Is money ruining football?

Question

Former England defender and eurosport.yahoo.com resident expert Paul Parker says he’s becoming disillusioned with the huge sums of money involved in football. He believes the game is under threat as a result.

See http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/08062007/58/premiership-parker-money-ruining-game.html

But, there are benefits to money - investment has provided vastly improved stadiums across England, for example, and higher wages have attracted a large number of genuinely world class players to the Premier League.

So, is he right? Is money ruining football?

Answer 1

I think it's a question of sustainability...players are being paid enormous amounts and for the clubs to afford this they need to increase ticket prices. Unfortunately many of the traditional football supporters can no longer afford to go to the games week in week out as it simply costs too much. Much of the attraction about football is the atmosphere generated in a big stadium, filled to capacity but because of the admission prices, full stadiums are becoming a thing of the past. This will eventually have a detrimental effect on the attractiveness of actually going to a game, whether you're a 'real' supporter or a corporate ligger.
An element of balance is required as soon as possible to stop the decline. Wages need to be capped, admission prices need to be realistic to tempt the next generation of supporters to actually go and see a live game rather than watching on TV.
There is also the danger of diminishing competition. There are only 4 or 5 premiership clubs who can afford the top players and these clubs generally win all the competitions, effectively making the other clubs into 'also ran's' this is frustrating for the clubs supporters and many are beginning to question whether it's actually worth it anymore.
The sun is shining at the moment and there are only a few people making any hay. Rain is on the way and within the next 5 to 10 years i see a very different system and a serious case of diminishing returns.

Answer 2

Money in itself is not ruining football. The real issue here is greed. Since the early 90s, top clubs have manouevered themselves into a position where all the cash stays at the top of the game.
The result? Football is over as a sport. In the first year of The Premiership Norwich City finished third. Can you imagine that happeneing now?
Champions League and TV revenue means the Big Four are now untouchable. The gap between Premiership and Football League is so gargantuan that the English league structure, the envy of the world, will be gone within the next 10 years. We'll be left with an elite 2 division mega buck league and a bunch of part-time non-league clubs.
I've done a lot of research into this subject for my book [Prawns in the Game] and one thing is clear - football fans need to wake up and try and reclaim the game from the money men before it is too late. The question is: can anybody be bothered? Apathy reigns, football dies and the rich are looking pretty smug at the top end of The Premiership.

Answer 3

Sorry has this person been in a coma for the last 20 years or so. Football as we knew it has gone, it is no longer just a sport which any average youngster can aspire to play for their local team. Just look in most premiership teams how many BRITISH players there are and you'll understand that MONEY controls everything. Fine yes there are foreign players who are great, why should we bother to nurture local talent when we can just buy some! Floating football teams on the FTSE was the beginning of the end or just the beginning of the NEW ORDER. Also if we allow players to get huge sums of money whether they play or not, where is the incentive/drive to play well or indeed play at all, especially if they have no real personal affiliation with a club. Yes all businesses need money to expand etc, football clubs are no different. So either force everyone to get back to basics or just accept we are all capitalists!

Answer 4

I think money ruins the concept of a team game. What I mean by this is that money buys the best players and they do not necessarily represent the team they play for.

How many Man U players are from Manchester?
How many Arsenal or Tottenham players come from their respective London Boroughs?

Effectively, football has become a game about money, and the team with the most money and who can therefore buy in the best players, usually wins.

I think the FA need to go back to basics and I suggest that as with similar rules on numbers of foreigners in a team, this should be down to one simple thing - that at least six players must be able to represent the club in some way - i.e. if they want to play for Man U, that their mother comes from Manchester, they were born there, they lived there, went to school there etc.

At least in this way money will be combined with talent - local talent and team talent. Hopefully this would mean a more competitive game where the same teams don't necessarily win year in, year out.

Personally I've started taking a greater interest in rugby these days.

Answer 5

yes money has ruined football for the FANS. Its all just about which club has the most money so they can buy the best players. It a multi-million pound industry.

Whats the point in supporting anything other than the big teams like man u and arsenal no other provincial cities and their teams will ever get anywhere in football. As a devon lad my local team is exeter and they are just shocking cos they have no money. But i don't see the point in supporting man u as i have sod all connection with the team/ place.

My grandfather recently said that it should be a rule in the sport that each city MUST have at least half their players who come from that town. ( or perhaps have lived there for a minimum of five years) That would mean that arsenal would have some english players and would make the whole thing a little fairer and would make more sense.

Answer 6

You must have got up early and worked really hard to think this one up! There has been an ever increasing inflow of money into football since the original SKY contracts in 1992. The money the players are on in still small beer compared with the salaries paid to Baseball players etc in the USA where some top performers are on $20M.

The other factor to take into account is the growing influence of agents who make sure that most of the TV revenue goes on players contracts.

Sky would not exist without football and the biggest concern must be the fragmentation of the TV contracts to meet the requirements of the Euro-loonies. Football will be ruined when the Sky money stops and the clubs are stuck with the high salary bills.

Paul Parker is jealous because he missed out on the big money that's available now.

Answer 7

The current high transfer costs and wages mean that only the wealthier clubs have any chance to suceed. That can be seen in the English Premier division, where only the top five clubs effectively compete for the Premiership title. The other clubs play only a supporting role. Buying expensive foreign players stifles the development of home grown talent, particularly as the top Premiership clubs also use the loan system to nurture their young foreign players in the Championship & other leagues. Fans are also affected by the high cost of entry to Premiership and Championship games, where to take an adult and 2 children into a game could cost between £50.00 and £80.00, depending on the location and the game. Yes money is ruining football!

Answer 8

Money plays too prominent a part in all sports, but particularly in football. Up until at least the early 1970s it was seen as a working class pastime where people could go along to support their local team on a Saturday afternoon. Most of the players in a side came from a particular area and the ticket prices were commensurate with the working wage.

In order to gauge how much this has changed, I would just point you to Chelsea and to check out how many players are English, let alone native born Londoners. After checking this, look at their ticket prices. As a percentage of a living wage, the tickets are out of the range of many pockets. This is not what the beautiful game is supposed to be about.

Here are a few ideas to reslove the problem:

Every team should have at least half of their players born within a 20 mile radius of the ground.

Limits players' wages to no more than twice the national average.

Only 2 foreign players per team.

These may seem quite extreme but they would allow us to regain all that has been lost through the search for mammon.

Answer 9

Multi million pound deals are being thrown at so called professional footballers and clubs for what reason?
What footballer can say they've worked and earned the right to make such phenominal ammounts so quickly.
If something is not earned and just given what value does it have to that person?
All it creates is demotivated ,lazyness ,arrogance and loss of ambition, not hard working atheletes who once had a dream,
that dream is now lost to greed and celebrity, but arent footballers supposed to be footballers and sportsmen.

The fans and people who love the sport want atheletes not film stars, fair enough charismatic entertaining players do add and have always been part of the show but they are few and far between.
We need hunger, determinaton and lower wages for all managers and players.
Put that money in the communities and people who have supported the clubs, not on three £100,000 bentleys for each players.
The fans are the cornerstones of the clubs not the players
Make the clubs and footballers work for there wage and then maybe they'll gain some of that lost respect back , for without the support of fans a club and its players are worthless.

Answer 10

Its not money ruining the game, its the greed of so called talented players who thinks half the time the world owes them.
Its getting totally out of hand, no man or person is worth what these players of today are getting.
My late father use to say cant see what the fuss is about 22 players on a pitch kicking a ball full of wind around and to be honest im thinking the same these days, what with the stupid amounts of money involved.
As for England I do watch there games and im often disapointed by the quality of play. Apart from 1966 when we won the world cup. There as not been a team decent enough to win anything. We can blame the manager but on the night its down to the team and from what I have seen of late none have got any brains to work it out for them selfs. So we will still field a rubbish team and the rest of the world will show them how to play football.