Liverpool F.C. CEO Worries About Millennial Interest in 'Fortnite' And What It Means For Soccer

The CEO of Liverpool Football Club -- and the former boss at Electronic Arts -- Peter Moore, is worried that millennial audiences would rather play and watch video games like Fortnite, then watch soccer matches. And according to the CEO, this will be a problem in the future.

In order to counter this, Moore believes soccer needs to invest in ways to keep younger audiences more interested in the world's most popular sport. One of the ways to do this is by using new technology and adapting content to shorter attention spans, which millennials tend to have thanks to the hyper consumption culture they've grown up in.

That's right in addition to rival clubs like Manchester United and Chelsea, the Liverpool boss fears video games, like Fortnite, are increasingly competition for viewership.

"90 minutes is a long time for a millennial male to sit down on a couch," said Moore while referring to the average length of a soccer match. "When I look at viewing and attendance figures of millennial males, I'm concerned as a chief executive of a football club that relies on the next generation of fans coming through."

The CEO continued:

"If we don't build technological prowess as a club we will lose [millennial male viewership]. There's so much pressure on time now and only 24 hours in a day… there are only so many hours to play 'Fortnite.'"

According to Moore, the solution is offering bit-sized content for people who aren't willing to invest 90 minutes each week (sometimes multiple times a week) to watch soccer.

"We are an industry that needs to harness technology to make sure we don't miss an entire generation of young people growing up that don't have that love for football," said the CEO. "We need to package content in bites of 60 to 90 seconds to keep their engagement."

Of course, if you follow any big clubs on social media, you'll know many have already started to do this. However, it seems Moore thinks more than this will need to be done in order to get more millennials invested. Or, you could just sign Ninja at striker. That would probably do the trick.

That said, with the increasing amount of young players streaming, playing games, etc., I think part of the engagement will come naturally. But Moore is right, it hasn't, and likely won't ever be, easy to get attendance and viewership in a world where attention spans are increasingly shorter and shorter

Thanks, SportsPro.