scored by your team in the next
03:15two minutes counting double, things like that.
03:18La Liga chief Javier Tabas described it as a circus and a freak show, but it was never
03:23aimed at him.
03:24The main audience is 15 to 24-year-olds, and the league already has partnerships with major
03:29brands like Adidas and McDonald's.
03:32As for the more traditional fan, they are being courted with the involvement of legends
03:36like Iker Casillas and Sergio Aguero being the de facto presidents of teams in the league.
03:41Aguero has even played in some matches, striding on for his debut in a clown outfit before
03:47revealing his identity.
03:49And while Enigma may have turned out to be ex-Kadizh forward Nano Mesa underwhelmingly,
03:53Javier Hernandez has made a one-off appearance on launch day, followed by cameos for Javier
03:58Saviola, Juan Capdevilla, Gibril Sise, Andrea Pirlo, Andrey Shevchenko and Ronaldinho, the
04:04latter of which attracting enough eyes from South America to draw an audience of 2.1 million.
04:10Pique, speaking exclusively to 442 in an outstanding feature written by our own Chris Flanagan,
04:16has even said that Neymar has been in touch about owning his own team.
04:20And that he can't rule out Messi himself getting involved at some point in the future,
04:24although he is, and this is a quote, very busy at the moment.
04:27Interestingly, Pique himself hasn't made an appearance yet, but has been loaded into
04:32one of the games as one of the secret weapon cards teams can use.
04:36He was hidden on the sidelines ready to go, but neither team drew his card in that match.
04:41And that's just how it goes in the Kings League.
04:44So how does it work?
04:46Well, the Kings League follows an Apueta and Klasura style format more popular in South
04:50America, in which each season is divided into two splits.
04:54The Winter Split and the Summer Split.
04:57Both splits have their own league stage followed by playoffs for the top ranked teams.
05:02During the league stage, the 12 teams play 11 matchdays and face every other team once.
05:07The top 8 teams based on their rankings at the end of the league stage advance to the
05:11playoffs.
05:12Each matchday features six 40-minute matches, which are divided into two 20-minute halves.
05:18All these games are then played consecutively on the same ground.
05:22For the inaugural season, players were given the opportunity to apply and were selected
05:26through a draft process that took place last year.
05:29The respective players underwent physical and skill testing before the top prospects
05:33were then drafted.
05:34Each team can have 12 players on their roster, and the draft involved selecting 10 players
05:40for those slots.
05:41The other two, and this is where it gets good, were reserved for guest players.
05:46Your Agueros, your Pielos, your Ronaldinos, your Shevchenkos, your Adam Clearies, that
05:51sort of thing.
05:52These players are known as the 11th and 12th player, and as well as famous footballers,
05:56famous streamers and YouTube stars have appeared as well.
06:00The 12th player can change on each matchday, while the 11th player is meant to stay with
06:04the team for the entire season.
06:06The most recent final held almost unbelievably in a near-sold-out Metropolitano, home of
06:13Atletico Madrid, saw the league whittle down to El Barrio and ex-Bayern's team.
06:18After a frankly stunning 4-4 game played out, it was to be decided on penalties.
06:24But of course, this is the Kings League, not your classic 12-yard penalties.
06:28Old-school MLS hockey-style penalties where the attacker starts on the halfway line and
06:34then has a one-on-one with the goalkeeper.
06:37Deep into sudden death, ex-Bayern's team took the win and the inaugural summer trophy.
06:42For all the big names and celebrity streamers, it was a young defender called Micky Fernandez,
06:47a man who admitted later he'd never really played in front of a crowd before the Kings
06:52League, who scored the decisive goal.
06:54There were near 50,000 people watching him do it in the stadium, over 1 million have
07:01watched the highlights on YouTube, and you can then double that again for the audience
07:06on Twitch.
07:07That alone is a remarkable thing.
07:10The challenge for the Kings League now will be finding a way to stop the novelty from
07:14wearing off.
07:15Throughout 2023, new rules and new stars were regularly being introduced to keep everything
07:20fresh.
07:21It's difficult to see why expansion is on the agenda, specifically into South America.
07:27But in theory, there's no reason this can't thrive anywhere where the sport is popular
07:31and that has a switched-on, engaged, socially-media-savvy young audience.
07:36This is football, you see, just not as we know it, and that, to be completely honest,
07:41is the beauty of the thing.
07:42Sometimes, people just want to have fun, and if there's one thing that the Kings League
07:47is, it's fun.
07:49If you'd like to read more about the Kings League, you can find a huge interview with
07:53PK and other notable people involved in it in 442 Magazine.
07:57We were very lucky to be invited out to Spain to see how it all works, meet the man behind
08:01the league, and hear about their expansion plans for the future.
08:04The piece which has informed this video was written by Chris Flanagan, and the magazine
08:08and indeed all issues of 442 are available from all good news agents, all via subscription
08:14in the link below.
08:15Until next time, I've been Adam Cleary, this has been the incredible story of the Kings
08:19League, and I'll catch you next time.
08:21Goodbye!