Spanish football and the social network X. A case study of clubs playing in the 2023/24 season of LaLiga EA Sports

This article is part of a wider research project whose main general objective is to catalyze the creation of an observatory dedicated to the systematic exploration and continuous monitoring of sports discourse within the realm of social media. The present study undertakes an examination of the online presence of all 20 clubs participating in the 2023/24 season of the Spanish League EA Sports, specifically on the social networking platform X Employing a quantitative methodology, the research relies on the Fanpage Karma tool and a purpose-designed table to scrutinize the X accounts of these clubs over a span of three months. As expected, the findings show a huge disparity in follower count between Real Madrid and Barcelona as compared to the rest of the clubs. Notably, the trajectory of followers is not consistently upward and the frequency of posts per day exhibits marked variability. It is concluded that the volume of posts does not exhibit a direct proportionality to the level of engagement generated.