More Than Football Award 2023 Longlist: Ferencvárosi Torna Club – I’ll become a Fradist!
The European Football for Development Network (EFDN) is proud to present the Ferencvárosi Torna Club – I’ll become a Fradist! project, that has been selected for the longlist of the More than Football Award 2023.
One of the strategic goals of Ferencváros is to provide values to people. To communicate the values of the club and its history, along with educating young people to represent this trait with those of quality and tradition. These are supported by the various community activities in which Ferencváros is involved in, such as their Fradi Fair Play movement, their decade-long Anti-discrimination campaigns and the club’s CSR projects.
MAIN PROJECT OBJECTIVES
- To give real value about the identity and history of the club
- Education of the next fan base generation
- Preservation of tradition and social inclusion
- To make football and Ferencváros attractive to youngsters
- Promotion of non-digital content education, and to read books
The storybook is a new initiative in the history of their club, which already published several books, but, this is the first time a fairy tale has been written about Ferencvárosi TC and Fradism (club fandom). This storybook fills the generation gap amongst fans of different ages, and adds a new method to highlight their CSR activities. The latter is done through descriptions of the club’s identity and its community programs, such as Active Fans, Walking Football, Fradi School Program, Fradi Fair Play Awards and Christmas hospital donations.
The Club found it essential to engage fans from an early age, because if a young child identifies itself as a Fradist (as Ferencváros fans are called) from an early age, then they have the chance that these children will play sports at their club or come to their matches.
BOOK DESCRIPTION
Ferencvárosi Torna Club wrote and produced the storybook, financed by its commercial partner, Provident. The book called I’ll become a Fradist! introduces its readers to the world of football and Ferencváros through the fan journey of a young child. Their protagonist is a young boy called Gergő, who has fallen in love with football and the Ferencváros Torna club, glad to his grandfather. The book’s producers, Ferencvarosi Torna Club and Provident, also wanted to show the importance of involving children in the love of sport and the fan community through the story. Following this, around the publication of the storybook, a competition was launched. The scope of the competition was to look for grandfather-grandson stories similar to what the storybook is about, and together they were aiming to select the most adorable and inspiring one. Additionally, Ferencváros also looked for grandfather-grandson surrogates, real-life individuals who remind the readers of the characters of the book. Overall, they looked for stories where something fantastic happened, and where someone can start a fan journey that engages these little guys to Ferencváros, as well as to Hungarian sport in general. Finally, an award Jury selected the winners who won a trip with the men’s 1st team, to their last UEFA Europa League group stage match in Turkey: Trabzonspor vs Ferencváros, which is a priceless experience for fans.
