RFU Consideration of Asia Move Sparks Debate on Russian Football Audience

The conversation around the Russian Football Union’s (RFU) potential shift from UEFA to the Asian Football Confederation has surfaced in recent media discussions, with Zarema Salikhova, the wife of former Spartak Moscow owner Leonid Fedun, weighing in on what such a move could mean for Russian football and its audience. Salikhova stressed that even brief visual exposure to leagues in China or India can be challenging to process. She described a personal effort to brace herself and focus on this prospect, suggesting that a transition to Asia could dampen public interest in the sport within Russia. Her perspective implies that audiences might shrink for both men’s and women’s football, as viewing habits would pivot toward a different regional landscape and away from the established Russian league ecosystem. In her view, a shift to Asia would likely limit the number of people watching women’s football to a narrow circle of players’ families and their close friends, rather than a broad, nationwide fan base.