Futcrunch: from barman to TikTok star and world leading FIFA and football content creator

Santiago Vazquez, better known as Futcrunch, is one of the most popular FIFA and football creators in the world, with over 1.1 million TikTok followers and an average of 1 million views per YouTube video.

But it all could have been very different for the 24-year-old if he hadn’t made a key wrong decision.

Originally from Venezuela, Santiago moved to Liverpool six years ago, hoping to learn English and go to university. He had no intention of becoming a social media star, he was in the city to get a degree in a very different profession.

“I went to college for a year and studied mechanical engineering,” he told LiverpoolWorld. “Then I went to uni and in my first lecture I realised I completely hated mechanical engingeering.”

That was a turning point.

Santiago was also working as a barman but believed in the long run, this kind of work wouldn’t fulfill him, and others around him looked unhappy.

“One day after work I literally searched, ‘how to make money at home’ and paid for a course about how to grow Instagram following,” Santiago recalls.

“I didn’t really learn anything from the course but I’d spent so much money I knew I had to put it to use.

“I was trying to set up a profile and couldn’t think of a niche and I was like ‘hey, I spend my free time playing FIFA maybe that should be my niche’.”

Futcrunch is born

Santiago’s love for FIFA began at a young age, but he wasn’t always able to play all the latest games. He said: “My parents didn’t have the money to buy me FIFA every year, so I’d be playing the version from five years earlier.

“I fell in love with FIFA because I used to play with my brother. We didn’t have good internet so I’d spend hours and hours updating every player manually, I remember how fun that was.”

Using his FIFA instagram, he started his online career being paid for Instagram story advertisements. Receiving around £50 per ad, he saved any money he earned and continued to live off his bar wages and tips.

After a year, he had a large following of 100,000 people and felt a ‘dopamine hit’ every time a post did well.

Embracing TikTok

Mainly posting graphics on his Instagram, he decided to change his tactics as TikTok began to take off.

“Musically I had just turned into Tik Tok and I was already creating graphics so I thought I may as well record them on my phone.

“I was making little graphics, on an old computer my grandpa bought me and editing would take hours, it was crazy slow. I decided to record my computer screen and I’d add a Drake song and my third ever post got 100,000 views.

“I had been working on Instagram for a year and wasn’t seeing views like that - it was crazy.”

Santiago continued uploading to TikTok and was one of the first FIFA creators on there.

“Another year went by and I still wasn’t making enough money to leave my job but I was able to do less and less days,” he said.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Santiago began getting more and more requests to start doing live streams of him playing FIFA.

With the money he saved from his Instagram stories, he bought a computer and streaming equipment and within two months, he quit his job.

Changing focus

Futcrunch’s name began to become widely known and he was posting on TikTok and Instagram six times a day, creating streams and working 12 hours a day.

He switched his focus to YouTube, to have a better work-life balance.

He said: “Streaming is a lot of pressure, you’re constantly switched on and constantly live.

“YouTube is a lot more work but far more control. Once a video is posted, it’s there forever and can continue to grow.”

The Real Madrid and Liverpool FC fan has 667,000 subscribers on YouTube and an average of 1,000,000 people view each video, making him the biggest FIFA creator in the world, when comparing views rather than subscribers.

A highly motivated individual, he regularly sets himself goals and after becoming the biggest football gaming creator, he now hopes to become the biggest football creator.

He explained: “I already do game commentary and I went to the Champions League Final and the Women’s World Cup Final and created content.

“A lot of people like to label women’s football as less than men’s but the atmosphere was just as good, if not better, than any other final I’ve seen.

“I also recorded a video with a women’s team the other day that I’ll be sharing soon and I want to share more content like that.”

Future goals and tips for success

Santiago wants to share the joy of football with the world, and how football brings different cultures and countries together.

He said: “I want to show the world how good football really is.

“I want to show how it’s played around the world and introduce the game to as many people as I can so they see the good it brings in people.

“I want people to see all the amazing and creative content you can create with football.”

The 24-year-old also added: “I think a lot of the people reading this will want to be content creators and all I can say is start now. Don’t question it, just put your foot on the gas. Do that thing you’ve been wanting to do.

“You don’t need to buying fancy courses like I did but all you need to do is open that channel you want to, put in the work. Start today.”