The ascent of Queens Park Rangers and Norwich City to the top table in English football, soon to be followed by the winners of the playoffs (Cardiff City, Reading or Swansea City), triggers all manner of estimates of the financial boost that these clubs will experience. Promotion to the English Premier League (EPL) is said to be worth £90m to these clubs, with at least £40m coming from a mix of TV income, sponsorship and gate receipts. Even if these clubs are relegated back down to the Championship after one season with the ‘elite’, they are still guaranteed a further £48m in the form of parachute payments over the next four seasons.
The eventual third promoted club will no doubt luxuriate in their having won the ‘Most Valuable Game in the World’. And while broadcasting income from the EPL selling the rights to screen matches domestically and abroad continues to rise, the ‘MVGW’ will be spun into an increasingly important event. Only later will complaints be heard of the injustice of income distribution in the EPL and the time constraints associated with newly-promoted clubs assembling their squads.
While we are familiar with these fairy-tales of ‘rags-to-riches’ for clubs from ‘sleepy backwater’ towns, we have also heard time and again of the perils of competing in the EPL and being relegated from it. ‘Riches –to-rags’ might sum up the experience of some of the worst affected clubs. Leeds United remain the best example of a club crashing and burning after relegation from the top tier, but there are plenty of others. Portsmouth FC, for instance, whose seven-year membership of football’s elite club brought administration and precious little in the form of ground improvements, with only the consolation of a second ever FA Cup Winners title to parade. In seven years, Portsmouth FC enjoyed a multi-million pound income stream, but through financial mis-management and the onset of the global financial crisis, the club shows few signs now of the impact of these riches.
In a polarised world of EPL fat-cats and the battle over the crumbs left by the big four, five or six clubs, it’s easy to forget the other side of professional football in the UK – the non-league. In a variation on the fight for top-flight status, here promotion up the leagues can prove to be an immediate hardship, not one that you only regret years later. According to point 8 of the following list from The Ball is Round, the cost of promotion up the non-leagues can be punitive. Players demand higher wages, ground improvements must be made otherwise the club is not allowed into the higher league. There are longer travelling distances involving costlier travel and accommodation. The final step before the Football League proper is the Blue Square Bet Premier, where costs are inflated by most clubs being fully professional.
The Ball is Round call it the “inverse economics of non-league football” and it means that only those clubs with rich owners willing and able to finance the losses that promotion involves. With each step up the non-league, the gap grows between the increased income generated by higher attendances and sponsorship deals, and the extra costs of competing at a higher level. It all sounds eerily familiar and for every Manchester City you can identify a Crawley Town in the non-league prepared to bankroll their way to success. At the top level there are soon to be new financial ‘fair play’ rules designed to prevent clubs from spending more than they earn. But at the non-league level in England no system exists to enable the rise of the ‘minnow’ from the ‘backwaters’.