Premiership wages finally gone mad?

[Arginald Valleywater]

Henry is going to earn ?130k a week, Ballack the same, Schevcehnko and Lampard much more. The game has finally lost the plot. What fucking idiot of a manager agrees to these obscene wages?

[Porn crackers]

I totally agree with you. I posted this reply to a recent thread about GP pay being the highest in europe.......

"Author: Porn crackers
Date: 04-19-06 19:54

Dam I was just going to say.... but Cynical Sid beat me to it.

Anyhow I much rather see my GP "earning" ?100K pa. than people like the W.R. in football being "payed" that much a week.......

PC"

[todge]

Arginald Valleywater wrote:

> Henry is going to earn ?130k a week, Ballack the same,
> Schevcehnko and Lampard much more. The game has finally lost
> the plot. What fucking idiot of a manager agrees to these
> obscene wages?

If people stopped watching the money wouldn't be available.
And since when was a football club run as a proper business ?

I stopped watching ages ago when it became apparent that they
were laughing themselves to sleep every night at my expense.

[MegaTon]

Its all lose change for Red Rom!


todge wrote:

> Arginald Valleywater wrote:
>
> > Henry is going to earn ?130k a week, Ballack the same,
> > Schevcehnko and Lampard much more. The game has finally lost
> > the plot. What fucking idiot of a manager agrees to these
> > obscene wages?
>
> If people stopped watching the money wouldn't be available.
> And since when was a football club run as a proper business ?
>
> I stopped watching ages ago when it became apparent that they
> were laughing themselves to sleep every night at my expense.

[Flat_Eric]

You say "if people stopped watching". Fair enough.

But consider this: My late great uncle was a professional footballer for Aston Villa and Blackpool from the late 1930s to the late 1940s (his playing career was interrupted by Army service during the war) and he got paid a normal working man's wage - possibly a couple of bob more but that was it.

Okay there was no blanket TV coverage like there is now, but they still had "the wireless" - and he was still playing every Saturday in front of a packed Villa Park (and in those days, they really did literally pack 'em in - none of this "health & safety" maximum capacity malarkey). The point being that football was every bit as popular back then as it is now.

There is absolutely no justification for players' wages now (I refuse to use the word "earnings" in their case). It's fucking obscene when you've got nurses, firefighters, coppers and others doing dirty, sometimes dangerous jobs for what amounts to a pittance. Last night on the news I saw a feature on the Beckhams' "World Cup Party" that they were throwing at one of their mansions for all their fellow overpaid, overhyped and overrated celebrity friends, and I just wanted to puke at the sheer self-indulgence and over-blownness of it all. But I was just as mad at the TV coverage it was getting, because such arse-licking just encourages them to believe their own press and boosts their already over-inflated egos even more.

Football used to be fun, but it isn't any more. It's just a greed business. And that's one reason that I bother with it far less than I used to. It saddens me the way it's gone over the past decade or so - and I'm sure I ain't alone.

[crofter]

You gotta pay the top players the going rate and then sum, it all harps back to the players now having all the power and the clubs have just got to go along with it, or else the player will "manufacture" a move to somebody willing to pay an obscene amount of money for what they do.
I would be more worried about the hundreds of players in the Premier League who are sitting on the bench or playing reserve football and getting between 30-50k a week for not being "up to scratch".
Sky TV has ruined what once was a "working man's game" with them throwing stupid amounts of money at the FA each year, knowing that if they were outbid on Premiership Football they would lose a giant chunk of their subscribers who pay the bloated costs in the first place.

[davewells]

Variation of rip off Britain. Exploit the poor (majority of footie supporters ain't rich) to pay for the rich to live in style. I played semi pro for 10 years in the 80's and I wish I'd just been that little bit better and luckier.

[sky blue alzer]

Don't forget all the endorsement money, sponsorships, ad appearances, image rights etc.........Boy, do I wish I'd stuck in at the footy a bit harder when I was younger.

[Fraser]

Blame Jimmy Hill if you like until he campaigned to remove the cap on footballer's wages in the late '50s, the wage was set at ?20 per week.

[Jock Strap]

You just have to look at clubs like Leeds who starting splashing out silly money they didn't have. Where did that get them? Relegated. Oh wait they're coming back - oh no they're not!!! Maybe next season.