I once heard
a premier league football manager giving a very frank interview on the radio.
The perceptive interviewer asked him why it was that Premier league footballers
(and major-league footballers around the world) get paid such astronomical
money each week for playing the game they love. (Players weekly wages were
already high – but seem to have increased massively in recent years.)
The
manager replied that the clubs had so much money rolling in each month from the
TV companies around the world, that they simply did not know what else to do
with all the money apart from pay the players these high salaries. The problem
the clubs had 'came across' as that they simply would not be able to spend
all the money they received otherwise…..
While I
understand that in the film, TV, music, and sports industries - that getting
the best talent comes with a price…… it
did seem such a pathetic answer for the football manager to give; that they
simply couldn’t think what else to do with the money. Of course, we should not
blame the football manger being interviewed since he may well of simply been answering
the interviewers question truthfully.
“If” it
is the case, that the football clubs (or rather the mentality of the people
running them) is such that they can’t think of anything worth doing with the
money apart from paying higher and higher salaries each month - then perhaps some
more creative thinkers should suggest to them some alternatives for that money,
or at least a small part of that money - perhaps 10 to 20%.
Even the
Bank of England has commented on the extraordinary rise in player wages (with
expanding TV revenues) particularly in the last 5 years.
Major football clubs are not just blessed with disposable cash (and mostly unused facilities for 6 days a week) - but importantly they are also blessed with having established positive role models for local youngsters - playing for their teams each week.
It seems
to me therefore, that football clubs (at various levels of the game) are
ideally placed to be major ‘engines of positive social change’ within the local
communities they supposedly ‘serve’ and represent.
While it
is true that some players have taken this role on as individuals, and indeed
some clubs run ‘community projects’ (e.g. notably Arsenal) there is an argument
to be made that the football clubs as organisations could - and indeed should -
do a great deal more to improve life within their local communities and perhaps
beyond in a whole range of areas.
I hope
that somehow this idea of clubs becoming major ‘engines of positive social
change’ can be suggested regularly to the people who can make a difference in
getting such an idea off the ground. Any help with this sharing of ideas would
be appreciated.
