Metal Biker
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- Manchester City (and McLaren F1)
Apologies if this has been posted in another thread, but i couldn't see it anywhere.
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11 July, 2011
City’s stadium rocks
City have been cute and cunning in their new "sponsorship" deal with Etihad, says John Baines
Unsurprisingly there’s been a polar split in opinion towards Manchester City’s new ‘record’ sponsorship deal with Etihad Airlines.
Which side of the fence you sit on comes down to your ethical stance, as in announcing an essentially ‘mates rates’ deal for the renaming of the City of Manchester stadium, Manchester City have actually done little wrong aside from being cute and cunning.
The incestuous package with Etihad – the club’s shirt sponsor and long term associate of the Abu Dhabi Group and the Dubai royal family – has alerted UEFA and appalled their rivals but the impartial observer must doth the cap to the much maligned Garry Cook for his latest piece of intuitive business dealings.
Cook was transparent in the aims of the deal declaring the partnership would, “deliver significant revenue at a key stage in the club’s evolution.” Or, behind the business speak, assist City in skirting round UEFA’s incoming financial fair play rules.
Under the terms of the UEFA charter which is come into force from the beginning of the upcoming season, clubs will need to adhere to a phased implementation period of financial dexterity over three years, with the key component of the regulations for clubs to ‘break-even’ over three year passages. Under the break-even requirement, clubs may not spend more than the income they generate.
Initial
A buffer is allowed over the first three years of the window, but even still, clubs must not post losses exceeding a total of £40m during that initial monitoring period. Given that Sheikh Mansour’s mob have ploughed almost a billion pounds into their middle-eastlands dream thus far – including £121m losses for the year ending May 2010 – there would have been grave concerns as to whether City would be inline with FFP rules.
The riches from the Champions League and the peripheral commercialities would have gone someway towards reducing the margins, but in lay terms the £400m naming rights package and various other bits and pieces over the next ten years essentially provides the club with a £40m bonus p.a to stick on the balance sheet.
People can shout and scream about the integrity and amount of the sponsorship package, but City have done nothing other than use the vast wealth available to them to their advantage against the backdrop of a set of ambiguous financial guidelines.
Similar things have been done for as long as the ball’s been round. The older generation may remember the corner cutting that went on during the days of the maximum wage, with players wives being paid handsomely for nondescript clerical jobs and other offshoot rewards and payments being lavished upon players belonging to those who could afford to do it.
Bravado
It’s akin to the bloke on the terrace doing 40mph in a 30 or feigning a cold for a day off work when you’ve got a stinking hangover. If you can do it, and get away with it, you may as well.
Behind all the bravado and adopted fortunes, City have never detracted from the fact they are where they are because of the Abu Dhabi petrodollars. It’s a long and winding road to the top and the Blues haven’t so much taken a toll road through it but glided on a magic carpet over the congestion. So why would they stop now?
What it does do is unequivocally reaffirm the Abu Dhabi group’s commitment to Manchester City and the seemingly outlandish goals they set out when they first rode into town.
A billion pounds later they may only have an FA Cup and a spot in the Champions League to shout about, but the gradient is continuing to rise and the new investment into the club shows the Sheikh and his pals have no intentions of seeing that or their spending comes to a halt.
Changing
From a fans perspective it’s perhaps slightly cringeworthy to have your ground named after an arabian airline, but the mould has long since been broken by the likes of the Reebok, the Britannia and the Emirates – an arabian airline.
Soon following a similar trend with similar financial gains in mind, the world famous Anfield or Chelsea’s Stamford Bridge could have their monickers pre-fixed with some finance company or electronics giant. Times are a changing. It’s not reinventing the wheel, it’s changing the tyres.
The City of Manchester stadium’s generic title has never caught on so little tears will be lost when the Etihad stadium placards go up around it.
You cannot imagine City fans enquiring whether one another is off down the Etihad on Saturday afternoon. Eastlands or any other colloquiality it’s always likely to be.
There would have been more reverberations had it been the old Maine Road, or a specifically designed new stadium commissioned by and for Manchester City but it isn’t. The City of Manchester stadium was and is a stadium essentially built for the people of Greater Manchester for the Commonwealth Games.
Renegotiate
At this juncture it’s also worth adding that Manchester City council – who have recently announced over £100m of council cuts to key services in Manchester, including fundamental health, education and sporting facilities – were only too keen to renegotiate the terms of their lease to ensure their slice of the pie.
Quite whether the additional income to the council pot will result in the tangible sprouting of libraries and swimming pools is an argument for another day but indirectly there should be other beneficiaries than those associated with the football club.
What this sponsorship deal won’t do of course, is further enhance the prospects of any more silverware arriving at the Etihad or Eastlands or whatever you want to call it. In many ways the additional cash available for player transfers and wages could indadvertedly have a destabilising affect as Roberto Mancini continues to mould his team.
Questionable
Part of the reason this windfall has been necessary is because the failings of the regime whilst in its infancy. Big collective losses on the likes of Wayne Bridge, Jo, Roque Santa Cruz and Emmanuel Adebayor, not to mention the questionable sums parted for Joleon Lescott and James Milner were borne from an eagerness to advance too quickly and having money at the ready and freely available to spend could see familiar faults followed if lessons aren’t learnt.
Sometimes less is more, and whilst in their current climate it’s perhaps unwise to make reference to Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal, the fact that players like Adebayor and Kolo Toure were pruned and then profited upon at City’s expense shows that launching inflated sums at players is not always the best approach.
For all of their perceived faults, the latest actions of the Abu Dhabi group reaffirm that at least one half of Manchester does not intend to make money from it’s football club.
As they said at the start, they are here to win things with the club and whilst their financial power has given City a leg-up, they are powerless over what goes on on the pitch.
Money will never guarantee success.