Football today seems to have a fresh topic of debate, revolving around the financial contribution in teams, particularly the English game.
Many have deliberated about the effects of a wealthy new owner to clubs and whether the amount of money they are pumping in, is a valuable asset for a club or a derogatory one.
Chelsea's wealthy owner Roman Abramovich
There are examples of teams thriving under new ownership and investment such as Sunderland and more notably Chelsea.
However such projects don’t necessarily go to plan in the cases of Newcastle and Liverpool, where the ventures have led to other stresses and strains on the clubs.
Yet we supporters are somewhat ignorant to an element of this extra money, which is starting to ruin the game.
It doesn’t seem to ever be mentioned with the new financial highs in the game.
Hemal Mistry comments on the future of the ‘beautiful game.’
The change of footballers’ attitude due to the influx of cash, understandably, the game is made for those with an ego, but money has enhanced this predicament to a whole new level.
Never has the game ever had so many egotistical players in the game before, admittedly there were colourful players in the past such as Graeme Souness, Charlie Nicholas and Paul Gascoigne.
Today however there is a growing feeling among fans that players ego’s are so large that they feel they are bigger than the club.
Finding examples of this are ten a penny these days, particularly this summer as Real Madrid, Manchester City and Barcelona were all determined to flex their financial muscles.
Cristiano Ronaldo
The most notable illustrations have to be the transfers of Cristiano Ronaldo and Emmanuel Adebayor.
They claim that they felt a change was necessary in their career, yet neither of the clubs they joined have had any success in the past few seasons.
Ronaldo always said it was his dream to move to Real, but this speculation and dealings occurred the previous summer but he ignored the callings to stay with Manchester United.
What seems pretty clear is that he has moved for the money on offer at Madrid, however whether this was his main motive for leaving the best team in England over the past couple of seasons is unknown.
Emmanual Adebayor
In complete contrast to Gareth Barry who chose to leave Aston Villa who are very much in the same boat as Man City, to allegedly cement his World Cup place, surely however it made more sense to play for a side who qualified for Europe, nonetheless it seems pretty evident that money proved a major factor in the switch.
The same goes for team mate Adebayor, who, some have said, only left Arsenal for the money.
He claims he was shown the door by Wenger and his ‘cronies’, begging the question, what did he expect, as he was touting for potential suitors to come in, with AC Milan, Barcelona, Real Madrid and Chelsea all flirting with the prospect.
The problem with these players’ innocent acts is that everybody can punch holes in their creditability, as at they were all first choice players, in some cases a guarantee on the team sheet, but they epitomise the changing face of football, effectively meaning money has ruined the game but not in the way we think.
This will become more evident in future transfer windows as loyalty will be replaced with greed as a key attribute for a player, in actually fact there are only one losers from this situation.
The fans who will become detached from the stars they see gracing the pitch, as role models in the game for the future will be those from the past, and higher prices for the average person to pay to help fund the player’s lucrative wages.
For now though, the big money clubs are unfairly moving ahead of rest – buying up valuable players as assets.
Who knows what the future holds for a game dominated by money and business men – particularly after they get bored and want move on.
By Hemal Mistry
