“They were worse than useless,” Steve Gibson said in 2003, recalling the period two decades earlier when he started investing in Middlesbrough, his hometown football club. The board had been third-generation shareholders “who’d kept control irrespective of what they had to offer” and Gibson could not see any way the structure in place could help save a struggling north-east institution drowning in debt. He wanted executive powers to change things and what followed was an “ugly discussion” with the shareholders believing Gibson, still in his late 20s, was acting way above his station. He later admitted, “I had not learnt the art of diplomacy.”
Gibson threatened to walk away, “to never come back” and when the directors finally let him in, one of the first things he did was sack them all. He has always been quietly spoken but his ruthlessness and ambition had once made him one of the wealthiest owners in the early days of the Premier League, richer even than the men who controlled Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal.
There have since been challenges for Gibson’s delivery firm Bulkhaul and he last appeared in the Sunday Times’ top 500 rich list in 2012. Yet it surely says a great deal about the dramatic shift in football that if league tables in the Championship were today determined only by affluence, Middlesbrough would now finish in the bottom two next to Millwall. Currently 18th and six points above the relegation zone, to supporters — especially those who remember the 1990s — it might not seem like Jonathan Woodgate’s side are overachieving at the moment even if, in one significant sense, they are to some degree.
“If they come down, they’ll go straight back up,” a League One manager told The Athleticthis week, having almost secured his own involvement in the third tier of English football next season — his minimum target at the start of the campaign. It was hardly a surprising calculation considering Middlesbrough’s history and potential recruitment reach at a lower level. The manager, though, extended his forecast. Charlton Athletic and Stoke City are currently outside the relegation zone and they could go down “but they’d rebound” back into the Championship at the first time of asking as well — not to mention those clubs already in the drop zone. “If it’s Wigan, Luton or Barnsley, you’re looking at the top three in League One for next season already,” he predicted confidently.
This was no lazy assessment based on what appears to be an obvious possibility but a fair reflection based on his own experiences operating at the frontier of a divide that has widened over the last decade. The manager is not alone in thinking the gap between the Championship and League One is greater than it has ever been – “just as big and as significant as the one between the Premier League and the Championship,” agreed a League One chairman, who has assessed his club’s finances and concluded he would not be able to compete financially if promotion was achieved and a stadium that holds more than 16,000 seats was sold out for every home game.
More will be known about the future of Middlesbrough after the result of their away game on Saturday at Barnsley, who were, according to the League One manager, “the best team in the league” during 2018-19 when they sealed promotion by finishing second. Currently propping up the Championship, Barnsley went to Craven Cottage and turned over Fulham last weekend by winning 3-0, a result which reflects the depth of competition in a league where the South Yorkshire side are now one of four clubs with billionaire owners and the accumulative wealth spread across 15 clubs under the influence of foreign businessmen or groups stands in excess of £42 billion.
The figures do not necessarily mirror investment, especially with Financial Fair Play to consider and the Football League clamping down on the clearest offenders since the appointment of Rick Parry as the organisation’s chairman in the autumn. QPR co-owner Lakshmi Mittal is the 11th-richest man living in Britain, for example, and he is worth somewhere north of £14 billion. Yet he only has a 11 per cent stake at Loftus Road and in each of the last three seasons, QPR have been amongst the lowest spenders in the league.
The numbers, however, are on a completely different level to what lies beneath, where only Bristol Rovers, Oxford United, Coventry City and Portsmouth are under foreign ownership and the accumulative wealth of those involved would be a lot less than £2.4 billion if Portsmouth’s Michael Eisner, the former CEO and chairman of Disney, was not an anomaly in the group, considering his resources alone stretch beyond £1 billion. The figure, indeed, stretches further than in seasons past because of the presence of Ipswich Town for the first time since 1956-57, a club owned by Marcus Evans, who is estimated to be worth more than £800 million.
It is spending, indeed, that helps most when illustrating the distance between League One and the Championship. According to figures from Transfermarkt, the flow of activity at clubs this season was almost the same, with 508 signings in the Championship and just four more in League One.
However, the average signing in the Championship cost 45 times more than one in the division below, compared to a decade ago when a player’s value was 10 times as much. The gulf is emphasised when you realise an average signing by a Premier League club was just 12 times more than one made by a Championship club in 2019-20, compared to just over eight times more in 2009-10.
Overall, that’s a 50 per cent rise in the difference of the average cost of a signing between the Premier League and the Championship over the past 10 years but a 350 per cent rise between the Championship and League One over the same time period. In other words, just over £200 million has been spent in the Championship this season compared to £5 million in League One — a decade ago, second-tier teams spent £75 million compared to £9 million in the division below.
Owners and managers tend to agree that prize money available has influenced the gap, with Championship clubs earning around 80 per cent from a central funding pay pot, League One 12 per cent and in League Two, just eight per cent. If this were to change, it is believed there would be more of an equal world below the Premier League. Yet if that happened, there would be more distance than ever between English football’s top tier and the rest.
According to one financial expert with experience of working in each of the divisions, Championship clubs are taking greater risks with their finances because they know the reward could be a £100 million pay day in the Premier League. Meanwhile, funding in League One tends to go towards day-to-day operations.
Perhaps the flow of traffic between the levels in recent years reflects the impact of a changing world which, if it is not careful, might ensure a great deal of repetition. From 2010 until 2014, Peterborough United and Doncaster Rovers were the only clubs in England with more than two experiences in one of the divisions. By the end of this season, it is possible that Barnsley will have been involved in three relegations and two promotions since 2014 and Rotherham, three promotions and two relegations. Elsewhere, if Wigan go down from the Championship, they will have been involved in two relegations and two promotions in five seasons while Charlton will have the the same record as Peterborough and Doncaster six years ago.
“It feels like a certain number of clubs are now too wealthy for League One but not quite wealthy enough for the Championship,” observed the League One manager who now thinks of the Championship as a “Premier League 2” because the TV deals are potentially as much as six times more lucrative depending on which games are selected for broadcast.
He says that what has long set the lower leagues apart is unpredictability — “unlike the Premier League…” and a degree of hope that keeps attendances higher than in other comparable divisions across Europe. He is not alone in wondering whether interest will remain if the future really becomes so easy to second guess.
Comments
"If it’s Wigan, Luton or Barnsley, you’re looking at the top three in League One for next season already,” he predicted confidently.
If we're talking about the wealth of clubs, income, attendances etc, then those 3 clubs shouldn't necessarily be automatically going straight back up instead of Portsmouth, Ipswich or Sunderland.
Yes Barnsley have a rich owner, but they didn't win league one last year and would likely lose at least 2 of their better players.
Roland was wealthy but spent fuck all at the end .
Took us 3 seasons to get back up with him .
How would you measure ESI’s wealth , skint or gazillionaires is the range of views .
The article is right when you look at Luton , Barnsley and Charlton promoted and all struggling this season .
No matter what wealth the owners have or haven’t if you don’t spend over time you’ll drift back to your spending level .
Currently there are 8 sides in the Championship earning premier league parachute payments.
Hull, Middlesbrough, Swansea, Stoke, West brom, Cardiff, Huddersfield and Fulham. Then you have Derby trying to bend the rules and Leeds who get 35k every week and it's almost half the division with a financial advantage over other clubs.
It's not hard to see why a side like Luton and Wigan coming up who get 10k crowds might struggle.
If we assume an average net ticket price of £20 (excluding VAT and steward costs, ie gross margin on a ticket), a 35k vs 10k would have a difference of £400k revenue a game. With 23 home games a season, that's £9.2m over a season. That's more than the average revenue for a league one club in an entire season.
Also, pardon my ignorance, but isn't the amount a director can inject for FFP a function of income? So extra revenue earned also equals extra cash that can be injected by a director?
One of my favourite books freakonomics looked at drug dealers, and why so many of them are poor and live with their mums, while risking their life on the street, and it all boiled down to "because they think they might be the kingpin one day"
I can't help but feel like we will see more clubs cease to exist, because they gamble and lose.
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I think an often over looked bit though is comparing the clubs in terms of "non 1st team" expenditure and non football expenditure.
Is there a 3rd tier club any where else in the world that have the training facilities and academy set up that compares to Sunderland? How many 3rd tier clubs run proper U23 squads, like we did, even under Roland.
Away from the football how many FTE staff do we employ, I would assume its not dissimilar to Ipswich but would be miles ahead of Burton or Accrington and probably miles behind Leeds and the "parachute" clubs.
Part of the problem with the academy structure is you can't turn it on and off. You either have one or you don't. I wonder if it will, in the long term continue, in its current format or your end up with more independent set ups like the Nike and Hoddle's. Not much comfort knowing you fielded 8 under 9s teams on Saturday morning when your 3 nil down at Rochdale is it?
What this will do is encourage all clubs to produce England internationals which will strengthen our chances at World Cups etc... Especially as many Premier League clubs take on foreign youngsters. I think it is easily affordable for the Premier League too.
Its such an unexact science it makes every little sense for anyone. In the premier league it doesn't really matter but you can't turn catagory 1 or 2 status on and off like a tap. But now more than ever if the player is too good they will just leave no matter what club you are, also if they don't think you will play them they will go as well.
So you have to produce players at the exact level you are or what's the point.
As an aside how many players have we got on pro contracts that haven't played a league game for us this season, despite being fit, even when we named 5 subs?
I don't think Brentford will be the last.