What I’m Reading: May 6, 2007

The economics of the Premier League (EPL) and the global rush to buy English teams proved to be the topic du jour this week. You know the league is making a splash worldwide when it gets a long article in the American news weekly Time Magazine. That article showed how the EPL has gone from a troubled and unprofitable league in the 1980s to last season, when it earned around $2.5 billion in revenue worldwide. Adam Smith writes that “The Premiership’s triple play – losing the hooligans, luring big money at home, expanding overseas – has made it the envy of other sports leagues.”

Losing the hooligans and getting more UK-based money have been necessary prerequisites to the EPL’s success, but it is really the overseas expansions that has made the league into the economic juggernaut it is today. The EPL, for example, gets $1.23 billion a year in TV rights outside of the UK, nearly a quarter of its total income.

This worldwide reach has had both positive and negative effects back home. Sponsors are eager to sign up, knowing their brand will get worldwide exposure. Martin Sullivan, CEO of insurance giant, AIG said his company’s sponsorship of Manchester United wasn’t about the UK market, but instead “buying Asia.”

Flush with cash, English clubs can now lure the best players from around the world with high salaries (there are over 300 foreign players in the EPL). Fans in England have been treated to a footballing master class in the past few years as world-class players have come to their once humble league. But as their league has become more and more financially successful, it has also attracted less wanted newcomers: foreign owners. As Richard Scudamore recently told the Sunday Telegraph, “One of the consequences of becoming of interest globally is that you’re going to attract global interest not just in a fan sense but in an owner sense.”

Many of these new owners are Americans and Mark Zeigler gave a run-down of the Yanks who recently have bought into or are planning to buy into the EPL. The main reason for these wealthy businessmen to buy English teams is, not surprisingly, economic. Ziegler quotes David Carter, executive of USC’s Sports Business Institute saying, “What you’re starting to see is that this isn’t about a love for soccer. It’s about the love of money. These guys understand that sports is a global opportunity for them, and they see an opportunity for growth.”

Americans George Gillett (R) and Tom Hicks (L) recently bought Liverpool

Also unsurprisingly, many English fans are not happy to have their beloved clubs seen simply as growth opportunities. The clubs being bought up have long histories and deep connections to the communities where they sprung up. This connection was evident in local owners (Adam Smith points out in the Time article that Manchester United “was led through much of the ’60s and ’70s by an enterprising local butcher”) who had little interest in profiting from clubs. Indeed, the idea that club directors were not to profit from this work was codified by the FA, as David Conn points out in an article for Sports Illustrated.

The history of the game supports the gut instinct of many fans that these men were supposed to remain true to their own descriptions of themselves as “custodians” of the clubs, and not make money out of them. The FA imposed rules on the clubs’ constitutions that prevented directors being paid salaries and limited shareholders’ dividends.

But, as Conn points out, this rule was largely ignored as teams became publicly listed companies, a change which ultimately made it possible for wealthy investors to come in from outside and take over local clubs.

The economic success of the Premier League is a double-edged sword, especially for English fans. They are happy to see their make money which can buy them better players, coaches, and ultimately success. But they also worry that these profits are bringing in characters who only see potential profit and are ignorant of the clubs’ histories and tradition. Economic success has fundamentally changed the Premier League. The only question is whether these changes are positive or negative.

While the new American investors got the lion’s share of attention this week, Patrick Barclay had an interesting article in the Telegraph headlined Chelsea Owe it All to Yelstin. Barclay writes that the recently deceased former Russian leader “was responsible for creating the so-called ‘oligarchs’, among them Roman Abramovich.” It should also be pointed out that Portsmouth’s new owner Alexandre Gaydamk is the son of Arcadi Gaydamak, another Russian who profited enormously from Yelstin’s breakup of formerly state-run Soviet enterprises. Perhaps Bill Clinton had a Reagan-esque moment with Yelstin in private: Mr. Yelstin, tear down these state-owned monopolies and enrich oligarchs who can later invest in Premier League teams. Perhaps not.

Thanks, Boris!

Private ownership of clubs is becoming more and more commonplace in England, but this is not the case in Argentina, where Neil Clack writes in that “Argentinian law currently states that football clubs must be non-profitable organisations, owned exclusively by supporters.” This law, however, is being questioned because some see it as allowing the notoriously violent barra brava fan clubs to flourish. Writes Clack in the Sunday Herald,

The [Argentine] government looks to Europe and sees that privately-owned clubs don’t have the problems brought by democracy and elections. In Argentina, with hooligan groups counting for so many votes, it is in the interests of club presidents to keep them sweet, supplying them with free tickets and travel, turning a blind eye to criminal activities.

The Argentine police have not been terribly successful in controlling violence wrought by the barra bravas. This lack of success, Clack writes, is partly due to past excesses. Police, Clack writes, “are obliged to take a cautious approach, at first, as a result of the legacy of the military dictatorship, when police brutality was extreme. Nipping the problem in the bud is certainly not the policy as they line up with riot shields in front of the fighting, but taking little action.”

Argentine police arrest fans in February

There was an interesting series of articles in the Guardian this week on the Arsenal women’s team, including a great set of photos of the team in action. Arsenal has largely dominated the Women’s Premier League (they haven’t lost in the competition since 2003) and this year achieved something new: winning the Women’s UEFA Cup, the equivalent of the Champions League. In doing so, they beat Sweden’s Umea, who can count the brilliant Brazilian Marta in their ranks.

Georgina Turner reports on the Arsenal Ladies and hopes that their recent success can be carried over into the upcoming Women’s World Cup with England.

I have to admit that I pay far less attention to the women’s game than I do to the fellas. I do wonder, however, if we may be reaching a sort of critical mass in women’s soccer. Since the first Women’s World Cup in 1991, the competition has been dominated by a few countries (USA, Canada, China, Germany, Norway, and Sweden). Even in the successful 1999 tournament in the US, most of the teams at the competition were extremely poor (see, for example, the Americans’ 7-1 victory over what was promised to be a “strong” Nigerian team).

It would be nice if there were more teams who could put out strong teams in the women’s game. I recognize the many impediments against doing so (most notably, sexist attitudes against women playing soccer in many parts of the world), but believe it’s only a matter of time before this happens. Brazil’s rise in the past few years has been phenomenal. Could England be next?

An Arsenal Ladies player holds her cleats

Though it’s not soccer-related, I was fascinated by a New York Times article on alleged bias in refereeing in the NBA. According to an academic study, “players who were similar in all ways except skin color drew foul calls at a rate difference of up to 4% percent depending on the racial composition of an N.B.A. game’s three-person referee crew.” It’s important to note that this nobody claims that the bias is intentional, or even conscious. The Times reporter, Allan Schwarz, quotes another academic who says that: “There’s a growing consensus that a large proportion of racialized decisions is not driven by any conscious race discrimination, but that it is often just driven by unconscious, or subconscious, attitudes. When you force people to make snap decisions, they often can’t keep themselves from subconsciously treating blacks different than whites, men different from women.”

In an interview with the radio show Marketplace, Schwarz says that players deny the existence of bias in referees’ decisions, but claims that this does not disprove the study.

I think need to remember this type of bias . . . the whole point behind it is it is not detectable by the person who experiences it. Or certainly not detectable in any accurate manner. It is a phenomenon that can only be diagnosed through a very large amount of interactions and data. And no individual player could possibly amass that type of experience

Others, including the NBA itself, also dispute the results of this study. That said, I wonder what the results would be if someone were to try to do a similar study in soccer. Many European leagues have players of all different backgrounds, although the referees are almost exclusively white. Actually, aside from Uriah Rennie, I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a non-white referee in a top level European match. Given that, would there be similar results to those of the study reported on in the Times? I don’t know, but it would be interesting to find out.

Uriah Rennie chats with Sir Alex

Finally, a few quick hits to finish off:

• A player in the J-League was suspended for violating the substance abuse policy. It turned out, though, that he had taken an IV filled with a garlic infusion. I don’t know if it’s more strange that he was taking garlic via IV or that he was suspended for doing so.
• The blog Rank and Vile reported on the fight to bring a “proper rectangular stadium” to Melbourne. Currently, the local team, the Melbourne Victory, are forced to use the Telstra Dome, a facility designed for Australian Rules football.
• It seems like it wasn’t that long ago that African players in Europe were relatively rare. Now, they are everywhere, as a recent Reuters round-up shows.
• Ehud Olmert currently has single-digit approval ratings. Not surprising, then, that there have been protests urging him to resign. I like the red card reference used by protesters.

• Want to wear a dishadashah and support Argentina? The blog 360east.com shows you how.

Where can I get one of these bad boys?

• And a bizarre sport to finish off. Parkour, anyone? I have no idea how to describe it exactly, so check out the Wikipedia article on it or the recent write-up it got in the New Yorker.

Parkour: it’s something like this

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 6th, 2007 at 4:37 pm and is filed under What I'm Reading. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.