NBA plan could see Manchester City in pole position to create a new team

The NBA wants to expand its work in Europe and sees Manchester as a key part of the plan

NBA commissioner Adam Silver is growing his organisation’s reach and Manchester City could benefit(Image: FRANCK FIFE/AFP via Getty Images)

Manchester City could follow in the footsteps of Real Madrid and Barcelona as part of bold plans by the NBA to crack the European market.

The world’s most prominent professional basketball league, America’s NBA, wants to expand its footprint in Europe, a continent that while producing more superstar players than ever before for the NBA, is commercially underdeveloped and where there are few strong professional top tiers.

The NBA, as first reported by The Times, are expected to announce a new multi-year deal to bring regular season games over to Europe, with Manchester’s 23,500-seater Co-Op Live arena expected to the choice, with live games over the past 15 years having largely been played at London’s O2 Arena.

That move could kick the door open to a potential Manchester City franchise in a European NBA league, something that is on the agenda of the NBA as it looks for further expansion in the future.

At present, domestic basketball is largely dominated in terms of the strength of competition by Spain, Italy, Turkey and Greece. The UK’s SBL, formerly known as the BBL, is some way behind when it comes to the quality of the competition.

In the European basketball ecosystem exists professional teams that are associated with football clubs, such as Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Olympiakos and Panathinaikos. They play in similar colours and lean into the relationship that exists between the fans of both clubs.

With Co-op Live part-owned by Manchester City owners City Football Group there are suggestions that a potential basketball team could emerge in an NBA Europe league, with the NBA keen to strengthen ties with the Middle East, where City Football Group has its Abu Dhabi roots.

Abu Dhabi has played host to pre-season friendlies for the past three seasons as well as Team USA exhibition games, with the interest in basketball being driven by Mohamed Khalifa Al Mubarak, the chairman of Abu Dhabi’s Department of Culture and Tourism and brother of City chairman, Khaldoon Al Mubarak. Abu Dhabi also has a jersey patch deal with the New York Knicks.

“While Europe continues to develop some of the very best players in the world, we think that the commercial opportunity has not kept pace with the growth of the game,” said NBA commissioner Adam Silver, speaking ahead of an exhibition game in Paris last week.

“Everything is still on the table. The potential to include existing clubs, absolutely, should there be interest. The opportunity to create sustainable competition, yes.

“Would we want to have a broad base of countries represented? Absolutely. That’s the benefit we have now by coming in and looking at this from a blank canvas.”

City Football Group’s multi-club model has seen them look for, for the most part, brand alignment across clubs through colours and badges. Having the ability for the club to cut through in a different market with a different set of potential fans could be tremendously impactful further down the line in terms of growing the club’s presence in the US, as well as the potential to market different kinds of merchandise across a Manchester City basketball team and the senior football team.