Football for the KSI generation

Baller League is a new sports entertainment venture which plans to bring football in line with the short-form content-sphere.

The brainchild of German Bundesliga veterans Mats Hummels and Lukas Podolski , in conjunction with an obscure “film producer” named Felix Starck .

The brand’s implication is that the once-beautiful game has become boring; too streamlined, too data-fied, too many cautiously recycled attacks and not enough lollipop stepovers.

The format is designed to highlight “ballers’: those with real footballing technique, but perhaps not the physicality, professionalism or luck that the boys in the big time possess.

The overwhelming impression is a version of football without tribal allegiances, or “skin in the game’s”.

Baller League may collapse under the weight of its own hype soon enough, but it seems to at least understand its audience.

For better or for worse, young people want their sport well-lit and TikTok-ready.

They want to be grabbed by big personalities and yet remain emotionally unattached.

If they can't get the Yamals and Mbappes of this world, they’ll settle for YouTubers .