Sport pro = Twitter pro? - How soccer stars use Twitter at the height of their career

Abstract

This paper examines the usage of Twitter by professional soccer clubs and players in the context of a major sporting event. The study focuses on the UEFA Champions League Final in 2013, which featured two German football clubs. Nearly 300 tweets were coded via eight variables (author, content, date, language, media, mood, person and team). The results reveal considerable differences between the levels of activity and the players Twitter performance. The clubs accompanied the season highlight in a communicatively extensive manner, but use Twitter in a strongly event-related manner. Concerning the players activity, a classification into five categories was possible, based upon their overall levels of Twitter use. Numerous differences between each athlete s usage of Twitter were observed.