| Abstract: |
Many Thai association football clubs in Thai Premier League have become sports
tourism attractions to captivate sports tourists’ attention to visit.
However, some football clubs have still not reached an achievement. Thus, this
study aims to investigate the goals and the elements of sports event tourism
management of the football clubs in Thai Premier League so as to enhance the
effectiveness of sports event tourism management which could lead to an
economic drive, revenue distribution to local communities, and eventually the
creative economic development as stated in the National Tourism Development
Plan 2012-2016 of Ministry of Tourism and Sports. The methodology used in this
study was a qualitative case study with the association football clubs
competing in Thai Premier League and the unit of analysis was sports event
tourism management. The results revealed that the goals of organizing sports
events should be to create physical motives, interpersonal motives, and
cultural motives. Such sports events were arranged by considering
nonresidential tourists’ curiosity to experience new environment and factors
affecting tourist decision making. The elements of sports event management
were administration, design, marketing, operation, and risks. The operational
methods were carried out under the conceptual frameworks of sports management,
tourism management, and event management with the aim to achieve the goals of
sports event tourism management. |