The Political Economy of Football V2

I confidently predicted that the real beneficiaries from Spygate would be sports lawyers and that looks like being the case.  Given the reputational damage they have already suffered, the club has wisely decided not to take the matter to judicial review, even though they might have grounds for doing so.  It would have been better if they had made a full admission more quickly. Southampton players are exploring their options regarding legal action against the club. Tonda Eckert’s squad had largely been kept away from the affair and only had the basic details communicated to them by the club. The players were furious at the EFL verdict, having only found out at the same time as everyone else, with members of the squad who had taken 40 per cent pay cuts after suffering relegation from the top flight year were due to have that reinstated in the event of promotion to the Premier League. They are due to meet with the club on Wednesday, and sources with knowledge of the players...

Southampton have been kicked out of the Championship play-off final, known as the richest game in football due to the financial rewards from winning it, after the club was found to have broken league rules by spying on opponents’ training sessions.  The English Football League, which runs the second, third and fourth tiers of professional men’s football, said on Tuesday that an independent disciplinary commission had decided to expel Southampton from the play-off final, due to take place on Saturday. It added Southampton had “admitted to multiple breaches of EFL Regulations related to the unauthorised filming of other clubs’ training”. Southampton will also receive a four-point deduction for next season. Southampton had been hoping to bounce back to the Premier League after being relegated last year. The south coast club is majority owned by its chair, Serbian billionaire Dragan Šolak. The club still has tickets for the Championship play-off final advertised for sale on its web...

This informative article points out that promotion to League One would actually worsen the finances of Swindon Town.  Clubs in that league make an average loss of £5m.  A play off run (now unlikely) would bring £1m to the Wiltshire club, but that is much less than current losses:  https://www.swindonadvertiser.co.uk/sport/26067738.league-one-promotion-impact-swindon-town-finances/ It's a brave man who buys a lower league EFL club.

Six EFL clubs are showing signs of financial distress according to BTG, but finances at Scottish clubs are stabilising:  https://www.btguk.com/news/football-distress-report-q1-2026

I have been sceptical about the long-term viability of fan owned clubs, recent events at Exeter City seem to confirm this.   Even prosperous fans in south-west London find it difficult to provide the funds needed to compete. AFC Wimbledon are at a crossroads, squeezed by what many League One and League Two owners believe is unsustainable spending that cannot continue. The fan owners face a dilemma: invite wealthy investors with deep pockets on board, or lose pace with the spiralling costs of running an EFL club. More than 4,500 of the 7,500-plus owners turned out to vote on Monday night, opting to dilute fan ownership to 50.01 per cent — similar to the model adopted by German clubs — and freeing up shares to sell to outside investors with funds to keep the club competitive. The club have spoken to about ten potential investors, including a consortium led by their former captain Robbie Earle. Many around the club fear this vote is merely a stepping stone to relinquishing ...

The chair of England’s new football regulator has told Premier League clubs to view money passed down to lower divisions as an “investment” in the game, as he urged the sport’s bosses to strike an agreement on how cash is redistributed. In a stern warning to the Premier League, David Kogan, who chairs the Independent Football Regulator, said that clubs “enjoying the good times at the top must surely see that any money passed down through the leagues is an investment”. “My message today is that it can’t just be about the clubs at the top. It has to be about ensuring the whole pyramid can survive,” Kogan told the FT’s Business of Football Summit on Thursday.   He cautioned that the lack of a new deal on how money was redistributed from the top flight “creates uncertainty that is detrimental to the pyramid and to growth and investment in the English game”. Talks between the Premier League and the English Football League — encompassing the Championship, League One and League Tw...

Premier League football teams could be banned from accepting sponsorship from gambling companies without a UK licence, as ministers look to crack down on black-market betting. Culture secretary Lisa Nandy on Monday said it was “not right that unlicensed gambling operators can sponsor some of our biggest football clubs, raising their profile and potentially drawing fans towards sites that don’t meet our regulatory standards”. The plans, which will be put out to consultation in the spring, are intended to reduce harm from gambling and “eliminate unfair competition” for companies regulated by the Gambling Commission, according to the government. Several teams in the English football leagues, including the top division, have sponsorship arrangements with unlicensed gambling operators. These partnerships are not prohibited at present, so long as UK customers cannot access the illicit platforms. But the Department for Culture, Media and Sport said ministers were “deeply concerned” that...

Championship club Hull City took English forward Louie Barry on loan from Aston Villa in January but then failed to pay his initial loan fee or monthly wages until early July. These sums came to more than £830,000 and the total number of days in default were 311, with the February-to-May wage payments adding up to 168 days between them. Under EFL rules, clubs get a warning when they hit a cumulative late-payment total of 10 days, an automatic fine of five per cent of the amount owed after 20 days and a transfer-window ban on paying fees for players after 30 days. All of this is managed by the EFL’s Club Financial Reporting Unit, with any disputes now handled by the Club Financial Review Panel, a bespoke group of experts on call for expedited decisions. Having been notified of their three-window ban on July 3, Hull City promptly appealed against the decision and were given a hearing on August 6. The club wanted the three-window ban replaced by a suspended sanction for the current ...

Reading fans are over the moon after the takeover of their club was completed:  https://thetilehurstend.sbnation.com/2025/5/15/24430246/after-500-days-of-torture-reading-fc-fans-can-breathe-again-royals The English Football League, who are responsible for a lot of the delays, issued a brief statement:  https://www.efl.com/news/2025/may/14/reading-football-club-under-new-ownership/

The Reading owner Dai Yongge was told at the time of his takeover that he would not be allowed to own the club in the Premier League, it can be revealed, although apparently Reading fans have known this for years. Questions have emerged over how Yongge was allowed to buy the club for £24.5million in 2017 after he was blocked from buying Hull City, who were then in the Premier League. The Chinese businessman was disqualified by the EFL in February and has been given until May 5 to sell League One side Reading, who are in serious financial difficulty. A consortium led by Yongge first tried to buy Hull, but was rejected by the Premier League and he formed a different group, which was allowed by the EFL to take over Reading in May 2017, when they were in the Championship. It is understood that the Premier League advised the EFL against the move on the basis that Yongge had not shown good faith in his application to buy Hull. But the EFL’s legal advice was that it would ...

The sad saga at Reading continues with the EFL understandably giving another extension to the deadline for the club to be sold rather than expelling from the league.  However, if Reading make the play offs, the EFL is going to face a difficult decision:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn8vdjd2ld5o

Charlton supremo Charlie Methven welcomes the new expenditure controls in Leagues One and Two, pointing out that the prospect of such controls was one reason Global Football Partners bought the ailing club:  https://londonnewsonline.co.uk/sport/charlton-athletic-hierarchy-supportive-of-new-spending-controls-that-kick-in-next-season/

Leicester will not face a points deduction this season after the EFL were forced to admit that they did not have the legal authority to impose Premier League penalties:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/68801570 Any potential points penalty issued by the independent commission Leicester has been referred to will therefore apply next season.

Football finance guru Kieran Maguire reports ' To get to the "promised land"of the EFL cost Sutton United £477k, in their first season in League Two they lost £278k and in their second season they decided to become less transparent & not publish an income statement but lost a further £950k.' They are at risk of relegation. I have nothing against Sutton United, but I wonder how much room there is for another London club in the EFL. But then it's possible that Bromley or Barnet could come up this season (although Barnet have had a setback over permission for a new ground close to their old one).

Reading have been deducted another two points and their owner Mr Dai faces a six figure fine:  https://www.efl.com/news/2024/february/27/efl-statement-reading-fc-and-mr-dai-yongge/ Nevertheless, there are limits to what the EFL can do on behalf of fans which is why a regulator with powers to deal with rogue owners is needed.

Barnsley have complained to the EFL that they may have been placed at a competitive disadvantage by Reading's financial situation:  https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/barnsley-reading-report-to-efl-26404603 This echoes earlier complaints against Derby County by Middlesbrough and Wycombe Wanderers.  The former case has now been settled out of court and the latter one may soon be resolved. Sports lawyers are booming and I suppose one has to accept that clubs will increasingly resort to seeing each other in court rather than settling matters on the pitch.  It is an inevitable by-product of big money in modern football.

AFC Wimbledon's chief executive has called on the EFL to take tough measures against clubs like Charlton and Portsmouth who have been unable to field a matchday squad because of Covid-19, claiming that the Wombles have done a better job of containing Covid.  The 'strongly worded' Wimbledon letter is here:  https://www.afcwimbledon.co.uk/news/2021/december/club-statement2/ The statement has received a mixed reaction from fans:  https://fanbanter.co.uk/afc-wimbledon-receive-mixed-reaction-after-issuing-strong-statement-to-the-efl/?fbclid=IwAR0lVEMX7LsQzW4B2clEtSbrVNyohNvHzCpado9OqdHV3rMnEGqDyrVmOcY

Premier League matches are to go ahead with no special Covid break:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/59732905   I have just done an interview for Sky on this.  A short break in matches - 28th to 30th December had been mentioned - would have little impact either on future postponements or revenues.   The underlying problem is that quite a lot of footballers have not been vaccinated making repeated Covid-19 outbreaks likely. The 28th-30th December dates would have been awkward for Amazon who are showing those games.  Amazon has paid £30 million a season to exclusively show two rounds of Premier League matches. Even on Sunday afternoon, Amazon had adverts running on Sky Sports promoting their own upcoming live Premier League action, in which they pledged to deliver 10 games featuring all 20 teams and urging supporters to sign up. The slot is particularly important as a strategy to Amazon as a delivery service, as it runs around the festive-season shop...

Parachute payments mean that the Championship is anything but a level playing field.  In many ways it is a de facto Premier League 2. Relegated clubs receive 55 per cent of the Premier League media rights revenue for each club in year one, 45 per cent in year two and 20 per cent in year three. Clubs who are relegated after one season receive parachute payments for only two years. That adds up to about £42m for each club in year one, £34m in year two and £15m in year three.   The remaining Championship clubs receive £4.5m each, while those in League One and League Two receive £675,000 and £475,000 respectively. QPR chief executive Lee Hoos told The Times : 'The balance is tipping away from the original purpose which was to prevent a fire sale of players and cover the cost of relegation and contractual commitments, to where we are now, where clubs have a ton of extra financial firepower and can blow everyone else out of the water.' The origins of parachute payments are rath...

Managerial turnover is a feature of modern football. It is always the manager who gets blamed for poor performances by owners and fans, rarely the players.  But although it is headlined 'This has to be a brutal year to be a manager' a Chris Dunlavy story in The Football League Paper actually suggests otherwise. There could still be one or two dismissals, but it's a bit late to make a change.   This season 35 managers have been dismissed in the English Football League, three below the 2015/16 peak of 38. What is remarkable is the consistency of the figures.   In general over a ten year period they hover around the mean of 30.   In the past four seasons they were never more than four away from this figure.   In other words, about 42 per cent of managers get sacked each season. What has changed this season is that the pandemic has led to new hires being offered shorter contracts, often as little as six months  or until the end of the season...