Skip to main content

Did Salford 'buy' the league?

Another club in Greater Manchester has been accused of buying the league: Salford City. Accrington Stanley supremo Andy Holt has even accused them of trying to steal a place in the Football League. Gary Neville has referred to 'a level of ferocity towards us on social media.'

My first comment would be that perhaps it's time to wake up and smell the coffee. Money was important in football before the advent of the Premier League in 1992 which is now portrayed as a kind of football AD (or CE to use modern terminology). The sums have become bigger, and there is more global sourcing of funds, but money has always talked.

The Ammies have won four promotions in just five seasons. They are the first club to bounce straight through the top tier of the non-league pyramid, having won the National League North last season.

The Class of '92 owners (the Neville brothers, Ryan Gigegs, Paul Scholes, Nicky Butt and now David Beckham) have insisted on foundations being put down. Singapore businessman Peter Lim is also involved. There has been a stadium rebuild at Moor Lane with the famous grassy bank disappearing. There is an academy, a women's team and a commitment to working with the city's community.

Just over 8,000 attended the Wembley final, the smallest number yet. Opponents AFC Fylde also lack deep roots as a contender for league status. The Coasters, who have probably benefited from the turmoil at Blackpool, were winners of the FA Vase 11 years ago as Kirkham and Wesham. Local businessman David Haythornthwaite bought them when they were playing in the eighth tier and has pushed them up the non-league pyramid. However, average gates at Salford have risen from 130 five years ago to more than 2,500.

Gary Neville told The Times, ''If you want to get out of the National League, a budget of £700,000 or £800,000 won't get you out and it will cost you three or times as much to get out the longer you are down there. It's cheaper to spend more and go up.' Most players at the club earn nothing like the £4,000 a week reported wage of Adam Rooney, last summer's star signing from Abredeen.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It's no deal say Spurs insiders over Taiwanese takeover

Senior figures at Tottenham Hotspur insisted on Friday that they had not been informed of any deal to sell Daniel Levy’s stake in the club. A business group, Eight Sports Capital — which is said to include a billionaire Taiwanese financier — claimed that it had an agreement in place to buy a 24.99 per cent stake in ENIC, the club’s majority owners, from Levy, who owns 29.88 per cent. The Times has been told Ng Wing Fai and Brooklyn Earick form part of the group, having both been linked previously to potential takeovers of the Premier League club. The Taiwanese businessman, Richard Tsai, is also said to be part of the consortium. He is reportedly worth £7 billion.  Last year Earick, the former DJ and tech entrepreneur, was part of an attempted £4.5 billion takeover, which was “unequivocally rejected” by Spurs.  An ENIC spokesperson said: “We can confirm that neither ENIC nor THFC are aware of any sale by Daniel Levy’s Family Trust of its minority stake in ENIC, THFC’...
Post a Comment
Read more

Spurs CEO attacks luxury training base

The Tottenham Hotspur chief executive Vinai Venkatesham has issued a withering assessment of the way the club was run under Daniel Levy, likening the state-of-the-art training centre to a five-star hotel rather than a centre of high performance.  Venkatesham was appointed to his role in April 2025, having stepped down as chief executive at Arsenal the previous summer. However, he has said that some aspects of the club were “in a significantly worse state” than he expected.  “Our training centre is amazing, one of the best, if not the best in the world,” Venkatesham told BBC Sport. “But when you look around, it looks more like a five-star hotel than it does a performance environment. That will change over the summer. I think there are many areas where the club hasn’t got the right level of expertise.”  He explained that the football side of operations was the club’s main downfall when he arrived last year. [One Spurs fan wryly observed that it was like a water company sayi...
Post a Comment
Read more

Fulham requires big funding from owner

After lengthy delays, Fulham’s shiny, new Riverside Stand has finally opened, creating “a unique Thameside destination with first class facilities for supporters and partners on match days, as well as for the wider community year-round”. This ambitious project has increased Craven Cottage’s capacity by around 4,000 to 29,600, while it has also taken advantage of the club’s fantastic location and wealthy catchment area by including two Michelin star restaurants, a rooftop swimming pool, corporate hospitality and event space, all benefiting from views of the Thames. Chief executive Alistair Mackintosh observed, “Fulham is the sort of club that can have a business class or first class and have fans that turn left on a plane.” Indeed, there is also an exclusive members club – with a football season ticket as an optional extra. It’s fair to say that “the times they are a-changing”, as this is a long way from the traditional pie and a pint. However, in a world where clubs face the tw...
Post a Comment
Read more