WAIT and do not kill me yet!! The reported £25k per week wage limit might just have been one step down a pioneering road. In these days of austerity, wage cuts for many of us and no job at all for far too many, what is wrong with expecting some of the linked names to come to LR but take a pay cut? Unless Fernandes' pockets are deeper than his reported wealth or The Mittals are chipping in the odd £100m, I can't see us signing the likes of SWP or Bridge with the wages they are on. Is it too much to expect footballers to take some of the pain or do the laws of supply and demand mitigate against that idea. Discussion welcome.
Players wages are what's killing the game, way, way too high. 'Course he was right about that... but was it the good of the game he was thinking about?
it is the stupid wages and transfer fees that are killing the game. There are "players" who hardly play a game, yet are paid millions. And don't start all that guff about players only having a limited shelf life and so need to make loads of money before they "retire". WTF does an agent do to justify making millions? We live in a world where football is the one business where the owner has to spend large amounts of money propping up the clubs. However this is usually fostered back on the club in the form of a loan. At the moment there are still people willing to "invest" in football clubs. They take on the club, and the debts, run it for a few years, increase the debt, then sell it on for someone to do exactly the same with. One day they will find that there are no more buyers.
Wage caps make a lot of sense IF every club does it - not necessarily a limit for every player but a squad spend limit - like in some US sports and the MSL - so you may be paying a couple more than the rest. If you go it alone with a wage cap sadly it makes life very difficult - can't attract or keep top talent. Current situation is insane and eventually the whole thing will collapse. Only Platini at UEFA is trying to do anything serious about it
I'm sure it's been said before but the wage structure are simply the wrong way around if the most greediest Prem footballer on an 50k per week is not going to get very excited by a 10k win bonus or even in our structure 25k probably would translate into 5k win bonus, not really worth getting out of bed. However if we paid 15k with a 10k win bonus that makes it alot more interesting of course there will be some players still happy with the 15k but overall it would make a massive difference; obviously wages scaled on what the player earns. Also a target performance related end of season bonus could be structured with maybe as an extra or part of the above, surely it would be better than what seems to in place now i.e. how many games played as I understand it, lets face it most of these players have get out clauses built in to their contracts if a team gets relegated why can't a club have an under performance clause get out of paying lazy players?!
if the players weren't getting the money the chairman and the board would be. never went to a game to see the owners quaffing champagne or eating prawn cocktails. sad as i am for someone not being able to survive on 25 grand a week since sky got involved that is just the way it is
Kiwi, the story that really irritated me was Bellemy falling out with Roberto Mancini because apparently he would not sanction an advance on his 90k pre week salary. Imagine you get 90k on Saturday and by Tuesday your broke what happened to all the other 90k's up until then? If true football really are living in an unrealistic state of lunacy.
Eamon - As Everton have found out, there are no buyers insterested in taking on a £48M debt with a football club tagged on. If Kenwright can't make money out of it how can anyone else? You need to maximise every facet of the club and theat doesn't solely mean whacking up ticket prices. I'm interested in Swiss Tony when he says 'yep, I can turn a profit at QPR'....it'll be a first and how he squares that with marquee signings I'm not sure about. I'm guessing the key as always are 'new revenue streams / emerging markets' and if he can tap into a TV / Beer / shirt deal in Malaysia or Asia in general then we might yet swing it. Will we see a QPR branded F1 Lotus? Will the much vaunted new Esprit come with blue & white hooped leather interiors?? So many questions and 36 games to go
