Player salaries now add up to around 70% of club turnovers. With the success of ManCity and Chelsea this figure is sure set to rise and this alarming trend is not something that bodes well for the league. I have spoken in a previous blog about how this changes the landscape of the league(Link here).
Is the recent discussion on how salary caps and spending limits the beginning of the end of this cancerous practice?
The FA had met to discuss how a new regulation for financial controls wherein clubs would have to break-even every year or face sanctions. Not shockingly this move was sparked by Manchester United who seem have been awakened by some cold water thrown at them given the recent success of ManCity and Chelsea and with their own trophy cabinet not being disturbed last year. Support to this proposal comes from a very unlikely frontier in the form of Dave Whelan the chairman of Wigan who themselves had a £7.2 Million loss in the season ending May 2011.
With 2 strong advocates for these changes being Manchester United and Arsenal along with Wigan, West Ham and Stoke. The obvious naysayers include Chelsea and ManCity with support from Fulham, Everton, West Bromwich Albion, Newcastle and Tottenham. The argument that David Gill, CEO of ManUtd had for this was logical that the leagues that sandwich the premier league viz. the Championship and the Champions League are in the process of or have already implemented them. So according to Gill why not the Premier League.
This of course is not an easy task given that at least 14 teams have to agree to make any changes which is just above a 2/3rd majority and getting everyone to a common ground would seem a tough task given how success has been bought of-late.
If we a little look into this a little more in detail at this about how clubs fare if this rule were to be applied today then we have the table which is in this link.
There is alarming 11 clubs which have have a wages to turnover ratio of 70% or more and with the top culprit being the obvious ManCity with 114% of their turnover going into wages. Surprisingly the other evil, Chelsea is 3rd at 86% with Aston Villa sandwiched between these 2 at 90%. These are 2011 figures and the number are sure going to be different for the 2011/12 season. Sitting safely at the top are Manchester United and Arsenal with 46% and 48% respectively.
Coming back to regulations this would prevent clubs from biting off more than they can chew and also prevent owners from treating clubs as their plaything. Such regulations would also prevent another Portsmouth and Rangers debacle. And like David Gill has said with both the league above and below the EPL with such regulations it would not harm to gradually enforce them onto this league too.
It is obvious that the big spenders would oppose such a proposal for their own success but if we are avoid a La-Liga like 2 horse race which is already seeming to form in the EPL too then these regulations seem necessary. I spoken about how this tiered structured seems to be coming into existence in the EPL too in previous 2 blogs
1) Predictions for the EPL 2012/13( Link here).
2) What does the rise of Manchester City mean(Link here).
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