Matt Maher: Football regulator will not be a moment too soon

If ever there was a statistic to sway the most ardent cynic of the need for football governance reform, it is surely that?

The numbers, contained in a research paper by football finance experts Christina Philippou and Kieran Maguire, were certainly enough to help convince the government.

Its endorsement this week of a fan-led review which called for the introduction of an independent regulator to run the game, was confirmation change is on the way. The only remaining questions are just how far and how quickly they are prepared to take it. Time really is of the essence.

Clubs getting into financial difficulty is not a phenomenon which arrived with the Premier League. Bad owners have existed for as long as the sport itself and no amount of legislative change could ever entirely eradicate them, or the risk which comes with running any business.

The difference now is the sheer number of clubs getting into trouble, at a time when the English game has never been richer. Some clubs have always been bigger than others but the gap between the haves and the have-nots has never been greater, with clubs like Bury going to the wall for sums less than a weekly pay packet of some playing at the top.

A fairer distribution of wealth is a key focus of reforms which, if carried through in full, would also see some power finally given back to supporters. The Premier League has pledged to give £1.6billion to the EFL over the next three years though, importantly, more than half of that sum is in the form of parachute payments to relegated clubs, which is hardly much help to those counting the pennies in League Two. This week’s news means the pressure is on to increase the figure to around £2.5bn with the heavy inference if the Premier League fails to voluntarily comply, it will be made to do so by the regulator.

“The industry has moved at a phenomenal rate of growth since the advent of the Premier League,” says Dan Plumley, senior lecturer in sports finance at Sheffield Hallam University.

“The problem with that, as I and others have said many times, is 90 to 95 per cent of that money stays within the Premier League.”

Plumley acts as an advisor to Fair Game, a group of 34 professional clubs from the lower levels of the EFL and non-league who have joined together to demand reform. Research carried out on their behalf found more than half of clubs in Leagues One and Two to be technically insolvent and while ensuring more of the Premier League’s riches trickle down is one thing, bringing in regulations to prevent them being wasted is also crucial.

“We need to look at not just giving more money to clubs around the league but also financial management, cost-control and sustainability too,” adds Plumley. “You need to do both because if not there is a danger any extra money you give clubs just gets swallowed up in player wages.”

Under the government proposals, the responsibility for overseeing governance would fall to the regulator. The biggest question in all of this is just who that regulator should be? The Premier League was quick to voice its opposition when the idea was first mooted last November and having called the shots in English football for three decades, you can bet it will continue to lobby hard against it.

In truth, there will always be the debate of just how independent any regulator can ever truly be? Neither do you have to go far before hitting on the problem of how to implement cost controls without skewing the competitive balance in favour of those who already have the money. No-one should be under the illusion reform will be easy. All this week has delivered is another step in what promises to be a very long process.

And yet, to return to the statistic at the top of this piece, it is necessary. There is never going to be a perfect model for English football which completely satisfies all parties. The only certainty is the current one is broken.

“There isn’t a silver bullet,” says Plumley. “It is going to take time. When you look at some of the numbers, it is potentially going to take 10 years for some clubs to become sustainable.

“But it is the right move to try and go that way. You can’t just do one thing in isolation. It has to be a big reform and it has to be given time.”