It's a newspaper convention that the front and back pages are a world apart, as if news and sport inhabit two different spheres with little to say to each other. Indeed, it used to be an article of faith that "sport and politics don't mix", with the former no more than a form of escapism from the latter. And yet the Occupy Wall Street and London Stock Exchange protests that led the weekend news bulletins might not be entirely unrelated to the Premier League results that closed them. For the current state of our football sheds a rather revealing light on the current state of both our politics and our economy. Or, as one sage of the sport puts it: "As ever, the national game reflects the nation's times." What that reflection says is that Britain, or England, has become the home of a turbo-capitalism that leaves even the land of the let-it-rip free market â the United States â for dust. If capitalism is often described metaphorically as a race in which the richest always win, football has turned that metaphor into an all too literal reality. Let's take as our text a series of reports written by the sage just quoted, namely the Guardian's David Conn, who has carved a unique niche investigating the politics and commercialisation of football. Conn elicited a candid admission from the new American owners of Liverpool Football Club, who confessed that part of the lure of buying a stake in what they called the "EPL" â the English Premier League â was that they get to keep all the money they make, rather than having to share it as they would have to under the â their phrase â "very socialistic" rules that operate in US sport. In other words, England has become a magnet for those drawn to behave in a way they couldn't get away with at home. Start with first principles. Of course, inequality is built into sport: some people are simply stronger or faster than others. What makes sport compelling is watching closely matched individuals or teams compete to come out on top. But a different kind of inequality matters too: money. A rich club can buy up all the best players and win every time. That's the story of today's Premier League, as super-flush Manchester United sweep all before them, challenged only by local rivals Manchester City â now endowed by an oil billionaire â and Chelsea, funded to the hilt by a Russian oligarch. This, then, becomes a different kind of competition, a battle not of skill, pace and temperament but of pounds, shillings and pence. The clearest manifestation of that came at the close of the transfer window, when the biggest teams splashed out millions to buy the top talent. It means the half-dozen top sides, already at a different level from the rest, soared even higher towards the stratosphere and out of reach â in just the same way that the super-rich float ever further away from everyone else, the 1% in a different league from the 99%, as the Occupy protesters would put it. Nothing you can do about that, says dogmatic capitalism. You can no more stop the richest teams dominating football than you can prevent the fastest sprinter winning gold. That's the force of the market, all but a law of nature. Except along comes American sport to show us another way. First, there are those rules on revenue-sharing that so frustrated Liverpool's new owners. All the money that, say, a baseball team makes â from tickets, TV rights and merchandise â is taxed by the major league that runs the sport and spread around the other clubs, so that the richest cannot dwarf the rest. That isn't because the titans of Major League Baseball have read too much Marx. It's because they understand that their sport is worth nothing if it stops being a real competition, if only a handful of the wealthiest teams ever have a chance of winning. Redistributing the wealth around the league ensures their sport doesn't become boring. It does not level the playing field, but it comes very close. The proof is in the stats so beloved of sporting obsessives. Over the past 19 seasons, 12 different teams have won baseball's biggest prize. In the 19 seasons since the Premier League was created, only four teams have won; Manchester United alone have won the title 12 of those 19 times. It's not just revenue-sharing that ensures true competition. In American football and basketball a salary cap applies, limiting how much each club can pay in wages and thereby preventing the richest teams making their domination permanent by snapping up all the best players. (A "luxury tax" performs a similar function in baseball.) In the same spirit, teams in all major US sports submit to a "draft", in which they take turns picking from a pool of newly eligible players, so that the equivalent of Chelsea or Manchester City can't gobble up all the fresh talent, but instead have to let the Blackburns or Wigans have a go. Put like that, it seems fantastical. Who can imagine Old Trafford voluntarily snaffling less of the pie, so that clubs in smaller cities with smaller grounds, and therefore weaker gate receipts, get a look in? And yet English football used to work just like that. When the founders of the Football League gathered in a Manchester hotel in 1888, they fretted over how they might ensure that a fixture between, say, Derby County and Everton remained a real contest. They agreed the home side should give a proportion of its takings to the visitors, a system that held firm till 1983. Clubs shared the TV money when it came too, spreading it around all 92 league clubs. But the big teams always resented subsidising the minnows; indeed, the Premier League was formed out of the biggest 20 clubs' express desire to keep Rupert Murdoch's millions for themselves. That TV money is at least partly spread throughout the Premier League, but now there are noises about ending even that small nod towards wealth-sharing, so that the biggest half-dozen teams can keep every penny for themselves. Not for the first time, it's fallen to Europe to act. Upcoming Uefa "financial fair play" rules will require teams to live within their earnings, which should put an end to the sugar daddy handouts of Man City and Chelsea. But that 2014 change will push clubs to maximise their revenue, which is bound, in turn, to mean even less sharing. Football will still be a game determined by who has most money. There are three consequences of this strange gulf between our rules and those across the Atlantic. First, football's most storied clubs have become attractive to foreign tycoons who sniff a licence to print money, unrestricted. Second, we've established a model that is inherently unsustainable, involving colossal debts that cripple all those without a billionaire to bail them out. Since 1992, league clubs and one Premier League team â Portsmouth â have fallen insolvent 55 times. Third, we risk killing the golden goose, turning an activity that should be thrilling into a non-contest whose outcome is all but preordained. Hmm, a system that sees our biggest names falling to leveraged takeovers â think Kraft's buy-up of Cadbury â thereby selling off the crown jewels of our collective culture in the name of a rampant capitalism that is both unsustainable and ultimately joyless. That doesn't just sound like the state of the national game, that sounds like the state of the nation.
First of all, congratulations on one of the best articles I've ever read on this site...This is a subject that I have been harping on to my mates about for a while, and for me is the only way to make the Premiership truly competitive. If that means the end of mega-bucks rich players and clubs, then that would be a further bonus...
Well owned up! Very, very good article though, well worth reading. Maybe we need a football supporters 'Occupy' campaign? I have always thought it odd that the USA, that worships capitalism and calls public health insurance communist, ensures its sports are run on socialist principles. And whenever I have discussed this with my American friends they really didn't understand the irony!
Thanks for the article, mate. To my mind, Conn argues against himself here. If the EPL system is what attracts mega-rich owners in the first place, and we change it, then surely the those owners wouldn't buy into it. And without the world famous players that they buy, we have little chance of keeping our global t.v. market. And that would hurt the Wigans even more than it would hurt the big clubs because they have less income from alternative sources. The irony is, Wigan need Man. C. to buy up great players. It makes it impossible for them to compete - but where would Wigan be without global t.v. money? Not an easy question.
I dont really agree with the American side of that at all. in 108 years the NYY have won the World Series 27 times and got to it 40 times, the next best is ST Louis Cardinals with 10 wins (and they are there again this year, and it starts tonight btw). NYY pay $200 million salaries to their players a year. The Leagues are made up of 4-6 teams with 6 leagues (AL East Central West NL East Central West), the NYY invariably either win theirs, or get a wild card spot (best runner up over the other 3 leagues in their division) Yes they can only have so many players, but they invariably get the cream of the crop. NFL the average career for an NFL player (not star) is 3 years, its not like football where if they dont cut it, they can drop down a division or 2 and resurrect their career, if no one wants them from the big league, thats it, gone and forgotton. The Detroit lions finished the 2008-09 season with a 0-16 record, back then i said, watch them win the superbowl within 5 years, this year they are 5-1 and playing great stuff, because they were allowed to get the best players in the draft. but again the NFL is made up of lots of leagues with very few in it, then like baseball it goes to a knock out stage, its more like the CL than the PL. If the NFL and MLB were just 1 league, and winner took all, you would have the same teams at the top every year NYY and New England Patriots, but as its lots of different leagues, with not many teams, then a knock out stage at the end, it does get mixed up a bit.
The fundamental difference is that American pro sport has no positive (Champions League) or negative (relegation) relationships that exert the kind of financial pressure that makes EPL clubs act in such a selfish manner. Remove the Champions League and relegation and maybe, just maybe you might see a similar attitude emerge in this country. But at what cost. Its a conundrum right enough, because the greed displayed by Liverpool last week may well be the death of the game as people of my age know it as well. Personally I think scrapping the Champions League would help a great deal, but the reality is that is as likely as un-inventing the wheel.
As Sunderland are not likely to win the league anytime in the foreseeable future, I would love nothing else but to see a levelling of the proverbial playing field, it is alas unlikely unless something is done by the EPL or the government. It is something of a conundrum as with drugs, half the problem with drugs is caused by the criminals, but if drugs were legalised more folk might take them. I guess come clubs will always be richer and fins away round rules.
Hypothetical situation here, but lets say our way was like the NFL way, with 32 teams (you dont play everyone either), all divisions are equal (not like Pl Championship etc etc), and the winners go through with 4 best runners up, 2 from each conferance. It is harder to do as you have lots in London for example, but there is only about 400 miles max seperating teams, so traveling isnt a problem. Conferance 1 Division A Man United Fulham West Ham Birmigham Division B Arsenal Wigan Leeds Notts Forrest Division C Sunderland Southampton Charlton Blackburn Division D Tottenham Everton Swansea Norwich Conferance 2 Division A Man City Middlesborough QPR WBA Division B Liverpool Newcastle Wolves Crystal Palace Division C Chelsea Aston Villa Leicester Norwich Division D Bolton Ipswich Stoke Derby phew that took some working out and its probably still wrong. But i did try to spread it out as best i could. then it goes into a cup competition from then on, quarter finals, semi finals, final (superbowl), so we could win the league (anyone could really, you do play each other in your league, you even play some in the other conferance, but its not many games) The problem is, the leagues stay like that forever, no promotion demotion, you play virtually the same teams year in year out, there may be 1 or 2 differences each season, but like i said its not many, and if there is a crap league, who keep getting beat by the other leages like last year where the 49`rs league didnt have anyone with a winning record, but the winner still got through, even though teams with a winning record in the other legues, didnt, so it can be unfair as well. But if it was like that, We may have a chance of winning the league, or Newcastle, or Norwich even, the way it is now, 1 league over 38 games, its very hard if not impossible to win the thing (but ours does have advantages over the NFL as well, relegation for 1) I could go on and on but will stop there.
Wow! Hurts my brain that but can see how it might work. I am sure Sheffield, Cardiff and South West England would want teams in there though and that is the problem. How do you pick the teams to go into this new league and do you really want to 'lock out' all others forever? But just because it is tricky does not mean it shouldn't be looked at.
Well we could have 12 leagues with 8 teams, or 8 leagues with 12 teams, and that would encompass 96 teams. but it will never happen anyway, but that way the league 1 and 2 teams will get better as they will play the likes of Man U or Chelsea every season, yes 1st few seasons they will probably get hammered, but eventually they will catch up, or just get better players to be able to compete anyway. It does have its advantages, and you could even have relegation, 8 leagues with 12 teams, 2 conferances, worst 2 teams in each conferance get relegated, best 4 teams from non league, get promoted.
If we went the whole hog, and done it like the Americans, we could have, say, 4 regional groups of 10 teams, playing each other team twice at home and away which would equal 36 games in the regular season. The 4 league winners would be joined by the 4 other teams with the best records, for a play-off series, with the team with the best record over the regular season, playing the 8th best, 2nd v 7th, 3rd v 6th, and 4th v 5th in the quarter finals. These games would be massive, and could all be played at Wembley NE and Yorkshire..... Sunderland Leeds United Huddersfield Boro No-class-el Sheff U Hull City Barnsley Sheff Wed Bradford City NW.... Man Utd Blackburn Preston Everton Blackpool Bolton Man City Liverpool Wigan Burnley Midlands... Villa Forest Birmingham West Brom Notts County Wolves Stoke City Derby Leicester Coventry London and South... Chelsea Ipswich Arsenal West Ham Spurs Fulham QPR Norwich Swansea Southampton
Should we make a take over bid for the FA? Blackcatsteve for Chairman and davrosFTM for General Secretary. I will be Vice-chair. Anyone else want a place on the board?
I think some of the suggestions that have appeared hear are absolutely brilliant. The suggestions should be forwarded to the FA and the Yank at Liverpool. It gets me when tabloids label football fans as moronic, and in the week when the truth might be revealed about Hillsborough it does beg the question why does anyone particularly football fans buy the SUN. OK I'm a hypocrite as I am about to watch Sky football champions league.
