Soccer

» Brent Sedo - Corruption in the EPL

Hi,

Sooo...I'm just wondering, what of it? Is this one of those nudge, nudge, wink, wink situations, everyone knows it goes on? Could there possibly be 6-8 EPL managers happy to take a bribe or always ready to tap up?

Over here, negotiating/approaching a player, coach or GM already under contract with another team is called "tampering". Rarely alleged and less often proven, although you do hear of the occasional fine.

But didn't the manager at Blackburn move to Newcastle last year a few weeks into the season? Wouldn't he have had to been talking contract with one team while managing the other? I remember that struck me as very odd. How can you be giving your all to one team, when you know in a couple weeks you'll be running a different team in the same league?

A similar incident happened with a coach in ice hockey about 20 years ago, and the coach was suspended for a half season, and the hiring team paid a heavy fine - and he made the switch in the off-season. But he was still under contract to team A, so it was obvious some under-the-table negotiations had been going on.

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» SimonMelville - Corruption in the EPL

In response to Corruption in the EPL posted by BrentSedo:
It's a strange one -- the world of agents is so remote to the fan on the terraces (or just sat at home in front of the TV) that you take the existence of this sort of thing for granted.

And all the papers say it happens, certain chairmen say it happens (Crystal Palace's Simon Jordan is most vociferous in his hatred for agents) and we know players get "tapped up" as it gets revealed in players auto-biographies.

How damaging is it to football? Hard to say. I have to be honest and say while I detest any sort of corruption or graft, it seems to be taking place between a coterie of wealthy managers, players and agents and not exactly affecting the man on the street. I see it as part of the culture of greed/excess that is now part and parcel of football.

If the bungs were stopped, I can't see the savings passed back to the fans!

Not only is this not new (see the George Graham case from a decade ago), kickbacks happen in all industries and I can't be surprised some venal people in soccer are involved.

The Panorama programme certainly was heavy on talk but didn't show anyone taking a bung, so no surprise that the lawsuits seem to be mounting on a daily basis.

Yesterday, Uefa descibed the culture in football as a "bung jungle". My hope is that the whole affair is known as BUNGLE-GATE -- which would just about sum the whole thing up.

-- posted by SimonMelville

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» Brent Sedo - Corruption in the EPL

In response to Corruption in the EPL posted by SimonMelville:
Okay, so the rich are different. But I won't stand for your resigned cynicism-mixed-with-hilarity. You need to move to Portsmouth, and get some passion. Don a wig.

What about Souness changing teams in mid-stream? Would that effect the fans? Who gives a crap what happens this week, next week I'm with a different team (although it appears he's running them into the ground).
Shouldn't there be a RULE against that? Doesn't the League have any responsibility to fair play?

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» SimonMelville - Corruption in the EPL

In response to Corruption in the EPL posted by BrentSedo:
Transfers between clubs have always been part of the game -- even managers switching clubs mid-season. It's great when your club gets a great new player, but sickening when one leaves you.

I don't think that anyone really wants to see that change -- in fact, the decline of the transfer fee worries smaller clubs as they have always relied on producing players and then selling them to bigger clubs.

With the rise of the 'Bosman' transfer (where a players waits until his contract runs out before moving for nothing) there is now a gaping hole in the revenue section of most small teams' business plans.

If anything, the transfer regime will get more liberal. Just this week, an article in the Economist on the subject makes the valid point that footballers are treated totally differently to other high earning individuals.

To quickly quote the end of that article: "Roger Welch, a law lecturer at Portsmouth University, says that, if a test case were brought, the contracts system could well be struck down by the courts. And that would prove a much bigger shock to the beautiful game and its fans than news of a few bribes."

Obviously that suits the Economist's free market principles but that seems to be the way things are going.

Footballers are different to other high earning individuals of course, because they're sportsmen and sport is treated differently to other businesses (although increasingly this is changing).

The lack of loyalty and domination of money is deeply depressing but I think clubs would do better to accept the new reality and plan accordingly -- otherwise we will have no small clubs left at all.

-- posted by SimonMelville

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» SimonMelville - Corruption in the EPL

In response to Corruption in the EPL posted by BrentSedo:
Just to address the manager issue.

Yes, you're right it is a strange one. I guess that everyone in football knows that the lot of a manager is not a happy one and that they always get the blame and the elbow (and a pay-off, of course) when things go wrong.

When they jump ship mid-season they get pilloried but seeing as they get villified even more when things go wrong and they're only doing what players do, it's just accepted as an unpalatable fact.

As long as it's not happening to your club, you generally just find it funny (with a tinge of "there but for the grace of God goes us").

Clubs taking a manager under contract somewhere else do have to pay compensation but it isn't much and is rarely revealed.

Incidentally, Graeme Souness made a bit of a mess of Newcastle and is still out of managerial work since he left the Magpies in February. He has plenty of media work, so I'm not shedding many tears.

-- posted by SimonMelville

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