With the announcement that Sky are going to pump another £3bn into the Premier League, there has been a call from Richard Scudamore along with (some) club chairmen to impose some kind of financial restrictions to limit another rocket in wages and / or to impose a similar model to UEFAs ffp where clubs can only spend what they generate. Can't come soon enough in my opinion http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2012/sep/06/premier-league-salary-cap
How likely is this? Not everyone welcomes change and then you have the obvious clubs that will reject this proposal.
The only clubs who I can see having an out and out opposition to it are City, Chelsea and possibly QPR though . .
Turkeys will never vote for Christmas.End of story.As Arsenal fans we are waiting for something that is never going to happen whether it's FFP in the PL or UCL
The problem is that the players are getting all the money that is being generated, not the clubs. The net effect of Nasri and RvPs money-grabbing moves, is that fans pay more to watch games and more clubs go out of business. I still think that buying all these players and paying them stupid wages does not guarantee success for a club, and there have always been rich clubs and poor clubs, but at least before the tycoon owners the fans knew that their support meant something. Manchester United were the most supported club so they were the richest. Now, it could happen that Boddington Green gets into the PL and wins trophies playing in stadiums filled with only away fans. More likely, Brighton and Crewe could become Champions of Europe playing in stadiums that only sit 25,000. This would cause football to become more unpopular, particularly if a team like Manchester United or Liverpool actually did go bust like Rangers did trying to compete. A lot of the fans that would be lost, would never be recovered. I think that the FA needs to act. It isn't so much that such scenarios are 100% going to happen, it is more a case that if they did actually happen, then the results would be very serious. In any business, no one thinks that decline is possible until it actually happens.
I read another article where they thought that a weak version was more or less a certainty. I don't think you are going to see anything close to a "Must break even" type rule, but I can see a weak version that limits wage bills to 100% of game revenue, or something like that. In other words (revenue - (sponsorship + capital investment)). Something that preserves the integrity of the competition. Right now, it is theoretically possible for a team to simply buy every player that another team targets, so that they cannot buy ANY players whatsoever. Having that kind of theoretical way of destroying the league is not good, even if it would never really happen.
14 clubs will support it. Aslong as the real big clubs support it, the rest will follow. If not then all that needs to happen is United, Liverpool or Arsenal just say......."so, individual TV deals eh?"
I think individual TV deals would set a dangerous precedent for the EPL. Naturally clubs like Utd, Arsenal and Liverpool would get the biggest share of the pot and the smaller clubs would miss out on the majority of the money that Sky dish out. The argument would be that more people want to watch the big clubs, but personally I think relegation clashes between the smaller clubs are just as entertaining. We've already got a two tier league, with a massive divide between the revenue of the top clubs and the smaller clubs. I think anything that would exacerbate that would be bad for the competition in the league.
Exactly. They can use the threat of doing it. After all if clubs who are bankrolled are allowed to do as they please then United, Liverpool and Arsenal are going to do what they can to compete and TV deals would be the only realistic option.
Well the clubs are paying the massive wages, so they do have a part to play in it. Unfortunately clubs like City, Chelsea and Utd have opened Pandora's box with regard to wages, so you now have players who know that they can demand £200k per week and that puts everyone else at a disadvantage. One of the proposals on the table, and importantly, it was raised by the premier league clubs - was the option to introduce a wage cap.
I'm not sure the threat would work though, if Sky think they can still make a profit from selling the big games, then I don't think they'll really give a **** if the smaller clubs miss out.
I agree, that is why I was suggesting that wages might be tied to playing revenue. It wouldn't curb transfer fees, or other investment, but it would cap salaries to a club's ability to earn money actually playing football. So it would only include income from Gate receipts, TV income and income from leagues. At present Manchester City would probably be the only team that might have a problem.
Bear in mind that it's not just the eye-catching transfer splashers like Man City, Man U and QPR who will be against this. It's also smaller clubs like Wigan who have a disgusting amount of debt underwritten by their chairmen like Dave Whelan, and stand to lose an awful lot from the introduction of fair financial regulations. Their turnover to wage ratio is shocking - over 100% a couple of seasons ago, if I remember rightly. The greed of the Premier League fuelled by BSkyB will win once more, sadly for the clubs who truly deserve a better deal than they currently get.
Linking wages to gate receipts immediately disadvantages clubs with smaller grounds though, and you could argue financially disadvantages those players at that club. I think a wage cap is a good idea though, but getting an agreement on it's ceiling and negotiating EU employment law would be a nightmare.
