Bad owners come in many forms, local or foreign, wealthy or skint. Manchester United followers chant loudly and endlessly their desire to be rid of the wretched Glazer family. Southend United could be wound up in a fortnight because of the debt-stained regime of Ron Martin. Crawley Town’s co-chairman, Preston Johnson, has turned his club into a circus by losing another manager and then turning up in the dugout himself. On it goes, this shame in the national game.
West Bromwich Albion supporters are irate with the club’s controlling shareholder, Guochuan Lai, for failing to repay a £5 million loan. Scunthorpe United fans are desperate to escape the clutches of Peter Swann. Bury devotees look back in anger at the disaster that befell their financially-mismanaged club. On it goes, this exploiting of clubs, this distressing ruination of vital community assets, this ignored cautionary tale.
So much of the English game should be celebrated — the passion of the fans, skill of the players, commitment of the managers and selflessness of everyone inside clubs from permanent staff to match-day stewards to ground staff. So much is right. So many clubs are well run, from Brentford to Brighton & Hove Albion, Port Vale to Wrexham, but too many parts of the football pyramid are beset with problems wrought by the wrong owners, by owners who run out of money or principles, who put cash before any conscience or community.
This crisis is not simply one of ownership of individual clubs but also of leadership of the game. Too many champagne charlatans pile in to English football, accepted by meek authorities. It remains an ineradicable blot on the FA’s reputation that its blazers met Malcolm Glazer for tea, fell for his patter about preserving a national treasure in United and naively allowed him to hoist debt on a historic, adored institution. Glazer’s offspring will walk away with about £3 billion in profit when it is sold.
That’s the hard-earned money of United’s loyal fans, that’s the hard graft of staff and sweat of players. And that’s on the FA: £3 billion sucked out of English football into the Everglades. That’s football-generated money that could have been invested in community football hubs, inner-city cages developing the talent of boys and girls, and more pathways for coaches and referees.
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As everyone delivers breathless dreams for the new year, hope springs eternal among fans and hype springs eternal amid broadcasters. Everyone focuses on Arsenal’s joyous expansion of the title race, on the celebration of young talents like Bukayo Saka and Erling Haaland, and saluting of whole-hearted campaigners like Kieran Trippier, Jordan Henderson and Phil Jagielka, the defensive rock of ages still going strong for Stoke City at 40.
Everyone respects the resurrection of Granit Xhaka and Miguel Almirón and the revival of Marcus Rashford. Everyone admires the management of Mikel Arteta and Eddie Howe, Vincent Kompany, Michael Carrick, Steven Schumacher, Darren Moore, Kieran McKenna, Richie Wellens and hugely capable others. There is so much in the game to delight and distract. There are so many leaders on the field and in the dugout.
Howard Webb is bringing much-needed leadership to the referees’ body PGMOL. Officials are being empowered again, encouraged to back their judgment in the age of VAR and now know they will be supported in Webb’s world of using VAR for maximum impact, minimum interference. It’s also reassuring to encounter Martin Atkinson at game after game, watching on in his new role as coach of the select group one referees. Atkinson was always one of the most respected and sound of officials, and his continued employment should mean improved refereeing standards.
Leadership is out there. The Professional Footballers’ Association has leadership in Maheta Molango campaigning for players’ physical and mental wellbeing. The League Managers’ Association has leadership in Richard Bevan, fighting hard for the welfare of those whose pulse rate races off the scale in games and rarely returns to resting pace the rest of the week.
Leadership is also shown by fans. Even before the pandemic and cost-of-living emergency, supporters were running food banks. At Old Trafford on Tuesday before the visit of Nottingham Forest, the Manchester United Supporters Trust had its usual match-day food-bank. At Anfield on Friday, the Leeds branch of the Liverpool Supporters Club dropped off crates of food near the Kop before the Leicester City game. So many fans of so many clubs organise these life-saving donation points. While other sports deliberate, and politicians dither, football acts.
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But strong leadership is also needed to address some of the ills afflicting fandom. The supposed guardian of the game, the FA, spoke out trenchantly against discrimination before Qatar but its resistance surrendered the moment Fifa ticked it off over rainbow armbands at the World Cup. The FA has some strong individual leaders, and the excellent chair Debbie Hewitt is clearly a force for good, but it has to be more resolute collectively, to remember that it is The FA, the original authority in the game, built on decades of experience, and has to stand up for what is right.
It has to challenge properly that egregious leader of Fifa, Gianni Infantino, and also, having criticised Qatar for its stance on gay rights, call to account those fans making homophobic slurs in English arenas, such as some Nottingham Forest supporters did with their “rent boys” chant towards Chelsea at the City Ground on Sunday. Forest issued a statement swiftly, but it was not condemnatory enough. More leadership was required from the club.
Now it is up to the FA. Those complicit Forest fans cannot plead innocence of the chant’s origins, just as England supporters cannot claim that “no surrender” is simply a song of defiance and not associated with the Troubles. The FA has to take the lead on “rent boys” and chants about Munich and Hillsborough as well as the continued “no surrender” at internationals. The Football Supporters’ Association, inevitably walking a tightrope between fanbases, must also condemn and intervene more. There’s rivalry and there’s crossing the line.
Greater leadership is craved in 2023 for taking on a minority of toxic fans and errant owners, in the year when finally an independent regulator might be confirmed. The Premier League barons have lost the fight against the arrival of a supervisory body without agendas but with powers. Anyone who cares about the game, who still keeps a wary eye on the European Super League raiders, knows the game cannot govern itself.
The FA is too weak collectively (with a respectful nod to Hewitt), too poor and still needs more football expertise on its board. The EFL, while caring and principled, is too weak, too poor and has too large a flock to shepherd efficiently. The Premier League is too focused on greed. As a union, the PFA is inevitably too focused on maintaining players’ wages when the game needs salaries to be far more performance-related.
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So a regulator, even the shadow service set to precede the full organisation, is needed to bring leadership, to ensure owners have acceptable motives and monies, and their financial figures, in and out, are checked regularly. This year is one of belt-tightening for many, certainly for sensible financial management, and football needs better leadership to ensure that.
