Week 17: Why We Can’t Let The League Become None League
April 2022 | Accrington
The man sits down on a wall. He is trying to decide if he should watch that day’s lunchtime kick-off. It’s a fairly interesting game for the neutral; Manchester City need a win to go top of the North Division, although Liverpool will get the chance to go above them again the following day. City’s opponent’s, East Lancashire United, need the points to boost their hopes of avoiding the wooden spoon.
He’s in two minds about it. When his local club – the one he’d supported for forty-seven years – was wound up with crippling debts, it had been difficult to get too excited about a new team; especially as ELUFC had only themselves been formed a year ago when Blackburn Rovers and Burnley had merged to the dismay of supporters of both clubs. Not that they had much choice. Financial worries meant that their only realistic option was to combine their resources and it was hardly unique. AFC South London Athletic Lions, North Yorkshire & East Riding FC and Birmingham & District FC – comprising four former-EFL clubs – had all been formed around the same time.
They were just some of the new clubs out of a total of twenty-eight that made up the new English Premier Football League (EPFL) after the governing bodies had merged a few days before Euro 2021 began. Split into two geographical leagues – EPFL North and EPFL South – they played a regular home and away season before the top four in each division went into playoff system that eliminated teams until the final two met at Wembley Stadium for the deciding game in May and the honour of being crowned English Champions.
Lots of people like it. Stadiums are sold-out without fail, and subscriptions for seasonal packages retail at £129 per month for EPFL North or South matches or £199 per month to watch both. It’s a lot for the man to pay, especially with little in the way of work coming in, but it’s his only football fix unless he watches the ‘foreign stuff’ which he thinks is slow and boring. From the wall he’s sitting on, he can see the stadium where his beloved team once played. It’s empty now, no-one has played there for over 12 months and the grass has grown to almost five feet tall and the stands and discoloured seats show signs of rapid decay amongst all the weeds. Graffiti adorns the outside wall. One says F**K the EPFL but that’s not so easy when there is nothing else. He decides to watch the match after all; East Lancashire have been in pretty entertaining form of late, now the players have got used to each other, and beat Sheffield City last time out. It’s not the same as watching ‘his club’ and nothing will replace that feeling for him but what can he do?
Without the non-league clubs, there is little else that might have interested him. And It’s not as if he can watch any other sports now they’ve all shut down too. And he’s too old for the on-line versions that have cropped up in their place.
Besides, he’s paid his Sky subscription for this month, so he might as well get full use from it.
***
A grim but perfectly plausible glimpse of a dystopian future? Or never going to happen?
Football is beginning to think about what happens after the virus. Even though a proper end is nowhere near in sight, there has been what was called a ‘quickening of the pace’ in the last few days, as ministers and sporting chiefs begin to mull over the resumption and what that might look like.
One thing is certain; it won’t be the same as it was – not for a long time – but that’s not a reason for inactivity or pessimistic overtones. It’s time to begin to pick up the pieces, not be a victim of under-preparation and poor planning of those in charge that some parts of the nation are suffering from.
In the Premier League, under ‘Project Restart’, clubs are beginning to open training grounds this week and think about a step up to full training with a potential 08 June date for recommencement of matches. The EFL, who announced a plan before most, are still keen to get restarted but concede that games will be played behind closed doors initially and at least until an effective testing system is in place. The clubs’ views are somewhat mixed. Lower league clubs fear the lost revenue and costs of playing without fans, but Championship clubs with an eye still on the prize want to continue for, like, one hundred and sixty million reasons.
Scotland has called all but it’s top league early and that one hangs in the balance. Belgium and The Netherlands have already cancelled (the Eredivisie will have neither champions or any relegation *relieved sigh from Alan Pardew*) and many others are waiting for guidance, although Italy and Germany look certain to resume one way or another.
UEFA have the enormous headache of co-ordinating the actions of 55 member associations and have set a deadline of 25 May for leagues to decide if they are stopping or playing to a finish. Having originally threatened disqualification from their competitions if a league is abandoned, they have softened that stance although their next problem is concluding this season’s UCL and Europa League, whilst also making plans for 2020/21. This might mean starting the latter before the former is complete although a Rangers v Wolves final, for example, in the 2019/2020 Europa League would make life difficult as the winner is technically through to the Champions League but might have already started their Europa League campaign as well.
FIFA have already cancelled international games and have now proposed allowing five substitutes in games until the end of 2021, to safeguard overworked players from fatigue if games come thick and fast as they play catch up. Closer to home, the National League has made the call to end its season but is still to vote on how it will be concluded and final placings decided. It’s not an easy call; for example do you just count unplayable matches as 0-0 draws, or go for average points per game? They have to be careful – one possible route (only counting the first game between the clubs) would see one team jump from thirteenth in the current table up to third.
So I was interested to read what Tim Walters, a College Professor at Okanagan College in British Columbia, Canada, wrote in his long (6000 words – and you thought these went on) piece on 22 April http://www.sportingintelligence.com/2020/04/22/opportunity-from-uncertainty-inventing-the-future-of-football-220401/
about the future of football and, to be fair, I agree with some of it. But the nub of it is that we should basically cancel the 2020/21 season and play out the what’s remaining of this one over that 18-month period.
That’s where it unravelled a bit for me. Bear in mind that many clubs have around ten games to play so that ‘idea’ would effectively mean that teams in the EFL would play roughly five home games between now and the European Championships which begin on 12 July next year.
For some Premier League teams, it wouldn’t be financially damning although there are lots of reasons why it wouldn’t be universally accepted. But I also noted that Tim once wrote a feature-length study about ‘the ideological function and revolutionary potential of the commanding heights of modern football — the Premier League, UEFA Champion’s League, and FIFA World Cup — from a Žižekian perspective.’ The perspective is that of Slavoj Žižek, whose musings on the world include ‘Humanity is OK, but 99% of people are boring idiots.’
Now, I might just be one of the 99%, but there is no way that half to three-quarters of professional clubs survive that particular scenario. And that’s just professional ones. Non-league would definitely become None League but the whole viewpoint of the article is at the top elite end. Interestingly, Tim supports Middlesbrough, which makes his stance slightly more surprising as his club would surely be one of those who would struggle to survive without external help or some more incredible generosity from their owner.
Because let’s face it, the government schemes and loans aren’t going to keep clubs afloat, furlough staff and put all lower league football on ice until the second half of 2021. Maybe the proud status of our second to fifth tiers of football will also be our / their undoing. No other country has third tier clubs with average attendances of 30,000. In the fifth-tier, Notts County, to name one, average around 6,000 fans for home games but without games or fans at games, sustainability in these circumstances is impossible.
Officials know there’s little to be gained from games behind closed doors that go beyond the natural cut-off point of June 30. Clubs below the National League, where no broadcast deals exist, rely almost wholly on ticket sales, cash at the turnstiles and additional cash spent during the match (merch, programmes, pies and pints) for their income, but a large proportion of EFL club revenue is derived the same way. They probably shouldn’t rely quite so much on ticket sales but we are where we are. Ground ownership and sharing complications will add more confusion, even if they could stay afloat financially. Many are wondering if they’ll play again; this season, next or maybe ever.
Back to the middle-aged guy at the start of this.
Take away everything else and what is most keenly lost is the heartbeat the club provides to its community; especially outside of the bigger cities. The club means far more than 90 minutes of football every other week. It is essential to many of the people surrounding it in the same way they are essential to the club.
Cancelling 2020/21 would be a dagger to the heart of a huge number of clubs. For some of their fans, their connection to the club is their life. They – we – live for news and updates be it new signings or sneak previews of the new kit. We are up in arms if the club wants to change its badge, we will queue overnight for tickets to a big match and we will be inclined to indoctrinate our children with our club’s values long before they are able to walk or talk. Removing this from people’s lives will have a much worse impact than we realise.
I don’t necessarily have any answers – like the current science, there is too much that’s unknown – but I know that the future outlined at the start of this article isn’t one of them. Neither is cancelling a year so that the top footballers can have a bit of a rest and TV can spread the action out. That works only in a world where money doesn’t matter and it’s purely down to survival of the financially fittest.
Millions of us love Premier League football, we don’t all support a Premier League club and millions of us will never do so (unless you think that Birmingham & District FC would still contain the essence of Walsall FC within it).
That’s why the next few weeks are as crucial a time as football in this country has faced since 1989, and maybe even since its inception. There are other options that appeal; maybe a shorter regionalised EFL season for 20/21 where there are fewer games but they have a lot riding on them (i.e. a format that keeps most teams in the promotion or relegation shake-up for as long as possible) and thus make up for the shortfall of games with full houses. Or a wildcard scheme in a similar fashion to the Nations League, where teams can get into play-offs for prizes previously out of their grasp. It would be for one season only but imagine the potential jeopardy and rewards; yes, unprecedented but then all of this is unprecedented.
But an English professional league consisting of 28-teams, including East Lancashire United, from which we all have to choose a favourite to follow, in the absence of anything else?
We should all be afraid of that ever becoming reality and do everything we can to avoid it.
No offence to East Lancashire.
words Darren Young, D3D4 columnist