It’s quite often a tweet that motivates me to write something for MFW.
In this instance, it was one from Kieran McGuire, the football finance expert pointing out that Manchester United had spent more money on Anthony than the 24 Championship clubs combined in the entire summer transfer window.
Unless you live, under a rock you will be well aware that many people in this country are facing a potentially disastrous winter with energy prices through the roof, double-figure inflation and many expected to have to resort to food banks to survive.
Yet Premier League clubs, enthusiastically egged on by Sky Sports, the doting parent of the honeypot that it created, have spent a total of £1.9bn in this window.
By the way, it’s worth pointing out for the hard of thinking – who will inevitably be popping up in the comments section talking about how much TV revenue clubs get and how that that justifies Nottingham Forest signing 21 new players – that the above figure is merely published transfer fees, on top of which come agents’ fees (invariably paid by the club not the player) and salaries.
Tuning into Sky Sports News you would hardly think there is a huge cost of living crisis gripping the UK as groups of talking heads sit around tables sagely discussing transfer rumours (that are readily available to anyone prepared to trawl the internet) for hour after interminable hour, as if they were some sort of secret transmitted from the gods to their chosen ones, while lauding the ridiculous amounts involved.
I’ll come back to Forest because they have epitomised how the game at the top level has turned into a real-life version of the Football Manager computer game.
I think that Steve Cooper did an amazing job to take them from a struggling Championship team to play off winners but the team he built has basically been binned in favour of a slew of high-profile arrivals who may or may not gel into something good (and Fulham fans will be well aware that it’s far from a given).
From a fans’ perspective, the heroes they cheered on last season will hardly be seen, but many will still be there if the huge gamble the club is taking with its future goes horribly wrong, while this season’s superstars won’t be seen for dust as they bail out to look for their next lucrative contract.
Of course, Cooper himself will have been long gone by then unless he picks up some wins pretty quickly.
Sadly, the filthy lucre that has got Sky into such a lather of excitement has, and will continue to, only benefit the EPL and its players because we have to continue to wait for a functioning government to get around to converting Tracey Crouch’s recommendations in the Fan Led Review into actual statutes.
Of course, in the interim the vested interests of the FA and the Premier League are doing everything they can to obstruct and dilute those recommendations, such as the ludicrous argument that an Independent Regulator isn’t needed because the existing powers haven’t been given enough time to show that they can police themselves.
After all it’s only 30 years since the Premier League was formed…
As Henry Winter pointed out this week, the 10% transfer levy that Crouch proposed would have applied to the greater part of this window’s spending bonanza and would have raised £160 million to be invested in grassroots football, but only a fraction of that will trickle down in the guise of the laughably named “solidarity payments”, while smaller clubs continue to try to fight off oblivion.
As Winter pointed out, even half that figure would have been transformative, but instead the rich just get richer, and the poor continue to attempt to scrape a living.
Sadly, we’ve all become a bit blasé about the obscene amounts being spent, but a tweet like McGuire’s provides a sense of perspective, very much like one from a few seasons back which pointed out that the total amount that Newcastle received in gate receipts (which were then the 19th highest in Europe) in 2018-19 was roughly 50% of what they paid for Joelinton the following summer.
Premier League spending is becoming more and more divorced from reality, and we may, at last, have reached a tipping point, because if Forest fail if will not only be a disaster for them and their fans – with administration the likely outcome – but also it will surely give any future promoted club pause for thought before taking such a wild gamble.
And finally spare a thought for poor little Eddie Howe, currently Front of House for the murderous Saudi regime’s sportswashing exercise.
Apparently when a club which boasts of being backed by one of the richest countries in the world wants a player the selling club ups their price.
I’m off to tune my tiny violin.
Hi Robin
An excellent read
There are two many people trying to get their finger into the pot.
Why should clubs pay agents unless they use an agent to get the player he works for the player so he should pay him.
Gary Neville slaggs of all the big clubs but wouldn’t help to save his home town club, shouts that managers should be given a chance to build a team yet sacks them at Salford quicker than most premiership club and then states he knows how to change football for the better I wouldn’t trust him to manager anything.
Theirs rumours he wants a safe Labour seat in the next Election as he wants to be PM.
As I said to Martin P today we now have new investors about to join the club will things change for the better I’m not sure our Stowmarket pair will still block most things that aren’t to their liking they forget sometimes others know best.
Now the cats out of the bag can anyone put it back in again I don’t think so, and Forest could soon be with neighbours County if things go tits up
I think in some ways your criticism of Forest is unfair, they clearly had to do a very significant rebuild, 21 seems spectacularly over the top but with 2 first teamers leaving for in their view better offers, they also had a number of loan players who played an integral role in their promotion who all went back to their parent clubs. So they had half the first team to replace and you would imagine a squad of lesser players behind those loanees in need of upgrades.
Uptil now they have stuck with some of the guys who got them promoted but that is drawing plenty of fan criticism as many forest fans are already condemning Worrall and Cook as inadequate and would like to see newbies replace them.
I think it’s a reflection on how you can win and lose using the loans market.
What is probably unfair is if they sack Cooper when it takes time to knit such a new squad.
It will be interesting to watch Forest either fail or succeed, many of our fans would advocate a much riskier ‘giving it a proper go’ where the club might be put at risk. So much like Fulham and their £100m before what price is there on survival?
As for a divorce from reality, I’m not so sure, the reality is that people still pay their sky subscription both here and abroad, even us city fans are stumping £55+ for our football shirts. I think Football lives in a parallel reality where the very best in the most popular sport in the world finally get rewarded on a par with their American sporting cousins. Supply and demand that shows no sign of diminishing.
The transfer rake to the lower reaches is an interesting idea, one that the haves would never allow of course, but one that would be better for the health of the game as whole.
Winston, you beat me to it. I was going to make the same point about the number of loanees that Forest had last season, which made it inevitable that they would have to spend this season, either buying those who were on a loan with option to buy deal, or to replace those who either wanted to return to their parent club or needed replacing anyway. It was a bit of Catch 22 situation. Whether Cooper can meld the new players into an effective unit remains to be seen.
…and in the warped world that is football, Norwich will be criticised for “not giving it a go” (ie. not sending themselves bankrupt) each time they get promoted. And then take flack on the other flank when top of the Championship basically because we are one of the very few clubs who is finding a medium term way to come to terms with the widening financial gulf in football.
Hi Robin
An excellent article that will touch the cockles of many supporters everywhere, regardless of club, except those who follow the priviliged few.
I’d genuinely fear for the future if I were a Forest fan.
And when you think things can’t get any worse Ms Truss claims to be a City supporter.
A very poignant read.
Football is 5 years from self imploding!
For me the government should have an independent look into how these clubs are financed and how far beyond the financial barriers they push the limits.
A club who goes into liquidation should never be aloud to pay 1p in the pound to the locals who get shafted!
Football is dead and ATM has no way of coming back to the people the players are so far out of touch with you or I…..
Do anyone in this part of the country give a dam about LiVARpool or Chelskusa or Arab city or manure my guess is not really along qith a few other in time a lot will not exist when the money people lose interesting the pay things and move onto something else!!!
An excellent read. I don’t think Forest will be in big trouble if they are relegated. Their owner is very rich with his finger in many pies, including Greek media and shipping lines. He’s also a very ‘colourful ‘ character and has been proven innocent of both match fixing and drug trafficking charges.
It’s usually “not guilty”, not “proven innocent “. A subtle difference, but significant.