Should the Premier League be levied?

[WasStefan]

With the money going to the FA to be spent on grass roots/ the EFL? i have seen Mr. Bernstein suggesting as much as a 20% levy with all of it going to the FA.

Would you support 20% of our TV income going to the FA? personally from the fall out of the Wembley none sale i would as long as the majority of it is guaranteed to go to grass roots.

 

[Jonzy54]

I agree.No doubt you will then see the top teams reassert their intentions to renegotiate the TV deal to give them the lion’s share with scaled down payments for the rest.
We all know the self perpetuating greed machine has to get more than everyone else.

 

[merseawolf]

With the money going to the FA to be spent on grass roots/ the EFL? i have seen Mr. Bernstein suggesting as much as a 20% levy with all of it going to the FA.

Would you support 20% of our TV income going to the FA? personally from the fall out of the Wembley none sale i would as long as the majority of it is guaranteed to go to grass roots.

I was only thinking about this while watching my local clubs kids playing on Sunday morning. The pitches were diabolical and made me think how much better it would be on a 4G pitch. We have mens vets and junior teams u7 through to u18's in a village population near 9k. When i was on committee i remember the problems we had in trying to get funding. That was 10+ years ago and i guess its still the same now.

 

[Jonzy54]

I was only thinking about this while watching my local clubs kids playing on Sunday morning. The pitches were diabolical and made me think how much better it would be on a 4G pitch. We have mens vets and junior teams u7 through to u18's in a village population near 9k. When i was on committee i remember the problems we had in trying to get funding. That was 10+ years ago and i guess its still the same now.

Part of the problem is many pitches have just disappeared.Works pitches have gone as have the more than a dozen pitches in the middle of Dunstall.As such the diminished number get extra hammer from adults and kids games over weekends.Throw in the reduced revenue for Parks and Recreation regarding grounds maintenance and we end up with mud baths .

 

[glorybox]

It's one of those strange situations whereby if you had a ballot of fans of premier league clubs to see whether they would like a fairer distribution of income down to grassroots football I'm sure there would be an overwhelming majority verdict...but that wouldn't be reflected by the clubs themselves...thus going against the will of the fans

 

[Yout85]

I think it should be voluntary on the "big club's" part to decide if they want to help out the local area, but it would be very easy to factor in tax breaks and incentives to make it almost a no brainer.

With the ridiculous amounts of money at the top end of football, it's absolutely crazy that money isn't filtering down.

Incentivise, maaaaaan.

 

[Sammy Chungs Tracksuit]

I was only thinking about this while watching my local clubs kids playing on Sunday morning. The pitches were diabolical and made me think how much better it would be on a 4G pitch. We have mens vets and junior teams u7 through to u18's in a village population near 9k. When i was on committee i remember the problems we had in trying to get funding. That was 10+ years ago and i guess its still the same now.

I agree that not enough goes into grass roots football. Things were pretty bad when I was involved that was 15 years ago. I'm not sure I would suggest 20%. I'd have though 5% could achieve quite a lot (say £100m a year) if it was a guaranteed long term income stream so they could buy and mortgage land. As Jonzy says there are too few pitches. 4G pitches reduce maintenance costs and make more use of the existing space through intensive use. The other issue is council owned pitches are poorly maintained and open to other users like dog walkers. The FA need to buy up open spaces and own the pitches in secure areas to stap vandalism and misuse. More of a problem in inner cities oviously. They also need low cost pitch rentals like £10-£15 hour to FA affiliated clubs rather than the ridiculous amounts that councils charge.

 

[merseawolf]

Part of the problem is many pitches have just disappeared.Works pitches have gone as have the more than a dozen pitches in the middle of Dunstall.As such the diminished number get extra hammer from adults and kids games over weekends.Throw in the reduced revenue for Parks and Recreation regarding grounds maintenance and we end up with mud baths .

Yes Jonzy this time of year when i was playing the pitches were fantastic. Well maintained. Now theres so many games on them not looked after properly and its awful even before winter sets in. Just felt sorry for the kids really.

 

[dingle01902]

I've recently been trying to get a project off the ground in Hull. We have £400k of funding which the FA have agreed to matchfund to develop pitches on a park.
Problem is that the council have no money for maintenance, so they need to partner with a community club who will lease free of charge for 25 years on the proviso they cover upkeep.
As the club, which has around 20 kids teams, needs to fence off the area to safeguard the kids and protect the integrity of the pitches, the council have pulled the plug as public access to the community asset would be restricted.

It's like banging ones head against a brick wall trying to cut through the red tape.

 

[Direwolf]

no

 

[Edgmond Wolf]

Top Six should be made to pay millions and millions......gives us a better chance

 

[Pagey]

A levy would be fair but,I wouldnt trust the fa with another 100million a year, perhaps a regional independent group needs setting up, affiliated to the fa?

 

[WasStefan]

A levy would be fair but,I wouldnt trust the fa with another 100million a year, perhaps a regional independent group needs setting up, affiliated to the fa?

20% levy on TV rights would be way more than £100m a year. But yes agree with your post

 

[WolfLing]

Rather than force clubs to pay a fixed percentage of their potential income to a failing organisation, with a history of making poor financial choices, it might be better to introduce an amount clubs have to spend on developing local infrastructure and grass-roots development.

That way the club becomes integral in developing local communities and the money doesn't find it's way into the wrong areas.

 

[mcwolf]

Yes as long as the money is channeled though an independent body to guarantee the money gets to where it should and not in the **** pocket of some ****erney FA spiv

 

[Pagey]

Listening to talk sport the day khan, pulled plug on wembley, the presenter said a deal had been place for 10% since 2001 but the fa never collected it???

 

[Big Saft Kid]

The pitches were very variable in quality when I was involved in colts football 15 to 20 years ago, and my impression is that things have gone downhill big time since then. Went back to the area of W'ton where I was born recently for the first time for about 40 years and couldn't believe my eyes. Two very large recreation grounds where there used to be a total of about 8 full size pitches had completely gone -- all built over. A big former works sports ground nearby which had 3 or 4 excellent pitches in my day also gone -- all houses! I would support a levy but I can't say I would trust the FA with the money!

 

[OLDGOLD]

The more pertinent question would be would you trust the FA to manage it properly and deliver the money where it is supposed to go. Call me a man of little faith but I have FA belief that they would do it properly.....
More likely to sell all the pitches to random Americans......

 

[The Wolf Of Wombourne]

The problem is would you trust the FA to spend the money wisely ... I certainly wouldn't.

The other issue is for all the talk about grass roots I don't think the FA are actually that bothered about it. Most kids who are deemed to have potential are in academies by the age of 8 or 9 so as long as its not hampering players coming through to the England team I think this is a lot of hot air from the FA.

 

[Pagey]

Rather than force clubs to pay a fixed percentage of their potential income to a failing organisation, with a history of making poor financial choices, it might be better to introduce an amount clubs have to spend on developing local infrastructure and grass-roots development.

That way the club becomes integral in developing local communities and the money doesn't find it's way into the wrong areas.

Fair comment, but what about areas without premier league teams like cornwall and birmingham?

 

[WolfLing]

Fair comment, but what about areas without premier league teams like cornwall and birmingham?

Birmingham!

Love it.

 

[Sussex Wolf]

Agree with a levy in principle. The exact percentage would need consideration, as would, I think, reviewing and if needed, adjusting the spread of tv money to clubs, so that the top clubs paid a larger share of the levy. As some others have said, I would worry about the FA spending it, as I could see them directing some of the revenue into other purposes, so I’d favour an independent group set up to determine how this and the existing grass roots funding is spent. Over time it’s likely that less funding would be needed, so I’d suggest the percentage be reviewed after each time the tv rights are tendered, and the revised sums known.

 

[Monketron]

The FA look after the English game, the Premier League only look out for themselves. You can see with the England youth teams how spending money on St George's Park was a good thing. Funding pitches and improving technical / youth coaching for local youth teams is a really important part of that. GIve them the money to do it. Why not levy agent fees? they take so much money out of the game and give nothing back, yet they do very little.

 

[JadeWolf]

Something could definitely be done, some of the pitches my brother plays on of a Sunday are awful. Think the problem now is the academies sign players so young, if you've not been spotted and scouted by the time you're 11 or 12, it's probably not gonna happen. A lot of clubs (I know Wolves do this) run their own soccer schools and things anyway, where they can do their own scouting. Point is, the FA/Premier League won't see the point in putting money into grassroots because the clubs don't get much benefit from it these days. They absolutely should be looking after grassroots football but unless there's something in it for them then they won't.

 

[clivewolves]

The Premier League have not responsibility towards grassroots football so they shouldn't have to pay for it.

The FA might have it in some 'mission statement' but if they really cared they would do something about it, but they don't because it isn't a problem for them.

The only people that can improve grassroots football are the people who have a problem with it. The people who participate in it need to own the problem and find a solution. If they continue to wait for help from someone else the situation won't change. I know it will be difficult, but in my opinion, it is the only way forward. They need to come up with other ways of making the change independently from the FA.

Maybe one idea could be to start local football co-ops with a plan over time to develop the facilities they need.