Reporters now free to use Twitter and live blog from matches after Premier League and Football League sign rights deal

Npower is activating its sponsorship of the English Football League this year with a Foursquare-esque social media game for fans to “show their loyalty” to their clubs.

Football clubs social media ranking in August 2011, showing the number of Twitter “followers” and Facebook “likes” (official club accounts). The chart presented below show the number of Twitter “followers” and Facebook “likes” for each football club.

The teams are ranked by their combined number of fans across the two sites. We only tracked the sites / account identified as “official”.

In July, Real Madrid has overtaken FC Barcelona as No.1 in our Social Media ranking.

Liverpool Football Club (FC) has launched a new social media campaign on Weibo, coinciding with its Asian tour, which started on 13 July in Guangdong

Twitter just Tweeted that the Women’s World Cup final scored a new record with 7,196 Tweets per second. Even U.S. President Barack Obama joined in Tweeting about the game.

Rangers football club has launched an official Facebook page and a Rangers Business Club LinkedIn page.

Owen Hargreaves turns to YouTube to save his career. He has posted several video clips on YouTube as he bids to find a new club.

Football Marketing World Clubs social media ranking in July 2011, showing the number of Twitter “followers” and Facebook “likes” (official club accounts). The chart presented below show the number of Twitter “followers” and Facebook “likes” for each football club.

The teams are ranked by their combined number of fans across the two sites. We only tracked the sites / account identified as “official”.

Manchester United Football Club has no plans to put any advertising on its Facebook page in the near future.

FC Barcelona and Lionel Messi were the names on everyone’s fingertips on Saturday night as the UEFA Champions League final took over popular social media platforms Facebook and Twitter.