Gary Neville has accused the Premier League of behaving like ‘bullies’ in the face of a Football Governance Bill, which would see the establishment of an independent football regulator, under the new Labour government.
Backing for the creation of an independent regulator began after the European Super League farce of 2021. The recently-ousted Conservative government introduced plans, and since taking power Labour have pushed ahead with the idea, stating football clubs will be ‘protected’ as a result by ‘ensuring their financial sustainability’. If passed through parliament, the bill would grant a regulator backstop powers to intervene in football when necessary.
Neville continues to be a staunch supporter and believes its introduction would safeguard the interests of English football fans throughout the pyramid, reports our sister title the Manchester Evening News. On the other hand, the Premier League has been hesitant as the organisation’s CEO Richard Masters has warned it would be a ‘risk’.
So now the Sky Sports pundit, in comments made to PA at the Labour Party Conference, has chastised the Premier League for this hesitancy. He remarked: “We have a Premier League that’s entitled, they feel entitled. I’m not going to use the word greedy, but I just have.
“They are selfish and I can’t understand that way of thinking. It’s almost like they’re the big brother that sit there and distribute scraps of food to the little brothers round the table.
“It’s not what you do when you’re in a family. Their mindset is such of a bully. Their mindset is such that they think they can influence the regulator once the regulator’s introduced and they can get a better deal potentially the other side of the regulator. And what they’re applying is their soft power and their influence to try and create scare stories and scaremongering, like we had a couple of weeks ago.”
Amidst the independent regulator’s possible approval, there have been suggestions that Premier League clubs like Leicester City or Neville’s former Manchester United would be barred from competing in future UEFA competition because of the organisation’s policy against state interference. Talking at the same event, Labour’s Culture, Media and Sport Secretary, Lisa Nandy, labelled this idea ‘ridiculous’.
Nandy also reassured that the government will not adopt a ‘heavy-handed’ approach, emphasising a desire to address the lack of sustainability in parts of the football pyramid.
The Premier League has hit back at Neville’s accusations of acting like a ‘bully’, stating they are in ongoing discussions with the new government regarding the football regulator. They have suggested that ‘light-touch, targeted and proportionate legislation can be made to work’, referencing CEO Masters’ remarks from the previous season’s end.
He had warned: “My overriding concern is that the bill will reduce our competitiveness and weaken the incredible appeal of the English game. Our competition is the most watched and commercially successful football league in the world. Thanks to that success, Premier League clubs are able to give away £1.6bn every three years – 16 percent of our total revenues – to the wider game, helping to make it the envy of the world.
“It is a risk that regulation will undermine the Premier League’s global success, thereby wounding the goose that provides English football’s golden egg.”
Referring to other top European domestic football leagues, he added: “Those competitors are relishing the prospect of the Premier League being uniquely constrained. Empires rise and fall and while I am confident about the League’s immediate future, it would be a mistake to be complacent about our place as the world’s most popular league.
“It is a risk to introduce uncertainty and red tape into an industry that relies heavily on a relatively small pool of investors, who often see club ownership as a passion project as well as a business. While the sport is buoyant today, it would be so easy to misstep and drive our world-leading investment elsewhere. Already, before it has even arrived, the promise of regulatory intervention in football finances has changed incentives for a new voluntary arrangement to be struck.
“We have spent the last year in discussions with the EFL about an even more generous financial settlement. But these talks have only served to highlight how destabilising intervention could be. The government claims its regulator will not interfere on the pitch, but by intervening in the carefully calibrated distribution of revenues and upsetting competitive balance, it is already doing exactly that.”
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