Dear editor,
My name is Lars Backe Madsen, staff reporter at Dagens Næringsliv (DN), a leading Scandinavian newspaper equivalent to Financial Times in the UK. Based in Oslo, I mainly write broader documentaries and features for our Saturday magazine.
Currently, I am working on an article about the money madness in international football in general, and English football in particular – and I want to ask editors and other people at the best English football fanzines about the situation for fans in general in 2016
More money than ever in history is poured into the Premier League clubs, more money than ever is spent on transfers, salaries and VIPs – and at the same time ticket prices are rising, as we have seen this winter. I sincerely hope you have time to answer the few questions I have included. My report will be published in our Saturday magazine March 5th.
Best regards,
Lars Backe Madsen
Do you
think more supporter ownership would be for the good of English football?
Yes I do. I believe that football clubs morally belong
to their supporters. To strike a theological comparison, I felt like a priest,
sure in his knowledge and understanding of both doctrine and scriptures, yet
unable to delineate a cogent and credible explanation of what life after death
would actually involve. Politically, it’s rather like the Socialst Party of Great
Britain’s absolutist position as regards Socialism; we know the radiant future
under workers’ control won’t be like capitalism, but we can’t quite describe
how things will pan out, other than mentioning the abolition of money. Sadly,
there is one reality we do know about attempting to transform Newcastle United
into a fan owned entity; it will take a lot of money. My mantra regarding
Newcastle United has always been that we need Mike Ashley OUT and 100% Fan
Ownership IN, though I’m prepared to take 51% as a transitional demand. I’m not, and I freely admit this,
particularly conversant on the finer points of detail regarding fan involvement
and ownership models in La Liga, the Bundesliga, FC United of Manchester or the
proposals for Bath City.
In
2007, almost 27,000 of us, many after reading an article in When Saturday Comes, paid £35 each to
create a fund to buy a club. The one that was chosen was Gravesend &
Northfleet of the Conference South, whose name was changed to Ebbsfleet United
after the takeover. As the club didn’t have two pennies to rub together, the
takeover was broadly welcomed by the fans as a means of securing the club’s
future. Each stakeholder received one vote, which could be exercised in all
major decisions, but no dividends. Unnecessarily and unhelpfully, in my
opinion, stakeholders also could vote in team selection and transfer dealings.
To me, this caused a major problem; the stakeholders are not as knowledgeable
about the technical intricacies of the game as the football people. When, not
if, we take over Newcastle United, I am convinced we must appoint a robust,
effective management structure, that encompasses every aspect of the club from
the first team to the catering operation, that has the best people possible,
remunerated accordingly and competitively though without any incentivised
element, working autonomously in their role that they were appointed to after a
rigorous selection processes in which all full club members (a definition of
who they will be is to follow) are involved at each step. Obviously, all those
in managerial roles will be fully accountable and subject to immediate recall,
whereby they would be required to explain their actions at an EGM.
At
the end of Ebbsfleet United’s first season, the team won the FA Trophy, as well
as the Kent Senior Cup. All well and good it seemed, except that over 50% of
stakeholders failed to renew for the 2008/2009 season. By the third anniversary
in 2010, which coincided with relegation from the Conference, membership was
down to 3,500. You do the maths; the club income from the stakeholders was now
negligible. Despite this, promotion back to the Conference was achieved in
summer 2011 but before the fourth anniversary of the takeover came round, the
club announced it needed an immediate cash injection of £50,000 to simply
survive. Begging letters were sent out. At this point, I decided not to throw
good money after bad and checked out of the project. The valiant few remaining
stakeholders voted to hand the club over to Fleet Trust, a group of concerned
supporters, who eventually brokered a deal whereby KEH Sports Limited, a
Kuwaiti registered firm, took control of the club for a nominal amount and
settled the debts. From democracy to dictatorship in ten short weeks; the
experiment in fan ownership was over. At the end of 2014/2015, Ebbsfleet United
finished 8th in the Conference South. Despite this bizarre story,
they remain solvent and stable, which is no bad thing. Interestingly, FC United
of Manchester have reached the Conference North; I wish them well, but my
instinct tells me (though I hope I’m wrong) that this level, the one below full
time professionalism, is perhaps the glass ceiling for 100% fan owned clubs.
Time will tell and I hope to be disabused of my reservations by the course of
events.
Obviously
the main problem for those investing in the www.myfootballclub.co.uk experiment
was that people were becoming involved in a club they had no connection with.
The lack of emotional ties meant walking away when the annual renewal notice
turned up wasn’t a hard decision for many. Unlike certain rapacious venture
capitalists we could name, it’s almost certain people didn’t sign up to try and
make money from this scheme, but out of curiosity and possibly a naïve hope to
effect change. With Newcastle United it will be very different; the loyalty,
passion and affection for the club, the city and the region will draw in,
potentially, hundreds of thousands of members. Yes, I know the ground only
holds 52,000, but there’s far more to Newcastle United than just the match day
experience.
I
think that there needs to be two levels of membership at Newcastle United. For
the sake of argument, we can call these ordinary members and full members.
Ordinary members pay a nominal sum each year; say £60, or a fiver a month,
which is what Labour Party membership costs. For this they get a vote in all
structural and philosophical questions and resolutions about the club mission
statement, the ethics of any sponsors, future plans for the ground and with the
community. In short, they will help shape the vision and policy for the new
Newcastle United, by being involved in the writing and adoption of the club’s
constitution. I envisage that ordinary members will encompass everyone from
lapsed attenders, exiled Geordies and members of the local community (by that I
mean everywhere from Darlington to Berwick) who cares about Newcastle United.
Any and every local sports team, union branch, social club, residents
association, pub, small business or other properly constituted organisation,
could buy themselves an ordinary membership. It would be the choice of the
individual organisation how they ascertained a democratic mandate for all
voting matters. For instance, if we bought ordinary membership for The Popular Side, we would consult with
all contributors as to their opinions, before voting. Of course, I could also
purchase my own membership, as well as persuading my union branch, employer,
constituency Labour Party and every other club and organisation I’m a member
of, to take out membership. We are talking at a potential membership of at
least 1 million people, though 10% of that would be nice.
Then,
there is the idea of the full member; these would be season ticket holders.
Whether that’s in Level 7 or a private box, it doesn’t matter; one season
ticket, one vote, but on every single aspect of club policy, other than team
affairs beyond the hiring and firing of the head coach, who would have sole,
ultimate responsibility for performances on the pitch. The head coach, like all
senior managers, but not all employees, would be subject to immediate recall by
full members. The question of the internal structures and committees that would
show fan ownership in practice would need to be established around the time of
our new club constitution and mission statement post takeover. I’m open to
persuasion whether full members should pay the £60 per annum ordinary
membership fee as well as their season ticket money.
Hand
on heart; I know the money raised from fans wouldn’t be enough to buy the club.
My fervent hope would be that fan investment could constitute 51% of the capital
involved in the club; the rest could come from larger investors. I would be
particularly happy if local councils (Newcastle, North Tyneside, Gateshead,
South Tyneside, Castle Morpeth, Wansbeck and Derwentside at least) were able to
use finance from any future plans for devolved government to become the kind of
ethical investors we would hope for.
Am
I naïve? Am I hopelessly romantic? You tell me…
Supporters have started to protest against the rising ticket prices in
Premier League and other leagues in England. Do you support the protests – and
why?
Of course. Ticket prices have risen at three times the
rate of inflation since the advent of the Premier League. With the unimaginable
wealth guaranteed by the latest broadcasting deal, the money raised by ticket
sales is almost irrelevant to the biggest clubs. As the Football Supporters’
Federation states, twenty's plenty.
That seems a reasonable price for all fans. Witness Liverpool’s humiliating
climb-down regarding next season’s proposed ticket price; it was fan opinion
that made the board act. It is lesson supporters of every club should learn.
Do you
think club owners in general are working towards the interest of broad and
local supporter groups?
Club owners are venture capitalists; their loyalty is
to the profit system. Any miniscule sop to fans is done to minimize the risk of
protest, rather than for altruistic reasons.
Back in
year 2000, the British author Simon Freeman wrote a book called “Own Goal: How
Corruption, Egotism and Greed is destroying Football”. Do you think the
situation is better or worse than in 2000?
Considerably worse and deteriorating by the year. The obscene amounts of money at the top end of
the game that make players millionaires by the time they are 20, and bankrupt
by 35 in many instances, should have improved the amateur and junior ranks of
the game beyond imagining. Instead, the amateur game loses clubs year after
year and junior teams are forced to play knee deep in mud because of a lack of
4G pitches. There is an easy solution to the problems of Britain’s ever wetter
winters; install 2 full sized, floodlit 4G pitches at every High School in the
country and 2 small sized, floodlit 4G pitches at every Primary.
I’m not saying 4G is a panacea for all the ills of the
game or better than grass, but it is a practical, reliable alternative when
inclement conditions prevail. Also, if floodlights were part of the package,
youth and Sunday leagues could avail themselves of the facility, meaning that
games could take place from Friday evening to Sunday evening, with the rest of
the week available for training. There is a market out there for teams wanting
midweek facilities outdoors and regular practises would keep wavering kids and
shadow squad players involved.
I’m also not saying 4G is the solution for all
grassroots (should that be astroturf roots?) clubs, mainly because it costs a
hell of a lot to install. So, how do we pay for it? The simple
answer is cancelling Trident and chasing the tax-avoiding multi-nationals for
what they owe. If that’s not imminently feasible, then get the FA to place a 5%
levy on all transfer fees and deduct 1% of all salaries and bonuses in the
Premier League. Surely any sane person would see the moral imperative in that.
However, I won’t hold my breath, either for decent weather or, more poignantly,
universal decent facilities.
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