The long history of football club's magazines

Club communication follows the habits of the club and the fans. After first opening up to Facebook, Twitter and then Instagram, for the past few seasons clubs have opened up to TikTok with profiles that tell matches and players following the trends of the moment. An inexorable transformation that has affected all media, moved in many cases from physical to digital, and that obviously could not fail to involve football as well. There was a time when the only form of communication for clubs was printed paper, with newspapers distributed at the stadium during matches and in-depth magazines sold at newsstands. Many Italian and international clubs have a long tradition behind them, with in-house editorial offices still existing and in other cases recently closed. 

While stadium newspapers are still part of the fan experience today, with a few pages reporting the official line-ups and a few pre-match statements, magazines began to appear in the first half of the 20th century, printed by the clubs and in many cases discontinued just recently, in correspondence with the crisis in paper publishing and the emergence of new media. Juventus launched the monthly 'Hurrà Juventus' as early as 1915; it consisted of only six pages in black and white and without pictures. Now the magazine's circulation has decreased to become a yearbook, but it remains the oldest periodical in Italy dedicated to a sports club. 

Instead, from 1963 to 2018, 'Forza Milan!' was printed, which, like 'Inter Football Club', provided Milan fans with in-depth reports, statistics and exclusive interviews, as well as news on the youth sector, game sections and a readers' mail, which they could send their own letters. Some magazines, however, continue to come out regularly, among them 'Lazio Style 1900', which still reports monthly on the biancocelesti's matches, but also 'L'Udinese' and '1928', since 2014 the official magazine of Frosinone, born in the year of the historic first promotion to Serie A.

European clubs have also printed printed magazines over the years, Liverpool fans for example can still buy 'LFC', in Manchester it is possible to read 'City' and 'Inside United' while in Spain there is no shortage of publications from Real and Barcelona, with 'Hala Madrid' and 'Barça' joining 'Fundaciò', the magazine about the social activities of the Blaugrana. Although in a complicated moment for paper publishing, magazines can still be a chance for clubs to tell untold stories, make fans even more involved by creating valuable and collectible products, to be kept like old jerseys, scarves and pennants.