In England, football should actually decide what its future should look like. But who does football belong to, which stakeholders, fans and officials alike claim for themselves? Because the game is only there for everyone who is enthusiastic about it, it would probably be the most charming solution if football could determine itself (or the ball and goals on its behalf) in order to end this eternal power struggle.
Depending on the political and economic systems as well as the socialization of the population, football has been organized differently in the countries. While the game in Germany is based to this day on a community-oriented model in which the members of the clubs hold the majority of the voting shares in their clubs (“50 + 1 rule”), island football has set up commercially from the start. Even when the Football League was founded in 1888, clubs could rely on the Joint Companies Stock Act of 1856. This allowed the clubs to transform themselves into private limited liability companies, whose capital shares were traded like foreign exchange.
As a result of the liberalization of the British economy under Margaret Thatcher in 1979 and the unprecedented rise of football to a world sport, the clubs attracted wealthy donors. Be it for calculation, hobby or, more recently, for image reasons: Investors bought up almost all professional clubs in England. Thanks to increasing TV revenues, the clubs’ total sales have risen from £ 250 million per season since the early days of the Premier League in 1992 to more than £ 5 billion – until the league’s turbo-capitalism has now caused a backlash that could become its undoing.
After plans for a Super League of super-rich clubs, Johnson threatened with a “legislative bomb”
The increasingly absurd looking excesses of the industry, the imposture of the lower class clubs and the megalomania of the top clubs have recently sparked a moral rebellion in England. The license withdrawal of the economically ruined fourth division club FC Bury in 2019 as well as further impending bankruptcies in the wake of the pandemic have called the government around its populist leader Boris Johnson on the scene. The barrel finally overflowed with the failed coup in April with the participation of six major English clubs (Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United, Tottenham) to unhinge the recognized national league system in their own favor via a European super league. Johnson wholeheartedly threatened to show the limits of this business conduct with a “legislative bomb” because on the one hand he feared for the status of the internationally prestigious export hit Premier League – and on the other hand saw the chance to win important votes in the football-loving north by cracking down on it.
As a first reaction to his announcement, six months ago Parliament commissioned former sports minister and current MP Tracey Crouch to investigate the structures and regulations of island football. After more than 100 hours of discussion with more than 130 club representatives, Crouch, 46, recently published her “Fan-led Review of Football Governance”, which was allegedly based on the demands of the fans. She had worked out this together with a ten-person panel, which included former England coach Roy Hodgson, Denise Barrett-Baxendale (managing director of Everton FC) and the head of the fan association, Kevin Miles. The 162-page report – with the empty Bury Stadium as a symbolic cover photo – actually contains the announced explosive, which could henceforth develop explosive power similar to the fundamental reforms of 1888 and 1992.
The government report states: The information “relevant” for the licensing of the clubs should also include “the reputation of close family members and business partners of the owners”. For Steve Parish, CEO of the London suburban club Crystal Palace, it sounds like “in North Korea” after screening.
(Photo: MB Media Solutions / Imago)
The 47 recommendations “on the sustainability of English football” encompass ten subject areas that cover all kinds of regulations, tests for club owners and directors, and the protection of traditional club associations. In essence, Crouch calls on the government to adopt a “new independent supervisory authority” to control professional clubs, whose “investigative and enforcement powers” would effectively disempower the current league umbrella organizations and the national football association FA.
The legal framework for the introduction of such a self-sufficient apparatus with around 50 experts should be in place by the 2023/2024 season. Until then, there is talk of a taxpayer pre-financed, approximately five million pound shadow regulation commission. According to the statements, the control body would in the future be responsible for inspecting the clubs’ financial statements as part of the annual licensing process – and regularly reviewing the integrity, the business plan and the origin of the assets of the new and existing club owners.
The future “relevant information”, it says in the report, should also include “the reputation of close family members and business partners of the owners”. For Steve Parish, CEO of the London suburban club Crystal Palace, this sounds more like a process “in North Korea” than like the conservative, liberal Great Britain. If the new criteria are not met, the club owners could even be “forced” to sell their shares.
As part of the licensing process, the clubs would also have to grant their fans a right of veto (“golden share”), with which the supporters could prevent a change of the club’s name or emblem and a sale of the stadium. In addition, Crouch would like to achieve a redistribution of money between the leagues: through a “solidarity transfer tax” from the Premier League clubs, which is valued in sub-item 9.30 at ten percent of the fee for a player transfer. Currently four percent flow into the FA’s coffers and another five percent to the lower-class clubs in the form of solidarity contributions for international obligations.
For the clubs, the government’s 162-page report reads like a communist manifesto
While the drastic proposals were received with goodwill by the fans who participated in a survey on the report (around 21,000) and especially in Parliament, the document met with rejection in the Premier League. The middle-class clubs in particular, who fear no immediate relegation and were not responsible for the super-league disaster, feel offended. Aston Villas managing director Christian Purslow was furious that “if the financially and commercially very successful Premier League is overregulated” there is a risk of killing the “golden goose”. His counterpart Angus Kinnear from Leeds United, who labeled the demand for an independent regulatory authority and a hefty transfer fee in the stadium booklet as “as flawed as it is radical”, hit the same line. Island football will be destroyed if a philosophy similar to “Maoist collective agrarianism” is imposed on it, said Kinnear. In his view, the lower leagues “do not need artificially inflated funds”, but rather must learn to live within their means. Although Leeds would have been in dire financial straits at the time without their promotion to the Premier League in 2020.
The level of indignation at the government initiative can be seen from the choice of words. Sport Minister Nigel Huddleston recently stated that Parliament “in principle” accepts the creation of an independent oversight body. In order to avert this horror scenario, the clubs of the Premier League have apparently forged a compromise to incorporate the supervisory authority into the structures of the FA in order to at least keep the state at a distance. In this context it can probably also be seen that Liverpool FC launched a publicity council this week to represent the views of the members in the strategic direction of the club. These advances on the part of the Premier League clubs are now supposed to vote in favor of parliament. A statement from the government is expected for the new year.
Bury FC got off lightly again: Two years after being excluded from the league, a group of fans recently acquired the insolvent club and the ailing stadium. Apparently, Bury should return to the game soon – which would certainly be in the spirit of football.