What is the Kings League? Gerard Pique explains success of real-life video game

May 29, 2024

“How has your involvement in this project affected your personal and family lives?” came the question from the press seats at the Estadio Metropolitano.

There was silence before an answer came from Ibai Llanos, Spain’s most famous streamer and president of Kings League team Porcinos.

“Well, for some of us, we all know what’s happened,” said Llanos, drawing nervous giggles from the audience made up of the players and coaches who would take part in the ‘final four’ stage of the Kings League and Queens League at the stadium the next day.

Alongside Llanos on the stage, Kings League president Gerard Pique grimaced. Kunisports president Sergio Aguero reached down from the row behind and squeezed Pique’s shoulder. Kings League CEO Oriol Querol smiled.

“The question is for everyone, better for some of you lot to answer,” said Pique, appearing to be angered by the clear reference to his recent very public break-up with former partner Shakira.

Even if he was truly annoyed by the line of enquiry, the former-Barcelona-player-turned-web-entrepreneur knows better than most the value of good content. So does Llanos, who was streaming the event live to his more than 15 million Twitch followers, 11 million YouTube subscribers and 16.8 million followers on TikTok.

The almost two-hour-long pre-match show was full of banter. When Pique was asked what stadiums he would like to bring the Kings League to in the future, he said the “New Bernabeu” because “I always loved playing there, it was just one stroll after another”.

This brought more chuckles as everyone turned to look over at Iker Casillas. The former Real Madrid player and president of 1K FC just shook his head, like the embarrassed dad who does not quite get what the kids are up to.

Di que eres boomer sin decir que eres boomer: pic.twitter.com/alap5OpfcJ

— Kings League InfoJobs (@KingsLeague) July 29, 2023

There were many who did not understand what Pique was planning when his Kosmos company launched the Kings League last year. But lots have woken up to its power and potential over the past six months — with hundreds of thousands of viewers watching games streamed from a Barcelona sports centre each weekend.

The ‘final four’, which ended the first half of the debut Kings League season, drew 92,000 to the Camp Nou in late March, with more than two million more watching online over Twitch, TikTok and YouTube. Almost 60,000 tickets were sold for the finale of the ‘second split’ at the Metropolitano on Saturday, where in 2019 Liverpool beat Tottenham in the Champions League final.

Pique himself knows all about such occasions, having won four Champions League titles in his club career with Barcelona and Manchester United, plus a World Cup and European Championship with Spain.

Speaking with The Athletic before Friday’s press conference began, the 36-year-old said that his new career was bringing him the same buzz he enjoyed during his playing days.

“The feeling is like the eve of a Champions League final; lots of energy, lots of adrenaline and lots of excitement,” Pique said.

“The truth is we did not expect all this. It has all developed much faster than I thought. The audiences are still crazy — in Kings League and Queens League, it still surprises us. This is a long-term project, and we are only starting out still. I’m very excited about this, as I am about everything I do in my life. We want to bring the Kings League to another level.”

The King’s League was born last July, when Pique and Querol were walking from Kosmos offices in Barcelona to have lunch with Llanos.

“We were discussing the problems of traditional football,” Querol tells The Athletic. “Ninety minutes has become a long time, and sometimes a match can end 0-0. In a Champions League final, for 20 minutes, there can be no content.

“We knew content creators, so we decided to combine both worlds. Ibai loved it and said yes straight away. We called Gerard Romero (Twitter followers: 1.1m) and Spursito (YouTube subscribers: 1.59m). They arrived at coffee time. In less than an hour, we had three of the owners we wanted.”

Other YouTubers and streamers quickly joined, including DjMaRiiO (YouTube subscribers: 9m) and TheGrefg (Twitch followers: 11.5m). Pique also contacted Aguero, who was already a Twitch regular with more than 4.8m followers. Casillas is not such a skilled social media user, but is an investor in different tech start-ups.

Pique was close to Llanos from previous business projects, including streaming Ligue 1 and Copa America games in Spain over Twitch. Pique’s company, Kosmos, had started out publishing online managerial football games, and now staff there started spitballing ideas for the new game they were developing.

xBuyer Team president Javi Buyer celebrates victory in the Kings League semi-finals (Photo: Borja B. Hojas/Getty Images)

“We thought about how we could make football more entertaining, taking things from other sports such as basketball or water polo,” Querol says. “We also wanted to make more things happen, to take football and turn it into a real-life video game.”

The idea quickly formed as seven-a-side games played in two halves of 20 minutes. Rolling substitutions were to keep energy levels high, and there would be no draws — if a game finishes level, a shoot-out where takers can carry the ball from the halfway line decides the winner.

The video-game elements included ‘secret weapon’ cards that coaches or presidents could play to give their team a free penalty, or to remove a key opposition player for two minutes.

Even more wacky ideas were the streamer presidents themselves entering the pitch to take a spot kick, and oversized dice that decide how many players remain on the pitch for the final two minutes of the first half.

Pique says the idea was to learn from how younger people consumed football, which, he believes, is generally not by sitting passively through 90 minutes on one screen.

“Competitions need to adapt to what the audience wants, whether it is traditional football, or tennis, or the Kings League,” Pique says.

“Younger people are consuming content at all hours of the day, with two or three different devices. I can tell you from my own experience, I have two kids. They need everything quicker, it’s difficult for them to concentrate on anything for long. But, they can also be involved in three different things at the same time. We should not force them to change their consumption habits. We have to adapt ourselves and our products to what the audience wants and likes.”

Kosmos also quickly found a previously abandoned sports complex close to Barcelona’s port that they could refurbish to host the games and equip with the technology to broadcast online. The spectacle was key — all the content would be free to access for anyone with an internet connection, not like how football is strictly controlled by clubs and broadcasters.

“We put cameras on the referees, in the dressing rooms, we mic’d up everybody,” Querol says.

“We wanted to access everything that professional football cannot. And then we wanted to involve the streamers. Giving them the rights to stream the games, putting cameras wherever they are, even making it so they can participate.”

Meanwhile, each of the 12 presidents had to put together their team. This meant hiring a coach and a director of football, as well as getting together a squad of players. There was also a lot of marketing work to make sure the project reached as many people as possible. Some presidents were more involved in the details than others, but Kosmos made sure everything got organised.

“When Pique called me, I thought it was a very good idea,” Aguero tells The Athletic. “He prepared everything and called me a month and a half later and told me that everything was ready. It’s just what I like, football and streaming. It’s different from professional football, with the secret cards and weapons so that people can be entertained a little bit more. I enjoy it.”

Sergio Aguero takes the heat off (Photo: Kings League)

The first round of Kings League games was played at the ‘Cupra Arena’ in early January. Almost 800,000 people watched across YouTube and Twitch — whether on the Kings League’s own channels, or (more importantly) via the channels of the streamer presidents.

As Pique had intuited from the start, the personalities and content creation savvy of the presidents are vital. Each week there are preview and review shows with Pique, Llanos and the other presidents. The more controversies, debates and bust-ups the better, with lots of arguments about VAR and refereeing decisions. There is a sense of WWE about some of the shenanigans — with Pique as a Catalan Vince McMahon — but the ex-footballer says that real competition is key to success.

“The presidents have a friendly relationship during the programme,” Pique says. “But then, when they have to compete against each other, it gets serious. There is a lot of tension. That’s good for the product. One of our objectives is to balance the show element with the competitive element. Without real competition, it would all fall.”

The show element has brought disdain from the traditional football world. Back in January, La Liga president Javier Tebas called the Kings League a “circus” and doubted whether it would last six months. On Friday, Pique reminded Tebas of his prediction online, and got a reply which he took to mean it was now taken more seriously.

No estoy en Madrid, pero espero que Spursito active la carta del penalti cohete🚀! https://t.co/cik6lf0Rwr

— Javier Tebas Medrano (@Tebasjavier) July 28, 2023

“We used (Tebas’ criticism) to promote ourselves, we like to be a circus,” Pique says. “Kun dressed up as a clown. We try to be creative.

“In the end, we believe that football is more and more about entertainment. And we want to go that way. We understand that La Liga and the Champions League have a lot of history, and many millions of euros involved. We’re not like that, not yet, we are just starting out. But Javier responding on Twitter shows the Kings League is on their radar.”

The final element for the Kings League product was the players — those who would actually take part in the games and score the goals.

An application procedure was set up on the Kings League website, drawing more than 11,000 applicants who submitted a CV and skills video. Some 180 of these were selected to go into a draft, which was streamed live, of course. Almost all of those drafted were semi-pro players from Catalan regional leagues, most from rungs four to six of the Spanish pyramid system.

A key part of bringing attention to the Kings League product was to also involve some better-known names — so each president received a budget to attract active pros or recently retired players as their 11th and 12th squad members.

One of these ‘extras’ was signed to play with the team all through the season — these have included Pique’s 2010 World Cup-winning teammate Joan Capdevila, former Athletic Bilbao winger Ibai Gomez and ex-Sevilla defender Nico Pareja.

The final player was someone who joined a team just for one game. There was an early downer when a much-hyped player in a mask turned out to be former Las Palmas reserve Nano Mesa. But bona fide superstars have since lent their skills (and fame) to Kings League teams. Ronaldinho, Javier Saviola, Javier ‘Chicharito’ Hernandez and Andrea Pirlo have all played a Kings League game alongside semi-pro teammates.

“The (stars) reach agreements with teams over payment, but their reasons are not really financial,” Querol says. “Chicharito came because Ibai convinced him, and Saviola was convinced by Kun. Others come in exchange for a place in an international league when we open in their country — Ronaldinho in Brazil, Pirlo in Italy (as we will see later, there are also plans to expand to England and Germany). They want to stay connected to football, and came to a project which half a million people watch every weekend.”

Gerard Pique greets Andrea Pirlo before a game between Pio FC and Jijantes FC (Photo: Jose Manuel Alvarez/Quality Sport Images/Getty Images)

The first half of the season ended with finals at the Camp Nou in March. The winners were El Barrio, whose president is Adri Contreras, once a runner on Spanish TV show El Chiringuito de Jugones, now a content creator with more than 4 million TikTok followers. The MVP of the first finals was El Barrio’s Martin Mantovani, a former Real Oviedo, Leganes and Las Palmas defender who scored twice in the decider.

After the first finals there was a break for something taken completely from traditional football: a transfer window full of online rumours, come-and-get-me pleas, and presidents publicly trying to steal stars from their competitors’ teams.

The second ‘split’ ran from early May until mid-July. Former AC Milan legend Andriy Shevchenko played a game for Ultimate Mostoles, donating the money raised to Ukrainian refugee children. Ex-Liverpool striker Djibril Cisse represented Los Troncos FC, getting visibly angry and remonstrating at his coach when he was substituted without scoring.

Aguero played for his own Kunisports side in June, arriving in Barcelona the day after attending his former club Manchester City’s Champions League final win over Inter Milan.

“I left the stadium in Istanbul at 2.30am for the airport,” says Aguero. “There was no time to celebrate, or have a drink. I arrived in Barcelona, had a little nap for two hours at the hotel and then I went to play. And I scored two goals!”

⚫ @aguerosergiokun, de @kunisport. pic.twitter.com/rmrF9Cnr2X

— Kings League InfoJobs (@KingsLeague) June 19, 2023

The participation of these former stars is vital for promotion and reaching audiences. Yet Pique is very keen to stress the Kings League is different from Legends competitions or exhibition games where nobody really cares who wins.

“You could see after the quarter-finals, the reactions of the presidents, of the players,” he says. “When they won they knew they were going to play at the Metropolitano. When they lost, many of them were crying, presidents too, as they knew they had lost an opportunity which could be unique in their lives. That dream of being able to play in front of more than 60,000 people. That makes the product much better.”

Another addition in the second half of the season has been the Queens League, with the same regulations and set-up. Some of the Kings presidents also have teams in the women’s league, while others have taken on partners — Casillas and Aguero share the role with Mayichi (Twitch followers: 1.8M) and Morena Beltran of ESPN Argentina (Instagram followers: 2m).

Queens League has an extra advantage in attracting players, given how poorly resourced traditional women’s football is in Spain. “We’ve had 300,000 people (online) watching a women’s game,” Querol says. “This means a level of exposure and pay that rivals professional football.”

xBuyer Team play El Barrio in the Kings League final at the Metropolitano (Photo: Manuel Queimadelos/Quality Sport Images/Getty Images)

The loudest complaints so far have been the regional Catalan mens’ clubs complaining about conflicts of interest. Most Kings League players continued to play for their 11-a-side teams, meaning scheduling problems were inevitable. It also caused a dilemma for the players involved — even the best players in Catalan semi-pro leagues earn less than €500 a month. The biggest flashpoint was when forward Cristian Ubon missed a key game for his fifth-tier Catalan club UE Sants in order to play for El Barrio at the Camp Nou.

Not that the Kings League was initially lucrative for most of those involved. Drafted Kings League players were initially paid just €74 per game. That quickly started to look very little as the competition’s massive viewer numbers attracted big brand sponsors including Infojobs, Oysho, Cupra, McDonald’s, Spotify, Adidas, Mahou, Xiaomi, Gatorade, Visa and Nescafe.

“The majority of our audience is very young, from under 18 years of age, up to 24 or 25,” Pique says. “That is one of the reasons we are so sexy on a commercial level, for brands.”

The Kings League have not released revenue figures, but Pique says they expect to turn a profit on the first season, even as they are still in a ‘start-up’ phase looking to grow users as quickly as possible.

Growth for the second year will include players’ salaries in Kings and Queens of €2,500 to €7,500, meaning an outlay of over €2m for the organisers. But players will also have to sign exclusive contracts so they must leave their Catalan league teams.

“When a Pirlo comes, a Ronaldinho, a Shevchenko, it means lots more people see the competition, the reach is bigger,” Pique says. “But it is important to raise the (general) level of the players. So we have raised the salaries for the draft in September. That will raise the level of the competition and make the product more attractive.”

Sunday’s spectacle at the Metropolitano was definitely very different from a typical La Liga match. There were lots of families and younger people in the stands, and plenty wearing replica jerseys of their favourite Kings and Queens League team. Fans enjoyed pre-game entertainment including French tightrope walker Nathan Paulin walking 40 metres above the pitch, and DjMaRiiO and Pique scoring penalties against Casillas to cheers and jeers from the stands.

Another big difference was the commentators from the online streams played over the Metropolitano speakers throughout. Everyone in the stadium could also hear the coach’s half-time team talks, and the referee explaining controversial decisions to the players. The noise level increased further when ‘secret weapon’ cards were played so the presidents took penalties — Contreras netted coolly, Mexican streamer Juan Garniza missed terribly, Llanos was very fortunate.

La celebración de Ibai Llanos Garatea 😳#KingsQueensFinals #InfoJobs pic.twitter.com/aTpZiepvli

— Kings League InfoJobs (@KingsLeague) July 29, 2023

Both Kings semi-finals were tight encounters decided by shoot-outs with takers running from halfway. The Queens semi-finals were generally more entertaining, both decided by last-gasp winners. The goal of the day was a screamer from Troncas midfielder Cristina Campos, with time almost up and a secret weapon card in play so that goals counted double.

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLLLLLLLAAAAAAAAAAZOOOOOOOOOOOOO con valor DOBLEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!@xBuyer_Team 3 🆚 5 @LosTroncosFC_
#QueensLeague #KingsQueensFinals pic.twitter.com/YW6UlbOmzo

— Universo Kings League (@UniversoKingsL) July 29, 2023

After the four semi-finals were played, Argentine rapper Nicki Nicole and Colombian singer Manuel Turizo both performed, amid a spectacular lights show for the 57,326 official attendance. Paulin got the Kings League final started by dropping the ball from the sky over the stadium.

French tightrope walker Nathan Paulin getting the Kings League final started at the Metropolitano pic.twitter.com/MMI9CRwiS4

— Dermot Corrigan (@dermotmcorrigan) July 29, 2023

The drama continued through a spectacularly entertaining 4-4 draw that swung back and forth, with both teams both scoring and missing penalties. The pressure then paid in the shoot-out as both sides had some dreadful misses, and the hero was X-Buyer Team’s teenage keeper Adria ‘Capi’ Gutierrez — the youngest player in the entire competition.

The key moment in the first-ever Queens League final came after the big dice decreed a one-v-one at the end of the first half, and PIO’s Julia Tomas scored from the centre circle. That meant joy for PIO president Rivers, a Mexican streamer with 4.9m followers on Twitch, and more disappointment for Llanos, who ended up being booed and whistled by the Metropolitano crowd.

De verdad que me expliquen qué es este golazo de Júlia Tomàs.#KingsQueensFinals #Oysho pic.twitter.com/2DZRMlwAib

— Queens League Oysho (@QueensLeague) July 29, 2023

Sunday also brought a big announcement for the future. Chicharito Hernandez will be one of the team presidents for the Kings League Americas, which Pique and Querol announced earlier this month. That will start in January 2024, with a base in Mexico City, and teams all through Latin America. Leagues in France and Italy are planned for 2024, and England and Germany for 2025.

“America is the project for 2024, and next will be another expansion, to other territories,” Pique says. “Our intention is to have eight or ten leagues, in different countries. And then the best in each country would play an international competition. We are able to create our own calendar, do it in a way which makes sense, over the long term.”

A Kings League with its own versions of the Champions League and World Cup, with millions watching its streams and the world’s biggest brands as sponsors, sounds like a serious challenger to the traditional football model.

Pique prefers not to see it like that. Traditional competitions, leagues and teams can learn from the Kings League, he says, but there should be room for two different but similar products.

“Traditional football could learn a lot from what we are doing, it needs to be modernised,” Pique says.

“The problem is that traditional football is set up in a way that is difficult to change anything. At FIFA, UEFA, the federations, the leagues, there are people of a certain age who do not like changes.

“Maybe we are the other extreme, where absolutely everything can be changed quickly. So we do not want to compare ourselves with traditional football. We believe we are a totally different product.

“It is compatible, we know there are many people who like La Liga or the Champions League, and also like the Kings League.”

(Top photo:Aldara Zarraoa/WireImage)

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