ABSTRACT
The question of whether sport marketing is unique and clearly distinct from mainstream marketing has been a long-lasting debate and will probably be an ongoing one for many years in the future. It is, however, likely that the reader of this book and this marketing section might be convinced that sport marketing represents a distinctive field of practice and research, and that textbooks such as those of Mullin, Hardy and Sutton (2000), Desbordes, Ohl and Tribou (2004) and Beech and Chadwick (2007), academic journals such as Sport Marketing Quarterly, International Journal of Sport Marketing and Sponsorship and International Journal of Sport Marketing and Management, as well as the tremendous number of sport marketing publications, represent enough justifications for such a distinction. This is also an opinion we share and for this reason we are glad to propose to the reader an up-to-date presentation of the level of knowledge of the field.
