Premier League side Southampton, in collaboration with its official partner TLCBet, created 18 videos titled "Journey to The West" to woo Chinese fans, according to Taruka Srivastav of THE DRUM. The club used two "Chinese influencers" who traveled from Beijing to Southampton alongside the club's filming crew and staff members and created branded content for TLCBet "after interacting with local fans they met on the way." The crew was on the road for 14 days, beginning from the Trans-Siberian Railway, which took six days in total. They then traveled across Russia, Germany, Holland, France, and England, "culminating in Southampton’s home stadium," St. Mary’s, for a home match against Newcastle United. Chinese agency Mailman worked with Southampton and TLCBet throughout the trip. The videos have garnered more than 68 million impressions and 4 million video views across Chinese social media platform Weibo, WeChat and football app Dongqiudi (DQD). Southampton Commercial Dir David Thomas said, "We worked very hard to ensure that we created engaging and interesting content that would resonate well within the Chinese audience" (THE DRUM, 12/11).
