The crisis has awakened our thoughts in some areas, primarily in the understanding of values and expectations in the sports business. A first core point of the discussion, which has been carried through the crisis so far, is the development of transfer fees, players' salaries and commissions of players' agents, which is considered to be rampant. This part of the system must therefore be questioned first, as it endangers even the most solidly established and managed clubs. It has been recognized that these sums are no longer up to the task and that the relations between the hard-earned income side and the expenditure side are therefore no longer correct. Developments in changing cost structures of the clubs are accordingly inevitable, also to compensate for discrepancies in the earnings structures. However, the depth of the changes will depend to a large extent on the extent to which other countries in the undoubtedly internationally networked soccer business are also prepared to undertake binding restructuring measures or fall back into old channels and abandon reasonable, economic behavior. The second key point of the crisis was the recognition of the actually obvious: the strong dependence on fans or spectators, on experience consumption as well as sponsors. The recognition and fulfillment of the needs of fans and sponsors will therefore become more important and further developments for higher involvement, more service and quality as well as greater proximity between the parties involved will be driven forward in order to regain trust in the sports and soccer business. I would also like to give a generic answer to the initial question and give an example to look at the economic changes and developments across all stakeholders of the sports business: increasingly, the areas of planning and service portfolio will change and develop accordingly.

In planning, there will be an increased focus on using approaches and instruments that offer more flexibility on the one hand and greater security on the other. Psychologically, this means a risk-averse attitude towards investments that are not at least partially crisis-proof. In terms of content, this means, for example, for the market participants "clubs" increased investment in infrastructure and digitalization, which will enable revenues regardless of the biggest risk factors in the sports business. The situation is similar in the area of the service portfolio of the respective stakeholders, which is closely linked to planning: Here there will be changes in expansion, elimination, transformation and pricing. Of course, digitization plays an essential role in all four aspects: especially the near future, which is currently not clearly visible with regard to the pandemic and the issue of contactless, will give digitization a necessary boost in every respect.

Take the matchday experience, for example, as a common point of intersection for all stakeholders: using the permanent target group data of fans and sympathizers of professional sports from our management information system, I have been working for years on optimizing services offered by clubs and their service providers. Here it is important to maintain the balance between closeness to the sport and the fan as well as the digitalization of customer contact points and experiences. This fine line has become more important than ever before in recent days, so that despite all the further development, essential success factors of the sports business are not lost sight of.

The matchday experience alone brings with it essential further developments in the areas of sports facility construction, visitors' tourney and digital infrastructure management. Views and expectations regarding the topic of hygiene will change in a sustainable way, so that all existing and especially planned sports facilities and their managers will have to think about long-term measures. Smart thinking and planning ahead can be the key to being excluded from a lockdown in the next similar exceptional situation.

And those who understand digital infrastructure management to mean only content and entertainment will oversleep essential further developments and optimization potential in areas such as security, catering and hygiene.

Here one must first of all consider what sustainability means in this context and must therefore differentiate between further developments that are driven forward depending on and independent of the length of time the virus remains. This means: Are we talking about developments that arise and are driven by the current market environment in order to be able to bridge the state of emergency sustainably in the short and medium term? Here, the keyword for sustainability is "flexibility", since the regulations governing the state of emergency, the duration of which nobody can predict just now, change in some cases daily to weekly. Developments are therefore sustainable if they are not only able to cope with a partial period of the crisis, but are better positioned for the entire period.

Or are we talking about developments that were triggered by this state of emergency, but are not only directly intended to survive the crisis, but are also concerned with more far-reaching considerations that this will also have an impact on the time after the crisis. Here, the keyword for sustainability is "transformation", business models can or must change in part or even completely.