2GS The Sunday Times November 28, 2021 11
and not having an owner — with
commendable stoicism.
Nor are Derby’s fans necessarily
screaming blue murder. They seem
to understand that the outgoing
owner, Mel Morris, repeatedly
breached the FFP laws and that this is
the consequence. No longer do they
sing to opposing fans (especially
Middlesbrough, whose owner, Steve
Gibson, was the most outspoken of
those demanding Derby be taught a
lesson): “We’re Derby County, we do
what we want.” Meanwhile, the club
seem to have a new owner in waiting,
a Midwestern American serial
entrepreneur, Chris Kirchner, who
has announced his intention to buy
the club and has written an open
letter to the fans, which was nice of
him, telling them: “Football [or
soccer as I knew it growing up but
have learnt to correct that over time]Why we must not hand over the
running of football in this
country to the government
On Thursday I attended a Palace For
Life event with Patrick Vieira,
celebrating our club’s foundation,
whose remarkable work makes a
tangible difference to the community
and young people in south London.
It was less than 24 hours after
publication of a fan-led review into
football, chaired by Tracey Crouch
MP. Throughout our event I tried to
reconcile what I’ve seen and lived
every day for 11 years as Crystal
Palace chairman with Tracey’s
opening salvo that the English game
“lurches from crisis to crisis”.
By Tracey’s admission, “there is so
much to celebrate about English
football. The Premier League is the
leading league in the world... the
Championship is by far the biggest
‘second division’ in football... the
work of clubs in their communities
has always been incredible.. .” And
yet within a few paragraphs her
report claims the game is facing
some kind of Armageddon.
It cites three rather disparate
calamities — the demise of Bury, the
failed European Super League, and
the Covid pandemic — as the basis to
argue that the government must
urgently implement some 47 drastic
and irrevocable changes.
There are elements we agree on:
heritage, stadiums need protecting,
and some financial controls —
especially in the EFL, where real-time
reporting of finances may stop clubs
falling off the same cliff as Derby
County. Tracey has consulted a lot of
people but just because people have
been consulted it doesn’t mean the
output reflects a consensus.
The Premier League, FA, PFA and
EFL don’t believe football needs a
government regulator, yet Tracey
proposes one and powerful,
popularist voices such as Gary Neville
endorse that view.
Gary is a great guy, fantastic
broadcaster and his role in
dismantling the Super League was
commendable — but I find it hard to
fathom his logic that we need to hand
the running of football to a
government he regularly berates.
Let’s start with Bury. Football
clubs are among the most resilient
businesses ever created. Bury (who I
believe will re-emerge in some guise)
are one of a tiny number of
professional clubs that have ceased to
operate in the past 100 years.
No other industry can claim
such longevity and it’s a myth that
only the Premier League can make
money. The Championship has the
sixth-highest revenue of any league
in Europe. League One revenues
are broadly similar to the
Scottish Premiership.
Covid? The pandemic slashed the
revenues around the world but the
Premier League emerged almost
unscathed, with no government
support, and increased its
contributions to the lower leagues to
ensure no club went out of business.Steve Parish
power — you can’t buy something
because I don’t like your friends.
Sounds more like something from
North Korea. Rather than nebulous
tests that will make it harder for
football to find investors, the key to
sustainability is sensible controls on
spending — and yet the review looked
at models of financial regulation
around the world and concluded
none offered a solution.
This just isn’t logical. The whole of
US sport is financially regulated via
salary caps to ensure almost no one
loses money, nearly every team rises
in value and there are always buyers
and investors.
Applying principles like those,
rather than chasing off investors, is
the way forward. Football has thrived
in England not least because of
investment from overseas and our
model is so effective that other
countries are moving towards it. The
Netherlands has and Germany is
rumoured to be removing the “50+1”
ownership rule. Yet this review wants
us to turn away from our policies just
as everyone is trying to copy us.
Its proposals include making new
owners place potentially three years
of a club’s running costs in cash in a
bank account. Few are going to invest
on that basis. A simple salary cap
linked to turnover, on the other
hand, would solve sustainability
issues in one fell swoop.
What about redistribution of
income to lower leagues? There are
ways we can generate huge sums to
reinvest but the report’s proposal of a
10 per cent levy on transfers is not the
solution. We already pay 4 per cent to
the FA and 5 per cent in solidarity
money on European transfers. We’re
in a global market for talent and a
further levy would make English
clubs uncompetitive. It would also
affect the smaller Premier League
clubs more than the rich ones.
Here’s a sum to think about:
£2 billion. That is roughly the net
balance of payments deficit to
overseas clubs, in each three-year
cycle, paid by Premier League clubs.
In other words, roughly 22 per cent of
all Premier League media income is
effectively gifted to mainly European
clubs simply because we have a less
effective and understandable work
permit system compared to places
like Germany, France and Italy.
We have made those countries
almost “approved suppliers of talent”
to our leagues. German clubs can buy
Alphonso Davies and Christian Pulisic
when young and inexpensive, then
sell them on to us at inflated prices.
Our policy is so flawed the Germans
can even buy our own talent, like
Jadon Sancho, for almost nothing and
sell them back at enormous profit. If
the government really wants to help,
it could fix this issue in an afternoon
and use the cash it would effectively
generate to help the wider game.
Steve Parish is the chairman of
Crystal PalaceAs for the Super League — which
didn’t actually happen — the report
says fans should be able to block any
competition not sanctioned by Fifa
or Uefa. Yet anyone, in any league
around Europe, will tell you Uefa and
Fifa are the biggest threat to national
leagues. The Super League didn’t fail
because Uefa doesn’t want one (in
fact their proposals looked pretty
similar). The Super League was
conceived because its member clubs
did not want to share the media
money the Champions League
generates with Uefa.
While we can agree that crests,
stadiums and so on should not
change without fan consent I’m
sceptical about shadow boards. Who
sits on them? How are they elected?
In my experience you will never find
anyone who reflects the whole
fanbase. I would suggest we make
heritage matters subject to a vote of all
season ticket holders and members.
Perhaps the most complex issue is
the owners’ and directors’ test.
Present criteria are similar to when
buying into other businesses: is your
money legit? Are you a criminal?
Have you made a plea bargain to
avoid jail? If you pass those tests but
the Premier League rejected you, it
would be taken to court and you
would win. That was the case with
Newcastle United and the
government, including Tracey, knows
full well they would have allowed it.
The review proposes a ramped-up
integrity test, including “the
consideration of the integrity and
reputation of any close family
member or business associate of the
proposed owner”. Wow, that’s some‘You can’t buy
because I don’t like
your friends’ sounds
like something from
North Korea
has been a part of my life since I
could walk. My father introduced the
game to me [futbol as he called it
growing up in South America] at a
very early age and I spent most of my
life playing the sport.”
Kirchner’s first task will be to drag
the club out of administration.
Shortly, I suspect, he will begin to
realise that while Morris played fast
and loose with the FFP rules, much
as did Yongge at Reading, an awful lot
of the blame for the various points
deductions in the Championship is
down to the grotesque injustice of
parachute payments to clubs
relegated from the Premier League.
The rest of the division simply
cannot compete unless they break
the rules. And when seen from that
perspective those rules do indeed
seem unfair, a case of rubbing salt in
the wound.thing now is run, and afterwards the
technical and quality will come.
When I was younger, it was enough to
make a few passes or score a goal, but
this is modern football — if you come
to the Premier League and don’t like
running, you will get smashed.”
The hardest opponents to defend
against? “Well, I thought Sadio Mané
was a different level but then in last
game, Allan Saint-Maximin [of
Newcastle] — he’s unbelievable. I was
telling him, ‘Do you not get tired? Do
you just run all the time?’ I guess he
only attacks and maybe that’s why he
doesn’t get as tired as me and Rico,
who are up and down. He has been
the biggest test.”
Benítez is special not only to his
mum. Canós grew up a Valencia fan,
attending matches at the Mestalla
with his dad, and reveres the side that
won two Spanish titles and the Uefa
Cup under Benítez from 2001 to 2004.
“We still love him in Valencia,” Canós
says — though, in truth, his real foot-
ball love is for the club he represents.
On that first start against Rotherham,
he reflects: “The Brentford from then
and the Brentford from now is the
same. All the fans who were in Griffin
Park that day, they’ll be there [in the
new Brentford Community Stadium]
on Sunday and enjoying their little
Brentford, in the Premier League.
“A lot of things have changed, and
to stay in the Premier League we need
to keep demanding a lot from each
other. But the passion and the happi-
ness is still there. How close we are to
everyone in the club. It’s a family
thing. It’s a Brentford thing.”he swiftly rejoined Brentford, who
broke their transfer record to sign him
for what now seems an utterly larce-
nous £2.6 million.
He has been unafraid to make bold
career calls. “Well, that comes from
me being very... stubborn. If I think
something’s not right and have to
make a decision, I don’t shy. If the
decision goes wrong, I’m not going to
regret it.” The way he sees things is: “If
I’m not brave, I can’t tell my sister to
be brave or my mum to be brave. The
idea of ‘no regrets’ is something I have
a lot in my mind.
“When I had that bad six months, I
remember regretting a lot of times
coming to Liverpool. I had left Barce-
lona and every week I thought, ‘Why
did I come here?’ And then I thought,
‘Wait, why am I regretting? Why am I
wasting energy on something I cannot
control? This situation is making me
stronger.’ Thanks to those six months,
I’m the person who I am today.”
Another big career moment came
early in 2019, when Frank went to
3-4-3 and moved Canós from winger
to wing back. Suddenly he had to
learn about defending, and continues
to work closely with Frank’s assistant,
Brian Riemer, on defensive position-
ing. He says, candidly: “I’m still adapt-
ing to the position because I have
never defended, never faced some-
one in a one-v-one situation, never
defended the back post, like I’m doing
now. It’s a challenge and I like it.
“Everyone knows I like to attack, to
create and score goals but if the coach-
ing staff needs me to do that job I’m
happy to do it. Everyone knows I’m
not the best at [defending] but I think
I’ve improved quite quickly and can
be a good wing back in this league.”
Frank is “very demanding” and
Canós says he is happy to do all the
running that playing wide in Brent-
ford’s system demands. “I wasn’t so
happy to run a few years ago but my
mentality has changed. These days
every team runs a lot. I think the first
Burnley v Tottenham
Burnley’s James
Tarkowski and Ashley
Westwood are
banned. Spurs should
be much changed
from midweek.
6 Match of the Day 2,
BBC1, 10.30pmLeicester City v
Watford
Leicester’s Jonny
Evans will have a late
test. Watford’s Ismaila
Sarr and Nicolas
Nkoulou are injured.
6 Match of the Day 2,
BBC1, 10.30pmManchester City v
West Ham United
Manchester City will
check Phil Foden and
Jack Grealish. West
Ham will recall Michail
Antonio.
6 Match of the Day 2,
BBC1, 10.30pmTODAY’S OTHER PREMIER LEAGUE MATCHES
ON TV TODAY
Brentford v Everton
Sky Sports Main, Kick-off 2pmGary Neville, the former Manchester
United and England defender,
believes the football authorities will
do their utmost to stop plans for an
independent regulator. Neville, who
has campaigned for change in the
sport, said after the publication of
Tracey Crouch’s report: “I’ve no
doubt [those in] the corridors of
power will meet in the coming weeks
and try to come up with a plan to
bring forward some proposals which
mean that they will suggest that we
don’t need an independent
regulator in the next 12 months.
However, we know what you’re really
like now.”NEVILLE SCEPTICAL
ABOUT CHANGE