Skip to main content

Two cheers for the Premier League

An all English Champions League final. That will silence knockers of the Premier League, for 24 hours anyway. There are always plenty of believers in the tall poppy syndrome ready to say that La Liga, Serie A or the Bundesliga are better.

First, congratulations to Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur for incredible comebacks. Anfield will always be one of my favourite football stadiums and I enjoyed going there when Charlton were in the Premier League. The owners of the club have invested money in the stadium, the manager and players, but in a prudent rather than reckless fashion.

Tottenham Hotspur have come through a potentially difficult season with flying colours. No money was spent on the team in the summer and they have had a difficult stadium transition, albeit one that has ended with an iconic stadium. I was privileged at the beginning of the season to attend a reception opened by the Mayor of Haringey and meet some of the Spurs fans doing important work in the local community.

Of course, the knockers will be back. They will say that the Premier League uses too many foreign players, rather than encouraging English talent. They will complain about foreign owners, although for me the distinction is between good owners and bad owners, not English and foreign ones.

They will complain about the money washing around in the Premier League without focusing in the consequences of globalisation or the use of soft power by states like Qatar (although there have been rumours this week that they may reduce their backing for Paris Saint Germain).

I was once accused of a Panglossian attitude towards the Premier League, but I do have some criticisms which is why I say two cheers rather than three. The dominance of the top six, even stronger this year, undermines the competition. OK, Wolves may break in next year, just as Leicester did, but it's a case of the exception proves the rule. I have an even greater concern about the distorting effect that in my view (and that of experts like Kieran Maguire) over generous parachute payments have on the Championship.

I am also not happy about plans to turn the Champions League into an effective cartel, although apparently these are running into some opposition.

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

Reports about Charlton sale exaggerated

Reports have appeared in The Guardian and elsewhere that Charlton has been put up for sale. Richard Cawley is an authoritative local journalist who runs a South London Sport substack site.  He reached out to the club yesterday evening to ask for comment on The Guardian’s article. Early indications from the club have been that nothing has changed since the story about them seeking investment, except that it is now a different company doing it. Charlton have since managed to consolidate their place in the Championship, avoiding an instant return to League One, with their women’s side promoted to the WSL, returning to the top flight for the first time since 2007, although staying there is likely to be costly. It would be counter-intuitive for owners Global Football Partners not to progress the club when looking for investment, that the focus remains on driving it forward, that their spend this summer is in line with long-term planning and will see an increase in wages spent on players...
Post a Comment
Read more

Hull City's 'strange' loan

When football finance guru Kieran Maguire seems flashing lights in a club's loan deal, I become concerned.  He is the leading football finance expert in the UK. Hull City have borrowed £55m against their stadium and training ground yet they should get £30m from the Premier League before long.  What is going on? https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/cpwel48y51do
Post a Comment
Read more