When universities sponsor football teams Sometimes class is not enough

Just yesterday, National League South club Torquay United announced their new kits for the 2023-2024 season. This would normally be an ordinary piece of news, if it wasn’t for the fact that the club’s new sponsor is a high school: South Devon College in Torbay. 

If you know your football sponsorships, you’ll be aware that very few teams - if any - get involved with academic institutions. It is simply an uncommon practice, perhaps because sports and academia are completely separated in Europe. It seems like the Old Continent dwarfs in comparison to the US and its college sports system, but, as it turns out, football clubs seek out partnerships with universities more often than you would think. 

Portsmouth FC x University of Portsmouth

And finally, the only non-British team: Ternana, also known as Ternana Unicusano. Owned from 2017 to 2023 by the university's president Stefano Bandecchi, the club played with "Unicusano" as their jersey's main sponsor for 6 years straight. Less collaborations between the two entities in this case, except for the purchase of a campus in Kent, England, for the university in 2019, financed in part with revenue from Ternana Calcio. Starting on July 15th of this year, however, we'll see the "Unicusano era" come to an end and make way for new sponsor Pharmaguida.

Clearly, this is a British dominated list and a purely British practice. There may be several factors that would help explain this one-sidedness, but the fact that the UK university athletic system is the closest thing we have in Europe to American college sports is probably more than just a coincidence. The athletic opportunities and facilities available to students in the UK simply outshine those of other countries in the continent, and this list fully reflects that.