Sports teams make a lot of money from the sale to fans/supporters of "merchandise", like jerseys and other items with their logo on it. If the team is not well known internationally, they have fewer people to sell to and will makes less money. In your phrase, "merchandise" means to sell this merchandise.

To merchandise something is to promote so that it can be recognized or become more popular. So in this case the merchandising of the team would refer to making that team more popular/noticeable on an internaitional level (world wide)