A single SEC football fixture in America regularly pulls in around 77,000 spectators, a figure that dwarfs the average Premier League attendance of roughly 44,000. That gap says less about the quality of the football on show and more about how differently the two countries have chosen to build sporting culture around education. The American college system has turned university sport into a spectacle, complete with national broadcast deals, six-figure crowds, and athletes who become household names before they’ve finished their degree. The UK hasn’t tried to replicate that, but they could take notes on some ideas worth borrowing.
The scale of the two systems
Start with the numbers. The NCAA, America’s governing body for college sport, covers roughly 360 institutions competing at the top tier. BUCS, its UK equivalent, has a comparable membership on paper, yet the money behind each system works differently. Oxford and Cambridge, two of the wealthiest universities in the world, still don’t offer sports scholarships. Loughborough and Bath come closest to the American model, with Loughborough offering course fee contributions, living expenses support, and free campus parking. But this is a rare exception rather than the norm.
What scholarships could do for UK athletes
The scholarship model is where the UK stands to learn the most, even at a modest scale. In America, athletic ability can open a door to an education that would otherwise be financially out of reach, with awards sometimes covering the full cost of tuition and accommodation. UK universities don’t need NFL-sized budgets to adopt a version of this. Smaller bursaries, kit sponsorship, or partial fee waivers tied to sporting commitment would still send a clear signal that athletic contribution has value beyond the pitch. Right now, most UK student athletes juggle serious training schedules with the same fees and financial pressure as everyone else, and get little recognition for it.
Building local identity around university teams
There’s also a lesson in how Americans treat college teams as a local identity rather than a niche interest. With only 30 or so franchises in most major US professional leagues, college sport fills a gap, giving fans in smaller towns and cities a team to rally behind that represents their community. That’s not so different from how people in Britain support a local non-league football club alongside their Premier League side. UK universities have never really leaned into that dynamic. Match days at even the biggest sporting universities draw crowds in the dozens rather than thousands. Building that kind of local following doesn’t require a stadium overhaul. It requires consistent branding, community outreach, and treating student athletes as figures worth promoting rather than an afterthought buried on a club noticeboard.
Where the American model falls short
None of this means the UK should chase the American model in its entirety, and the cracks in the system are worth noting. Despite billions in revenue, most Division I athletic departments run at a loss once coaching salaries and facilities are accounted for, and only a small share of the money actually reaches the athletes themselves. There’s also a structural mismatch: Britain’s football pyramid means the most talented young players skip university sport entirely and go straight into professional academics from as young as eight or nine. That pathway doesn’t exist in the same way across the Atlantic, where college is often the only realistic route into the NFL or NBA. Trying to force American-style commercialisation onto a system built around a different talent pipeline would create problems rather than solve them.
A more realistic path forward
UK universities need to build stronger support around student sport through better funding, clearer local identity, and closer partnerships with brands that want to invest in community sport. That doesn’t mean chasing the scale of the SEC or building university sport around packed stadiums. It means recognising student athletes as people worth backing, and creating stronger links between universities, local communities, and the organisations that can help provide practical support.
That is where Gift of Kit already sits in the wider grassroots landscape, helping support reach the teams that need it while giving brands a more meaningful role than simply being seen. If UK university sport is going to grow, it will be through that kind of practical investment: not copying America’s system outright, but learning from the way it makes sport feel valued.