Lend and Lease

Since the two home defeats mentioned in my last footballing entry, Watford have redeemed themselves with victories away at Middlesborough and home to Sheffield Wednesday, as well as stealing a point with a 93^rd minute goal at yet-to-win Ipswich.

Manchester United`s Tom Cleverley got the winner at the Riverside whilst Arsenal`s Henri Lansbury scored two as we found home form at last, beating the Owls 4-1 on Friday. Entrusted with some of the G4`s youthful talent (we also have Craig Catchcart from Man U™), we seem to be thriving in the season we sold all our best players. Now we have news that Sir Elton will play another concert at Vicarage Road, this time to raise money for us to actually BUY some players rather than survive on loans.

The next match – and the last before my birthday and the inevitable “life begins” messages – is away at West Brom. I would take even one point from the Hawthorns as an early birthday present, whether or not any goals are scored by someone borrowed.

Celtic and Rangers in the Premiership? Goodbye England.

The addition of the Old Firm to the Premiership is a ridiculously backward notion that threatens England`s chances of ever again lifting the World Cup or even winning the European Championship for the first time.

Recently the idea that the two Glasgow clubs, Celtic and Rangers, could join the English Premier League has been raised again. It is an idea whose time has come and gone, but still one that is resurrected evey couple of years when the Premiership is searching for a form of change for change`s sake.

The idea is so outdated as to be embarrassing, largely because it is completely out of tune with today`s political realities. In addition, it could result in the disappearence of the English national football team (as well as those of the other 3 home nations).

Politically, the failure of the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe (and more recently the Lisbon Treaty) to receive approval from voters in certain European states are undoubtedly mere blips on the road to greater integration. The suggestion that the Old Firm join England goes against this trend.

More significantly, the Scottish Parliament is controlled by the Scottish National Party – committed to independence north of the border – while the Conservatives look highly likely to win the 2010 UK general election and simultaneously seem unlikely to improve on their current number of Scottish MPs (1 out of a possible 59).

The tension caused by an English right-wing party ruling a left-wing Scotland with no support there will only increase the strength of support for Scottish independence. There was a similar problem during Margaret Thatcher`s heyday, but at that time, Scottish constitutents were more significantly over-represented in Westminster (the “West Lothian question”).

Whether or not Scottish independence comes to pass within the next five to ten years, including Rangers and Celtic in the Sky-Setanta-Playstation-Coca Cola-Premiership can only be harmful for prospects of the future existence of an England team. At the moment, England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales each have national teams despite the fact that they are part of one political state: the United Kingdom.

There are already many European FA voices opposing this situation (it is not unrelated that there is no GBR Olympic football team and the 2012 London Olympics will not see Englishmen playing our national sport). If the Old Firm join England`s league(s), it can only strengthen the argument that the home countries should lose their preferential status.

So, in other words, the already long odds on any future international success by “England” would lengthen to infinity with their non-existence. The Old Firm`s integration into English football is a proposal most likely to be supported by the richest “English” clubs (owned by Russians and Americans – hardly nations with great footballing histories), which will harm the national sides.

Moreover, why any Premiership team outside the G4 would want the Scottish teams in their league is also a mystery. As Motherwell chairman John Boyle recently said, “Turkeys don`t vote for Christmas”. Bolton`s chairman, Phil Gartside, sees a 36-team Premiership as the way forward. I disagree.

Gordon Strachan probably got it right a year and a half ago or so when he predicted a European league that included Celtic and Rangers. Football can not buck international trends and since European Union labour law has an important impact on the beautiful game, there is no reason to suggest that its meta-politics do not.

I hope that the G4 and Old Firm will float off into a European “super-league” that will prosper for a decade or so then suffer the ignominy of failure based on a fatal combination of distance and ennui. Hopefully the English Football League will have reorganised strongly enough by then to refuse the G4 back into the top tier and – if they are allowed reentry at all – they should start where United FC and AFC Wimbledon did – in the tenth tier of English football or below, with the most minor of the pantheon.

In the meantime, the Football League could change its laws to make the game fairer and more beneficial to the nation it is supposed to serve. A cap on player wages, protection from foreign ownership, a minimum number of home-grown players and a fairer distribution of TV money would be a good start.

Global Football Justice

It is time for global football justice and the revolution must start in England.

It was only in 1997-8 that “the big four” took the top positions for the first time. The second occasion was 2003-4, the third in 2005-6 and since then they have shuffled the Champions League positions between them in each of the following three years. There was a “bored by the big four” Philosophy Football T-shirt a couple of years ago but if it is only in the last four years that the Premiership places have been absolutely sewn-up, the relatively recent addition of European Champions League dominance has added an extra level of tedium.

Any initial tinge of patriotic pride in seeing Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United playing in the latter stages of the European tournament should be extinguished by the thought of their Russian and American owners or their lack of English or even British players. These days there is rarely an underdog to support: Portsmouth in last year`s FA Cup, Aston Villa for a while in the league this season (also US owned).

The only level of failure that these teams now know is not reaching the semi-finals or finals of the FA Cup and Champions League. Finishing fourth in the Sky Barclays Setanta premiership is still rewarded with ridiculous cash once the preliminary joke rounds of the European tournament are played out. How boring for the rest of us, but how uninteresting it really must be for the fans of these teams too.

At my club, Watford`s level, a 2-0 win at Doncaster is a triumph against the possibility of relegation while a 1-0 defeat at home to promotion-chasing Birmingham is accepted as not unexpected. Resignation and surprise still exist for fans of most of the G88 (the minor gods in the pantheon that is the football league) and without them a fan`s life is incomplete. Schadenfreude exists too, for us below the biggest, and perhaps for the local fans of the top teams too. It is the “plastics” who will not know that joy of a bitter local rival suffering.

The economic effects stretch to the cost of attempting to play with the big boys. Leeds descent into administration is well documented and Charlton are just the latest of several teams whose inability to “bounce back” has seen them slip into the third tier after the obligatory cost-cutting exercises. The ripples go beyond the lower leagues. Elsewhere in the world, attendances fall when matches clash with a “big” televised Premiership game.

Something must be done. The arguments are there: a player draft, a cap on wages, a minimum number of home-grown players or club ownership being put in the hands of the fans. Alternatively, the majority of the G88 could get together to demand a restructuring that brings (most of) the Premiership back under Football League jurisdiction (if the Big 4 want to float off into a European Super-League, let them). It won`t happen yet. The big four dominate English football like the G8 dominate world economic policy. The seeds of rebellion exist though. Viva Football Justice.