View all newsletters
Sign up for our free email newsletters

Fighting for quality news media in the digital age.

  1. Archive content
February 2, 2007updated 17 May 2007 11:30am

Milestone for adult footie mag

By Press Gazette

Being a specialist title, finding a different angle on stories and putting FourFourTwo ‘at the heart of the football industry’have been key factors in its success, according to editor-in-chief Hugh Sleight.

Speaking as the magazine celebrated its 150th issue, Sleight said its rise in sales to more than 100,000 in the past five years was reflective of a general trend towards niche titles in the men’s market: ‘At the moment we’re into a pattern of people looking at specific interests, vertical titles. That kind of one-stop-shop for everything isn’t working to the same degree. People want to drill down into their particular niche interests so that’s certainly been a benefit for us.’FourFourTwo marks the milestone this month with five different souvenir covers featuring ‘The men who changed football’– Eric Cantona, David Beckham, Roman Abramovich, Arsene Wenger and Sky TV. The first issue was in September 1994, launched as the first adult football magazine. Sleight said: ‘When FourFourTwo launched, adult football magazines didn’t exist. You had the kids’ magazines but there had never really been a grown-up magazine, so that was a cultural shift.’FourFourTwo tackled the challenge of competing with up-to-the-minute football coverage offered elsewhere, with fresh angles on stories or previews.

Sleight said: ‘There’s saturation coverage, so what we have to do is find a different kind of story – the story behind the story, or looking ahead to an event before anyone else has started thinking about it.’Sleight, who has seen an increase in sales from 67,246 to 111,406 since his arrival in 2001 as deputy editor, said that featuring lower league football that appeals to more fans has helped the circulation. ‘When I arrived you could talk to a lot of fans and they’d never heard of FourFourTwo. I don’t think that’s the case now. We’re much more mainstream, at the heart of the industry. One of the challenges is that football is such a tribal sport. What we have to do is provide a magazine that fans of all types of club are interested in.”

Content from our partners
MHP Group's 30 To Watch awards for young journalists open for entries
How PA Media is helping newspapers make the digital transition
Publishing on the open web is broken, how generative AI could help fix it

Email pged@pressgazette.co.uk to point out mistakes, provide story tips or send in a letter for publication on our "Letters Page" blog

Select and enter your email address Weekly insight into the big strategic issues affecting the future of the news industry. Essential reading for media leaders every Thursday. Your morning brew of news about the world of news from Press Gazette and elsewhere in the media. Sent at around 10am UK time. Our weekly does of strategic insight about the future of news media aimed at US readers. A fortnightly update from the front-line of news and advertising. Aimed at marketers and those involved in the advertising industry.
  • Business owner/co-owner
  • CEO
  • COO
  • CFO
  • CTO
  • Chairperson
  • Non-Exec Director
  • Other C-Suite
  • Managing Director
  • President/Partner
  • Senior Executive/SVP or Corporate VP or equivalent
  • Director or equivalent
  • Group or Senior Manager
  • Head of Department/Function
  • Manager
  • Non-manager
  • Retired
  • Other
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
Thank you

Thanks for subscribing.

Websites in our network