Like i've said before it's too late now the hos has bolted but i wonder how many clubs are still going today because of the money they get from sky.
Very true in so far as the game required a cash injection, but as you say it's gone too far the other way now. In contrast to those who've done very well out of things, how many have ended up in the brown stuff by over extending themselves over the lust and thirst for cash dangled just beyond their greedy snouts?
How many of those clubs which are still going today on the back of said cash have gone on to incur hyper inflated costs due to increased wage demands? Chicken and egg. How many of them would have been better off being more imaginatively run thus making the most of the influx of such cash? We'll never know. And how much in real terms do the other 72 teams out of the top flight receive anyway?
I think most of us on here are old enough to remember the largely dire conditions of many stadiums pre the Taylor Report. But that was all we'd ever known. I also think most of us know those initial stadium redevelopments were largely funded on the back of government improvement grants as opposed to direct finance via Sky. Yes monies are also now available for those further down the food chain and we can imagine where much of this has come from.......... (Sky et.al)
https://www.footballfoundation.org.uk/funding-schemes/premier-league-the-fa-facilities-fund/......... but those monies given through gritted teeth and redirected by the Prem' and the FA are a drop in the ocean compared to the funds generated by the game as a whole. Even given our good fortune of being in and around the top flight for the last fifteen years, we're light years behind what others receive.
Sky dangled the cash and the clubs and authorities were blinded by greed as were players and agents wherever they could/can get away with it; what comes in more or less immediately goes out. Fergie wasn't quite there when suggesting who suffers most when the piper calls the tune. It's not the authorities nor generally is it the clubs who are/were happy to bend over, it's the supporters who often find ourselves being bent over backwards while paying extra for transport and travel times etc for the privilege.
We have a choice as did the clubs and there's an argument to suggest we are in part culpable for still turning up. But to question a supporter's wish to attend a game is to question the point of the game in general. The game was supposed to be there for us, now we are there at the behest of the game and the TV companies.
I go home and away but have been questioning my motives and justifications for some time now. But if things continue as they are there
will be a time when I just say enough is enough and find something else to do with my time. Will Sky, BT, possibly Amazon etc give a stuff if I walk away? Of course not no. They don't know me and if they did they'd probably look forward to another potential paying customer.
Would the clubs care beyond the opening of my wallet and online debit payments? Probably not. Yet it's interesting to note clubs finally acknowledging inconvenience to supporters as more of us voice our frustrations. Is it lip service? Most likely, but it makes a change from hearing managers whine (rightly) about fixture turn around rather than focusing on poor substitutions and tactical decisions
.
Anyway, COYB and SOTV
.