Blockchain Technology in the Sports Industry: A Bibliometric Review
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18083168Keywords:
Sports İndustry, Blockchain, Bibliometric, Analysis, NFT, CoinAbstract
The sports industry has become a field open to technology integration alongside digital transformation. Blockchain technology, with its features of decentralization, transparency, immutability, and security, holds the potential to offer solutions to some of the problems within the sports sector. This study aims to present a systematic review of the academic literature on blockchain applications in the sports industry between 2018 and 2025. A search conducted in the Web of Knowledge database using the keyword "blockchain and sports" yielded 100 academic works. Following the application of inclusion criteria (English articles published between 2018-2025 and index limitations), 76 articles were utilized in the study. Within the scope of the research, the trends in academic publications were visually mapped using keywords. According to the analysis results, the country receiving the most citations is China with 96 citations. The authors receiving the most citations were identified as Mansoor Ali, Ekrem Hossain, Georges Kaddoum, and Faisal Naeem (43 citations), followed by David Vidal-Tomas (28 citations). In the co-author analysis, Salil Bharany, Seada Hussen, Upinder Kaur, Visal Mehra, Ateeq Ur Rehman, Ravinder Singh Sawhney, and Prabhsimran Singh stood out with 6 connections each. In the keyword analysis, blockchain (19 occurrences), cryptocurrency (8 occurrences), blockchain technology (7 occurrences), sports (6 occurrences), smart contract (4 occurrences), and security (3 occurrences) were the most frequently used terms. In the co-citation analysis, the author receiving the most citations was identified as Ante, I. with 12 citations. In conclusion, this bibliometric analysis reveals that blockchain technology is an early-stage but rapidly developing research area in the sports industry, while highlighting the need for more interdisciplinary and application-focused studies on topics such as NFTs, fan tokens, smart contracts, and digital fan engagement. It is anticipated that this study will provide researchers with a comprehensive perspective and contribute to the field.References
Konak, F., & Özkahveci, E. (2023). A new ring in the blockchain: A reseach on awareness of non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Düzce University Journal of Social Sciences, 13(1), 97–115.CrossRef
Regner F,A. Schweizer, N. Urbach, (2019). NFTs in practice: non-fungible to kens as core component of a blockchain-based event ticketing application, in Proceedings of the 40th International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS), Munich, Germany.
Lindman, J., Tuunainen, V. K., & Rossi, M. (2017). Opportunities and risks of Blockchain Technologies in payments– a research agenda. Proceedings of the 50th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, 1533–1540. CrossRef
Mattila, J., & Seppälä, T. (2015). Blockchains as a path to a network of systems-an emerging new trend of the digital platforms in industry and society (No. 45). ETLA Report.
Rhue, L. (2018). Trust is all you need: an empirical exploration of initial coin offerings (ICOs) and ICO reputation scores. CrossRef
Kırmızıer, A., & Yıldırım, Y. (2024). Information technologies and technostress in sports management. Ö. Eken & S. Reyhan (Eds.), Innovative studies in sports sciences-4 (pp. 25–37).
Ryu, H.-S. (2018). Understanding benefit and risk framework of Fintech adoption: Comparison of early adopters and late adopters. Proceedings of the 51st Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, 3864–3873.
CrossRef
Zachariadis, M., & Ozcan, P. (2017). The API economy and digital transformation in financial services: The case of open banking. CrossRef
Türkeli, D. (2023). An investigation of the use of cryptocurrencies in Turkish football clubs [Unpublished master’s thesis]. Gazi University, Institute of Health Sciences, Department of Sports Management, Ankara.
Udokwu, C., Kormiltsyn, A., Thangalimodzi, K., & Norta, A. (2018). An Exploration of Blockchain enabled Smart-Contracts Application in the Enterprise. Technical Report, 1-28. CrossRef
Üsdiken, B., & Pasadeos, Y. (1992). Method in data-based articles on management published in Turkey. METU Studies in Development, 19(2), 249–266. CrossRef
Hood, W. W., & Wilson, C. S. (2001). The literature of bibliometrics, scientometrics, and informetrics. Scientometrics, 52(2), 291–314. CrossRef
Biresselioglu, M. E., Demir, M. H., Solak, B., & Turan, U. (2022). Understanding the dynamics and conceptualization of environmental citizenship and energy citizenship: Evidence from the existing literature. Frontiers in Energy Research, 10, 1018035. CrossRef
Lis, A., Sudolska, A., Pietryka, I., & Kozakiewicz, A. (2020). Cloud computing and energy efficiency: mapping the thematic structure of research. Energies, 13(16), 4117. CrossRef
Zhao, X., Ren, Y., & Cheah, K. S. (2023). Leading virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) in education: bibliometric and content analysis from the web of science (2018–2022). SAGE Open, 13(3), 21582440231190821. CrossRef
Melo, L. S. A., da Silva, J. E., dos Santos, R. R., & Ramalho, Â. M. C. (2021). A Tessitura Analítica Bibliométrica da Produção Internacional da COVID-19 no contexto das áreas de Ciências Sociais e Naturais. Research, Society and Development, 10(7), CrossRef
Olivera, M. M., da Silva Dantas, N., & de Araújo, S. M. S. (2020). Recuperação de áreas degradadas e mineração: análise da produção científica internacional na Web of Science (WoS). Revista Ibero-Americana de Ciências Ambientais, 11(7), 672-689. CrossRef
Kara, M., & Kara, N. Ş. (2024). Bibliometric Analysis of Studies on the Concept of Anxiety in Sport with VOSviewer. Journal of Sport for All and Recreation, 6(2), 180-192. CrossRef
Wang, Q., Su, M., Zhang, M., & Li, R. (2021). Integrating digital technologies and public health to fight Covid-19 pandemic: key technologies, applications, challenges and outlook of digital healthcare. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(11), 6053. CrossRef PubMed
Yuan, J. H., Li, Q. S., & Shen, Y. (2023). Visual analysis of image-guided radiation therapy based on bibliometrics: A review. Medicine, 102(8), e32989-e32989. CrossRef PubMed
Yadav, S., & Lenka, U. (2023). Uncovering the intellectual structure of diversity management research: a bibliometric analysis (1990–2019). Personnel Review, 52(3), 856-881. CrossRef
