Ownership of ‘Clueless Crypto Crew’ wins over UK football fans
As Crawley Town FC searched for a new manager this spring, the ownership issued several warnings to leading candidate Kevin Betsy. People can hate usco-owner Eben Smith told Betsy. It can get a little crazy, because we do some things that are different.
Skepticism had followed WAGMI United (a reference to the crypto mantra “We’re All Gonna Make it”) since before it appeared in Crawley. When it first announced its intentions to buy an English football club late last year, the group, led by Smith and long-time sports bettor Preston Johnson, along with several NFT entrepreneurs, were branded “faceless crypto crews” and their bid to buy Bradford City was ultimately rejected.
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After WAGMI successfully bought Crawley Town FC – a club in England’s fourth-highest division – in April, “the first thought from most people was, ‘This is not going to work'” Crawley Observer said editor Mark Dunford. “Frightened, I think, is a word you can use about an American group coming in — not just Americans, but anybody coming in with the words cryptocurrency, all NFTs spinning around.”
Message board warriors referred to Crawley Town as Magic Beans United, and predicted the club would drop out of the league altogether.
And yet Betsy, the former manager of Arsenal’s Under-23 team, took the gig. “They want to bring a new, innovative way of thinking in the football industry,” he said at his introductory press conference.
So far so good. Contrary to crashing crypto prices, optimism around Crawley (30 miles south of London) is as high as it’s ever been. After landing a coveted manager, Crawley Town signed their division’s leading goalscorer from last year and cruised through five pre-seasons unbeaten this summer.
Off the field, new ownership has reduced season ticket prices while selling 10,000 NFTs, pledging to use the money to help fans see their promotion dreams come true and to include those fans in key decisions along the way. Today, for example, the club will interview for a scouting job live on Twitter.
Crawley Town kick off their regular season on Saturday. As Johnson said at Betsy’s introduction, “Now this is the fun part.”
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England’s football pyramid has dashed the hopes of many investors with their eyes on the windfall that awaits any team that can move up the ranks. But WAGMI feels it has a new formula.
After seeing online communities develop around NFT projects like the Bored Ape Yacht Club, Smith and Johnson felt that these people would also rally around something physical. If owners could go beyond local followers to develop and monetize an online legion, they could give themselves a competitive edge on the field. More fans would mean more money, which would allow for more investment, which would lead to more winners, which would attract more fans in a virtuous loop.
After Philadelphia 76ers president Daryl Morey joined the group, he said Washington Post“WAGMI United could be at the forefront of a revolution in how sports franchising is run.”
While much of the ownership group had ties to blockchain projects, WAGMI United does not want to limit itself to the NFT community. The team initially aimed to become “Crypto’s Club,” but Johnson now prefers a different title: “The Internet’s Team.”
However, WAGMI United did not roll out this designation right away. First, it wanted to get local people on board.
“Fans of a football club are very protective of their club,” Dunford said. “They’re going to be quite skeptical, cynical.” Steve Herbert certainly was. A 45-year-old train driver who runs a Facebook fan group initially wondered why a new time-ownership collective would be interested in his favorite team.
Although Crawley Town is 126 years old, the club joined League Two (the fourth division of football in England, behind the Premier League, The Championship and League One) a decade ago. In a town of 114,000, the team had just over 700 season ticket holders and were £500,000 in debt. The team was sold for a reported £5 million ($6.1 million).
At a fan forum in May, Johnson and Smith allayed fans’ fears. The league had required the group to buy in cash, and prove they had the means to drive the club forward. Fans would not be forced to buy NFTs. The group’s main goal was to win. And after the event, ownership continued to communicate
During one of his first days in the city, Johnson broke a vow not to use the word “football” and relented by going to the Old Punch Bowl in the city, where he bought £1,000 worth of drinks for fans as he discussed the team’s plans.
“It’s a bit of a nightmare for me as a journalist because they’re so transparent,” Dunford said. “They want to sign and they want to go on Twitter Spaces, invite everyone and explain why they signed.”
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On its website, WAGMI maintains a list of improvements it has made to the club so far—26 and counting, from providing ice baths for the players to partnering with Adidas. Other minor upgrades are not included in the list. “The fact that they had a hand dryer that was broken for five years and never got fixed is crazy,” Johnson said.
Number 1 on the list is hiring Betsy, a sought-after candidate who not only worked with Arsenal but with the England youth team. A couple of weeks later, the club signed Dom Telford on a three-year contract after Telford led League Two with 25 goals in 37 games.
“When that happened, I had to pinch myself,” Crawley native Jack Standen said in an email. “I honestly thought it was a wrap.”
Standen is a lifelong Crawley Town supporter who had also become known as the ‘crypto guy’ among his friends after buying NFTs, so he had more at stake than most when WAGMI took over. “This for me was a way to show my doubting peers that crypto is not just ‘internet monopoly money,'” he said. Overall, Johnson said WAGMI United plan to almost double Crawley Town’s player wages this year, while also investing in analytics, coaching and training infrastructure.
Dunford estimates that 90% of Crawley Town supporters are now with the management. The train driver, Herbert, might as well lead the carriage. “Everything they have promised so far they have delivered,” Herbert wrote in an email. “They are like the new messiah!”
Earlier this month, WAGMI unveiled its first NFT, a $500 (or 0.35 Ethereum) virtual season ticket that entitles you to limited edition merchandise, exclusive live streams, in-person events and some input into how the club is run.
Last year, Johnson said, Crawley Town sold 900 jerseys. This year, WAGMI United has already sold 10,000 NFTs, about as many as Premier League power Liverpool moved earlier this year at a much lower price. The plan is for the extra income to be translated into an advantage on the field, where real money can be earned.
If Crawley Town can achieve two promotions to England’s second division, the English Football League Championship, they will join a number of other American-owned clubs where teams in the top half of the table are regularly valued at over £100m. And the fans’ ambitions don’t stop there. “I think the fans are really dreaming of the Premier League in a few years,” Dunford said.
WAGMI United, meanwhile, have goals off the pitch. “It’s a playbook that maybe can be used in other leagues, other sports and other countries,” Johnson said. – We just have to win.
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