BluessinceHydeRoad
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 26 Mar 2012
- Messages
- 2,562
The PL version of "fair play" is in place because they need to resort to the double speak characteristic of brutal dictatorships, so that East Germany and China were supposed to be "people's democratic republics". For "fair play" read "cheating". In fact, these regulations, like UEFA's, exist because they're contrary to the law: for well over 70 years at least western Europe has sought to encourage investment as the only way to long term prosperity and to give investors the right in law to invest, so UEFA and the PL enshrine the quite contrary principle that investment by shareholders is cheating, football does not want investors and investment is outlawed! The PL takes this further by deciding which revenue streams can be used to pay wages and which can't. Try telling a bank how much they can pay their staff and who has to come up with the money!
The law protects the right of investors to invest: it does not compel them to do so. The law does not say what wage levels are to be set, or where the revenue to pay them must come from. I doubt that Sky or BtT told the PL that their sponsorship must go into the pockets of Stan Kroenke or anyone of the Glazer tribe, or even John W Henry rather than into the wage packets of Wayne Rooney or any of the players. TV audiences don't tune in to get a glimpse of Stan or John W! The fact is that no club is compelled to use TV money to pay higher wages if they don't want, but it's their decision if they do want to. What the 13 clubs who voted in favour of these regulations were doing had nothing at all to do with competition or the long term financial stability of the game - since each club could do all of these things without any new regulations if it thought they were in its best interests - but had everything to do with stopping other clubs spending on players and wages. Thus United can spend their matchday income and Chevrolet sponsorship on what they want since they're bigger than anyone else's. Arsenal must be allowed to do as they will with their matchday income. But City compete on TV income, so that is hedged with restrictions to erode the club's ability to compete. Those clubs who voted for these regulations have this in common - they did not want other clubs to become more competitive than they are. It's like MPs who decide they are unduly deserving of bumper pay rises, but they don't need to break the law to get them.
The law protects the right of investors to invest: it does not compel them to do so. The law does not say what wage levels are to be set, or where the revenue to pay them must come from. I doubt that Sky or BtT told the PL that their sponsorship must go into the pockets of Stan Kroenke or anyone of the Glazer tribe, or even John W Henry rather than into the wage packets of Wayne Rooney or any of the players. TV audiences don't tune in to get a glimpse of Stan or John W! The fact is that no club is compelled to use TV money to pay higher wages if they don't want, but it's their decision if they do want to. What the 13 clubs who voted in favour of these regulations were doing had nothing at all to do with competition or the long term financial stability of the game - since each club could do all of these things without any new regulations if it thought they were in its best interests - but had everything to do with stopping other clubs spending on players and wages. Thus United can spend their matchday income and Chevrolet sponsorship on what they want since they're bigger than anyone else's. Arsenal must be allowed to do as they will with their matchday income. But City compete on TV income, so that is hedged with restrictions to erode the club's ability to compete. Those clubs who voted for these regulations have this in common - they did not want other clubs to become more competitive than they are. It's like MPs who decide they are unduly deserving of bumper pay rises, but they don't need to break the law to get them.