From a modern stadium to a post-modern arena: Racing 92

How Racing 92's relocation to the Paris La Défense Arena has affected their spectators' perception of value and attachment. To say that rugby football union (RFU), as a sport, has changed considerably over the last 150 years would be an understatement. From its 19th century origins – located somewhere between "the fictional exploits of William Web Ellis" in 1823 (Collins, 2009, p.3) and the game's formal codification in 1871 (Collins, 2009; Dietschy, 2014) – to the 2019 World Cup in Japan, RFU has truly become a global sport. In France, professional clubs are no longer confined to South Western market towns and now rely upon the social, economic and political fabric of major cities to thrive. One club that perfectly sums up the changes that have affected RFU in general and clubs in particular since its arrival in France in the late 19th century is Racing 92. Formed in 1882 as a multi-sport athletic club in the most Corinthian way by "pupils of prestigious fee-paying lycées"(Richards, 2006, p.55)3, the club has experienced a number of changes – some incremental, others radical – throughout its 135-plus-year history. Although Racing 92's relocation is not an isolated example of stadium refurbishment or stadium relocation in French RFU, it is, perhaps, the most striking. In fact, from the outside, French clubs' senior executives seem to assume that, if they improve the perceived quality of the stadium, then, the number of spectators will increase, and, consequently, so will loyalty, income and ultimately profit margins. However, "year-on-year gate receipts have decreased by over 6% between 2015/2016 and 2016/2016, underlining rather bad fortunes with regards to how investments were dispatched" (Boissel et al., 2018, p.108). Literature on the antecedents of stadium value remains scarce and this paper tries to fill a number of academic gaps in terms of the roles of stadium value and stadium attachment. In conjunction with Racing 92's marketing and ticketing departments, a questionnaire was sent to their database twice: once before the move, and again after the club had relocated to Paris La Défense. 1,429 and 1,015 spectators replied respectively. This enabled the author to form a panel of 328 spectators having experienced a matchday at both Stade Yves du Manoir de Colombes and Paris La Défense Arena. Results are analysed through structural equation modelling (AMOS 24).