More Market and Less Regulation? Fan Attitudes Toward the Governance of the Russian Premier League

Russian football is currently excluded from international competitions as a political sanction due to the military conflict. Despite this, matches in the national football leagues are continuing, and fans still attend professional football matches in the Russian Premier League (RPL). As fans’ attitudes toward aspects of Russian football governance are largely unexplored, the question arises how fans evaluate the governance of the Russian Premier League. Therefore, this article presents evidence from the first large survey of RPL supporters (N = 4,090) with a focus on consumer culture and requests for reforms of the RPL. The regression results reveal an attitudinal pattern toward the governance of the RPL in line with recent findings on Chinese football fans, which may be characterized as a post-socialist fan culture restricted by an authoritarian league governance. Hence, unlike European fans, Russian supporters associate more consumer sovereignty with commercialization because they mistrust the politicization of the RPL.