2021 RANKING OF SPORTS CITIES - BCW Sport
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2021 RANKING OF SPORTS CITIES
New York City stays at the top of the BCW 2021 Ranking of Sports Cities.
In search of the city with the strongest association to sport, Burson Cohn & Wolfe
Sports (BCW Sports) is delighted to publish its annual Ranking of Sports Cities
which highlights the top 50 sports cities from around the world. The ranking
focuses primarily on the views of International Federations (IFs) and sports
industry experts, combined with an analysis of the association between sport and
a city in the digital space. The latter consists of the total number of mentions of
the word ‘sport’ associated with the name of the city on social media platforms,
blogs and websites.
For the second time in the nine-year history of the ranking, New York City takes
the lead edging out London and Los Angeles, which take second and third place
respectively. Barcelona, a newcomer in the top five this year, sits at fourth place
and Paris takes fifth place.
In a year of postponement, rescheduling, relocation, and modifications for sport-
ing events, it is more interesting than ever to discover the extent to which cities
are associated with sport. The organisation of events became uncertain, tourism
was banned and cities could no longer benefit from the degree of international
exposure that is linked to hosting events. As a result, cities were forced to make
different strategic choices when it came to sports. So, to what extent has this im-
pacted the perception in which people associate the city with sport? Our 2021
ranking has the answer!
Switzerland, February 2021
Lars Haue-Pedersen
Managing Director
BCW Sports
01
HIGHLIGHTS
From the 2021 Ranking of Sports Cities
> New York City stands unopposed, taking first place for the second year in a row. This is an
impressive performance by the city, which in previous years did not rank higher than sixth place.
> London, a solid contender, remains the second-ranked city. For two consecutive years now, the UK
capital has held steady in second place.
> Los Angeles rises by one place, moving to third position. This is the first time in the nine-year history
of the Ranking of Sports Cities that two American cities are in the top three.
> Completing the top five, Barcelona jumps by an impressive three places moving in to fourth
position and Paris, host of the 2024 Summer Olympic Games, has moved down two places to fifth.
It is the first time in the last four editions of the ranking that the French capital moves out of the
top three.
> After coming in sixth place in 2020, the postponement of the 2020 Olympic Games did not benefit
the city of Tokyo as this year the Japanese city drops to ninth position.
> The strict COVID-19 measures taken by the Australian government paid off as sports events
were able to be back up and running in a safe manner. This in turn had a positive effect for the
position of all three Australian cities: Gold Coast (+11 ranks), Melbourne (+9 ranks) and Sydney
(+1 rank).
> Budapest, host of one of the most spectacular Formula 1 Grand Prix races for many years, is up 14
places from last year’s ranking, now sitting in 18th position. This is the first time the city is in the top
20 since it was added to the ranking in 2016.
> The rise of two Italian cities, Milan and Rome, is impressive. Milan, a newcomer to the list, host of
the 2026 Winter Olympics and home to historical football Clubs AC and Inter Milan, is the
strongest climber ranking 15th in its first year. The capital, Rome, now stands in 21st position
(+17 ranks), which makes the two Italian cities the biggest climbers in the ranking.
> Cities that have significantly moved up on this year’s ranking include: Salt Lake City (+15 ranks),
Munich (+14 ranks), Calgary (+12 ranks), Indianapolis (+11 ranks) and Vancouver (+10 ranks).
02
RESULTS
Of the 2021 Ranking of Sports Cities
2021 CITY 2020 2019 2021 CITY 2020 2019
1 New York (USA) 1 6 26 Glasgow (GBR) 19 16
2 London (GBR) 2 1 27 Rio de Janeiro (BRA) 34 18
3 Los Angeles (USA) 4 2 28 San Francisco (USA) 21 35
4 Barcelona (ESP) 7 7 29 Indianapolis (USA) 40 42
5 Paris (FRA) 3 3 30 Salt Lake City (USA) 45 X
6 Lausanne (SUI) 5 5 31 Calgary (CAN) 43 32
7 Manchester (GBR) 8 10 32 Doha (QAT) 25 21
8 Munich (GER) 22 27 33 Edmonton (CAN) 33 31
9 Tokyo (JPN) 6 4 34 Stockholm (SWE) 37 41
10 Madrid (ESP) 10 8 35 Gold Coast (AUS) 46 X
11 Melbourne (AUS) 20 15 36 Sochi (RUS) 36 26
12 Berlin (GER) 14 14 37 PyeongChang (KOR) 30 29
13 Chicago (USA) 13 12 38 Torino (ITA) 31 44
14 Beijing (CHN) 16 9 39 Amsterdam (NED) 39 39
15 Milan (ITA) X X 40 Istanbul (TUR) 44 37
16 Sydney (AUS) 17 11 41 Singapore (SIN) 26 34
17 Vancouver (CAN) 27 30 42 Copenhagen (DEN) 12 23
18 Budapest (HUN) 32 25 43 Seoul (KOR) 42 45
19 Boston (USA) 11 13 44 Buenos Aires (ARG) 15 17
20 Toronto (CAN) 9 20 45 Moscow (RUS) 24 24
21 Rome (ITA) 38 28 46 Marseille (FRA) X X
22 Dallas (USA) 23 40 47 Baku (AZE) 35 38
23 Dubai (UAE) 28 22 48 Cape Town (RSA) 41 46
24 Montreal (CAN) 29 36 49 Oslo (NOR) X X
25 Atlanta (USA) 18 19 50 Minsk (BEL) 47 X
With each edition of the ranking, the three lowest ranked cities drop off the list, and the top three
non-listed cities named by the survey respondents are added. New cities which will be added to the
2022 edition of the ranking are:
Birmingham (GBR)
Jeddah (KSA)
Abu Dhabi (UAE)
More detailed results of the ranking are available upon request.
03
THREE KEY LEARNINGS
From the results of the 2021 Ranking of Sports Cities
1 CANCELLATIONS OR POSTPONEMENTS OF MAJOR EVENTS DO NOT HAVE
A SIGNIFICANT IMPACT ON THE PERCEPTION OF A HOST CITY
The year 2020 should have been the year of sporting mega-events, with athletes outperforming
each other in the world’s greatest stadiums and raving fans falling into each other’s arms because
of it. Instead, it turned out to be the year of virtual engagement as the global health crisis pushed
all interaction between stars, fans, rights-holders and the host cities into the digital sphere,
raising the role of social media from important to central. It is therefore interesting to observe that
despite the many cancellations and postponements, the perception of even directly affected host
cities has not really been changed.
The planned 2020 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo were rescheduled to 2021, however, the
city only dropped three placed in the ranking, from sixth to ninth. Another future Olympic host,
Paris, saw the European Athletics Championships cancelled and had to dramatically reduce the
annual Tour de France as well as the French Open. Still, the city only moved down a few places,
from third in 2020 to fifth this year. The overall global media coverage of a highly profiled sports
city does not really suffer from a one-time set-back in terms of the awareness and image as a
sports city. This could be more of a problem for less globally profiled cities, like Copenhagen and
Buenos Aires.
The various postponements of events in Copenhagen played, without a doubt, a role in its drop
from 12th place in 2020 to this year’s 42nd place. The same holds for Buenos Aires, which was
not able to maintain a high profile during the pandemic year and ended up in 44th position
this year compared to 15th in 2020. Moreover, it is important to keep in mind that while major
professional leagues were affected by the pandemic, they kept playing and were featured
globally throughout the year, which benefited the cities hosting these teams.
2 THE OLYMPIC GAMES CONTINUE TO BE A STRONG PERCEPTION DRIVER,
BUT MAJOR LEAGUES ARE EQUALLY STRONG
Of the top 10 cities in this year’s ranking, seven have hosted the Olympic Games (or Youth Olympic
Games in the case of Lausanne), and three are going to host the Games – again – in the coming
years (Tokyo, Paris and Los Angeles). These seven cities are also active in hosting other major
sports events or pro teams, but it is evident that the Olympic rings continue to shine strongly on
any city associated with them – even long before or after the Games are hosted in the city. Korean
cities, such as Seoul and PyeongChang, are not on the top of the ranking, but still managed to
come in at a decent 37th and 43rd place, respectively. Both cities would probably not make it into
the ranking at all if it were not for their Olympic hosting in the past.
It is the same for Winter Olympic hosts Calgary and Salt Lake City. The challenge for these
cities will be how to maintain an international perception of being a sports city in the coming
years. Moscow, Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro are in a similar position. A possible solution for
these cities would be to increase focus on the hosting of pro teams, which clearly has a strong
impact on the international perception as a sports city. This year’s winner (and winner in 2020),
04
New York, is known around the world, and constantly featured on digital channels, for its total
of 11 pro teams (in baseball, ice hockey, American football and basketball). While the U.S. Open
Tennis Championships and the New York City Marathon were both cancelled in 2020, both
events maintain global awarenes.
The same is true for the other two non-Olympic top 10 cities: Manchester and Madrid. Both
benefit tremendously from hosting highly profiled football teams, which continued to play during
the pandemic. Having the city name mentioned consistently around the globe when Manchester
City or Manchester United, Real Madrid or Atletico Madrid are playing week after week has a
strong impact on the association of the city with sport. Viewers and fans around the world are
emotionally connected to these cities even though they may never actually go there.
3 CITIES FROM FAST GROWING REGIONS ARE PROGRESSING,
BUT THE OLD WORLD IS STILL HOLDING STRONG
In the last 10 to 15 years, we have experienced a significant move of major international sports
events from the traditional markets of Europe, North America and Australia, to new and fast-
growing regions. Recently, both the Summer and Winter Olympics have gone to Asia, Rio de
Janeiro hosted the first South American Summer Olympic Games and several countries in the
Gulf region showed their strength by hosting the upcoming FIFA World Cup, various World
Championships as well as F1. In 2021, the F1 will be hosted in three Gulf region countries: Saudi
Arabia, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates. While this trend seems to be continuing, it also
appears to have not yet really made an impact in the perception of these host cities.
Also, the 2021 ranking shows that cities mostly associated with sports are European, American
or Australian cities. Tokyo (ranked 9th) and Beijing (ranked 14th) are the only cities from outside
the traditional markets that are included in the top 20, and in total just nine cities from outside
of Europe, North America and Australia made it into the overall ranking. The strong position of
the ‘old’ world can also be explained by their dominance of pro leagues and teams, whereas new
markets play a very limited role in this area of sport. At the same time, it should be noted that
Dubai is moving up, now at 23rd place, and that two of the three cities (Jeddah and Abu Dhabi)
that will be added to next year’s edition are also from the Gulf Region.
These points highlight the increasing role that this region will play in the sports world in the coming
years. The three newcomers will replace the three lowest ranked cities from this year: Oslo, Minsk
and Cape Town With the removal of Cape Town, no African continent will be included in next
year’s ranking. This huge continent is still in a holding position in terms of playing a visible role in
international sports. Priorities are understandably different, but it also shows that 10 years after
the FIFA World Cup in South Africa, the situation hasn’t really changed.
05
Three newcomers to watch!
The new cities on the list are examples of a perfect mix of old tradition and new ambition.
BIRMINGHAM (GBR): Home to old traditional football clubs like Aston Villa, West Bromwich Albion,
and Birmingham FC. Host of the next Commonwealth Games in 2022.
JEDDAH (KSA): The first Saudi Arabian city to enter the ranking and a clear result of the focus on
major events. Jeddah will host PGA Golf as well as later in 2021, and the first F1 race in Saudi Arabia.
ABU DHABI (UAE): A city with high ambitions led by hosting of F1 (finals) combined with UFC fighting
and later in 2021 the Short Course Swimming World Championships.
METHODOLOGY
Of the 2021 Ranking of Sports Cities
The 2021 Ranking of Sports Cities ranks the top 50 cities that are most strongly associated with
sport from around the world, based on a combination of perception-based analysis and in-depth
quantitative analysis.
More precisely, it focuses on the views of International Federation Presidents, Secretary Generals, and
sports industry experts (such as Heads of Events) and more than 300 sports media representatives.
In addition, an in-depth analysis of the association between sport and a city in the digital space
was conducted using the social media analytics tool Meltwater. The analysis consists of the total
number of mentions of the word “sport” associated with the name of the city on social media platforms
such as Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook, as well as Reddit, blogs, and websites. In this edition, the
search terms used in the analysis were expanded by using French, Spanish and German, in addition to
English, for the spelling of the term “sport” and the cities’ names. By doing so, the research became
more extensive and has a stronger international representation. For example, in Spanish, people refer
often to deporte when talking about sports and the city of Cape Town can be referred to as Le Cap,
Ciudad del Cabo or Kapstadt in the three other languages.
With the intention to illustrate the undeniable power and importance of being digitally present, the
results of the digital analysis (0.50) were weighted higher compared to the opinions of IFs (0.25) and
media representatives (0.25).
With each edition of the ranking, the three lowest ranked cities drop off the list, and the three
top-named cities mentioned by survey respondents that are not on the list are added.
06
About BCW
BCW (Burson Cohn & Wolfe), one of the world’s largest full-service global
communications agencies, is in the business of moving people on behalf of clients.
BCW delivers digitally and data-driven creative content and integrated
communications programs grounded in earned media and scaled across all
channels for clients in the B2B, consumer, corporate, crisis management,
healthcare, sport, public affairs, purpose and technology sectors. BCW is a part of
WPP (NYSE: WPP), a creative transformation company. For more information visit
www.bcw-global.com.
Based on extensive experiences, BCW Sports Practice has launched BCW Eventus™,
a model for attracting, activating and assessing the world’s biggest sporting events
– and therefore supporting cities in moving up to the next level.
For more information
Should you have any questions about the Ranking of Sports Cities please contact us:
Evita Schippers
Account Executive
Burson Cohn & Wolfe Switzerland
evita.schippers@bcw-global.com
Office: +41 21 313 23 00
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