Sport clubs are endowed with beliefs and practices that constitute their tradition. Conversely, there is a certain pressure to embrace innovation to win the race for tomorrow's fans. Managing two inherently conflicting systems such as tradition and innovation can be seen as an ambidexterity challenge. Despite this, new media and esports change the access, perception, and consumption of traditional sport. We conduct a multiple case study to investigate how nine (out of 18) clubs from the German Bundesliga approach esports. The dynamic configuration model presented in this study showcases that hybrid clubs effectively overcome innovation inertia within their traditional environment. This research enriches our comprehension of the tradition-innovation paradox, emphasising that tradition and innovation are orthogonally aligned rather than opposed.

This article examines the state of research on sport entrepreneurship, with a particular focus on the intersection of entrepreneurship, innovation, and creativity in sport management. Sport is an increasingly important sector of the global economy, yet little attention has been given to the role of entrepreneurship in its development. This article argues that entrepreneurship, innovation, and creativity are crucial drivers of change, innovation, and employment in sport and that sport entrepreneurship is an emerging but unorganized stream of business research. To better understand the relationship between these research fields, we performed a study that combined a systematic review and a bibliometric analysis. This article presents thematic shifts in the field of sport entrepreneurship, innovation, and creativity. It proposes an integrated model of sport entrepreneurship, offering novel perspectives that contribute to the field. Furthermore, the article addresses the lack of research on creativity, sustainability, and the sport entrepreneur, charting underexplored territories. Overall, this article provides a comprehensive overview of current research on sport entrepreneurship and identifies key areas for future investigation.

This article presents a state-of-the-art overview of the sport management research discipline through a bibliometric analysis of publication data from the top five sport management journals in the decade 2011–2020. The analysis includes citation and productivity analysis of journals, institutions, countries, and articles, author citation and output analysis, and title and abstract (co-)word analysis. The data identifies the Sport Management Review as the most prolific journal of the last decade. Institutions and authors from the US are dominating the sport management research, which has increased its attractiveness in other disciplines. Co-word analysis shows recent and frequently discussed topics related to management of sport organizations and events, team and game, sport marketing and sponsorship, and behaviour and identification of the spectator. The article serves the ongoing debate on sport management as an academic field with deep insights into the publication structure and thematic dynamics of the last decade.

Intrapreneurs are needed in the sport sector due to its competitive nature. However, little attention has been paid to this topic within sport entrepreneurship literature. This paper aims to examine the cross-cultural applicability of Ajzen’s theory of planned behavior for predicting the intrapreneurial intentions (II) of sport science students from two European countries and to discover if there is a moderating effect of country’s culture on the antecedents of II. A questionnaire to collect the data was used. The sample is composed by 736 final year sports sciences students from Spain and Lithuania. The combination of a symmetric (Structural Equations Modelling) and asymmetric (Qualitative Comparative Analysis) approach was used to examine the students’ country culture as a potential moderator. Results indicate Ajzens’s theory of planned behavior as a suitable framework to predict intrapreneurial intentions (II). Moreover, it is highlighted that the country’s culture can have a moderating effect on the university students’ II. Educational policy makers should consider the impact of county culture when promoting intrapreneurial behavior. In Spain, it should be developed a positive attitude towards intrapreneurial behavior, while in Lithuania it is more important to foster that they perceive as having the necessary skills to be an intrapreneur.

The domain of sport entrepreneurship has become firmly established in the scientific community, but there remains an ongoing debate about the true meaning of sport entrepreneurship. Is sport entrepreneurship a distinct characteristic of sport, or is it a deduction of innovative behavior to create business in sport? Current conceptual progress is limited in important aspects of opportunity exploitation and value creation. This study offers a fundamental reconciliation based on a thorough literature review on the distinct nature of sport and theoretical constructs of entrepreneurial research to decode and recompose the concept of sport entrepreneurship. The presented effort towards a universally accepted definition is based on a process perspective and by integrating sport-related social entrepreneurship, this study is a prelude to improve the coherence of the future paradigm of sport entrepreneurship.

Purpose The purpose of this longitudinal study is to examine the dual career and entrepreneurial experiences of professional football players and their influence on the career transition process to entrepreneurship or employment. Design/methodology/approach The study examined a Portuguese employer–employee data set from 1991 to 2017 using the logit model, a binary choice regression model that allows predicting the probabilities of two possible qualitative and binary outcomes. Findings Entrepreneurial experience is the key driver for retired football players to pursue entrepreneurship. Having a dual career and working during the athletic career leads to higher chances of continuing in the labor market as an employee. Higher education levels did not significantly influence the decision to pursue a second career but having secondary education increases the chances of continuing as an entrepreneur. Research limitations/implications First, the study aims to shed light on success factors in career transition of professional football players who engage in a dual career. Second, the authors introduce sport entrepreneurship as a possible activity alongside an athletic career. Practical implications Athletes can benefit from the experience they gain during a dual career in the process of career transition. Working in the final year of an athletic career represents a promising strategy to gain work experience alongside sport without jeopardizing sporting success. Originality/value This study adds evidence to the contemporary discourse on dual career theory and career transitions and reconciles the theory of sport entrepreneurship and dual careers.

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has spread worldwide in a short period and has developed into one of the biggest public health issues of the last decade. The actions initiated by governments to minimize person-to-person contact have also severely affected professional football clubs (PFCs) in the season 2019/20. Given the role of football in Europe, football clubs gained massive public and political attention during the COVID-19 crisis. Based on an exploratory multiple case study approach involving PFCs from five European football leagues, this study investigates the responses of these clubs to the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings show the relevance of solidarity with certain stakeholders during the pandemic, but also reveal the fragility of PFCs due to their financial structure and underdeveloped managerial and entrepreneurial strategies to cope with the crisis. This study contributes theoretically and empirically to the literature on the entrepreneurial behavior and crisis management of elite sport organizations and illustrates a holistic map of a dense, high solidary stakeholder network.

Managing a personal sporting career and conducting an entrepreneurial initiative are two vitally connected processes.Most athletes require a second career and many engage in entrepreneurship.Research on the similarities and differences of the sports career management process and entrepreneurial process -with a special emphasis on the necessary capacities -will have a ready audience among practitioners.This study begins the task of closing a surprising gap.In entrepreneurship literature, there is (1) growing research on entrepreneurial process and entrepreneurial capacity as the key driver, (2) strong work in generic, descriptive and explanatory modelling of process as a whole and capacity as a sub-process, and (3) the presence of a generic model of entrepreneurial process based of what distinguishes entrepreneurial capacity from other human capacities.In sports management literature these research strands are virtually absent.The study indicates how the deficiency might be remedied.

In recent years, sports entrepreneurship has emerged as a promising discipline in the field of sports management research. However, the research field is still fragmented. This study gives an overview of sports entrepreneurship and coopetition research and is the first work analyzing EO and performance in professional sports. First, quantitative results about EO, organizational performance and coopetition of 22 professional soccer clubs were obtained. Following the mixed method approach, the data was then extended by qualitative expert interviews. Entrepreneurial orientation had a significant positive relationship with both financial and sporting performance of professional soccer clubs in German-speaking countries during the 2017/18 season. We suggest coopetition as a promising strategy for professional soccer clubs to succeed. Hence, our study fosters the concept of sports entrepreneurship and offers evidence that entrepreneurial orientation is a well-suited managerial approach to enhance organizational performance in professional soccer.