Earlier this year Amazon released a television series that chronicled the extreme highs and very seldom lows of Manchester City Football Club. A soccer team playing in the most prestigious league in England, Manchester City teamed up with Amazon to give fans the inside access to everything City. The series starts in the preseason of their 17/18 season and concludes with Manchester City winning the league title. Netflix is looking to rival this all-access pass European soccer series, but with a twist.
Netflix’s series which is set to air in December will follow the trials and tribulations of Sunderland AFC (emphasis on the tribulations). During the 16/17 Premier League season, the club was playing in England’s top league, today, they’re playing two divisions lower in the Football League One. Netflix’s series will spotlight the realities of being a Sunderland fan, and one of those realities is despair.
“Following a club like Sunderland is a far truer reflection of the vast majority of sports fans’ emotions and realities than that of the richest club in the world,” Leo Pearlman, director of the series.
Sunderland and its Executives are determined to work their way back into the category of elite English soccer teams. Netflix will not be paying Sunderland, rather, the team will hope to recoup in the form of publicity and merchandising opportunities. In what has become a story of decline and struggle, Netflix can hopefully breathe life into an otherwise back peddling team.
A side note, Sunderland’s mascot is a Black Cat.
Categories: Netflix, Premier League, Streaming