It’s fair to say that Mrs Thatcher was no fan of football. She tended to see it through a ‘law and order’ lens, although it has to be admitted that there were serious problems of that kind during the time she was prime minister.
She came up with a completely unworkable membership card scheme for football fans which, if implemented, would have seriously damaged the game. It was another case of treating football fans as second class citizens, although unfortunately that still happens today.
It’s fair to say that Mrs Thatcher was no fan of football. She tended to see it through a ‘law and order’ lens, although it has to be admitted that there were serious problems of that kind during the time she was prime minister.
She came up with a completely unworkable membership card scheme for football fans which, if implemented, would have seriously damaged the game. It was another case of treating football fans as second class citizens, although unfortunately that still happens today.
On Hillsborough, Mrs Thatcher was too ready to accept uncritically the police version of events. The football authorities are right to resist pressure from Dave Whelan and Sir John Madejski to have a minute’s silence for her before games. It wouldn’t be appopriate and it wouldn’t be respected.
Not suprisingly, two rather different interpretations of Mrs Thatcher’s impact on the game are to be found in The Times, part of the Murdoch empire and somewhere to the right of the centre, and The Guardian, the paper for middle class herbivores which is to the left of centre.
Before looking at these two contributions, it is worth bearing in mind that, understandably enough, discussion of Mrs Thatcher’s legacy has tended to prioritise agency over structure, the effect of one woman’s preferences over broader changes in the world economy. The way in which British industry, for example, was exposed to greater competition through trade liberalisation and membership of the common market is generally overlooked.
Similarly, in football, there were globalising forces already at work. Domestically, the top clubs had been fed up with some time with the stuffiness of the Football League and its failure to maximise television revenue, for them in particular.
Owen Gibson, chief sports writer at The Guardian, has provided an in depth analysis which draws attention to the way in which the granting of a satellite licence to Rupert Murdoch ushered in the media revolution that made the Premier League possible. Of course, once the technology was available, it was going to be used, but Sky were particularly effective at making good use of it (and, it has to be said, introducing innovations in presentation).
Gibson’s conclusion is that the Premier League is a child of Thatcher’s Britain in terms of its ruthless divisions between rich and poor, its clear focus on maximising revenue etc. What he doesn’t mention is that it is also a child in the sense that it is a commercial success. In a structurally challenged economy, Premiership football is a success story in terms of invisible exports and giving England a high profile. Sometimes there is more than a hint of the tall poppy syndrome.
Of course, the Premiership model is not perfect and aspects of it could be modified. I would like to see lower increases in parachute payments and higher increases in solidarity payments. There is an issue about the distortion of competition in the Championship as well, although that is the most successful ‘B’ league in the world.
Matthew Syed sets out the standard critque well: ‘Clubs are no longer hubs of the community but profit-maximising institutions. Spectators have become consumers rather than fans. Television rights are no longer handled by the cosy BBC/ITV duopoly, but auctioned to multinationals bankrolled by subscription and advertising. The free movement of labour means that players are recruited transnationally (rather than from the local area)’.
Syed argues that fans and clubs are engaged in a symbiotic relationship in which they exploit each other. Both of them want to win matches and fans demand success from owners. Very few people make any money out of football and the emphasis is on maximising revenue not profits, Football has ‘moved in the direction of free exchange, shorn of the restrictions of the postwar consensus.’ But there are also limits to the sway of free market economics.
It’s very easy to believe in a sepia tinged age of football that was purer, but wealthy businessmen often owned clubs in the past. There were limits to how far they were prepared to subsidise clubs and some took money out of them by various means. Bob Lord, the ‘Burnley butcher’, in fact owned a meat processing business.
Of course there is a role for supporters’ trusts being more involved in clubs and it will be interesting to see what happens in the impending court case involving Portsmouth. But don’t imagine that clubs run on community lines are havens of solidarity. They are often riven by personal rivalries and bitter disputes about matters that appear to be relatively trivial.
It does all come down to identity and as Tim Montogomerie, writing as a Manchester United fan, argued in The Times earlier this week one can legitimately argue that identities in contemporary society are chosen and constructed rather than given by locality. The world has changed and not just because of Mrs Thatcher.