PROFESSIONAL football, in common every other sector of British up - coupled with compulsory investment in ground improvements have driven many of the smaller clubs to the verge of bankruptcy.
In a situation like this, you would expect your average capitalist to strip the company's assets, sell up and invest his capital somewhere more profitable - or simply hang on to it.
Some club owners have, in fact, done this by selling their biggest asset - the land on which the ground stands - for development or speculation. The slump in property prices means that this is no longer an option for most clubs. Owners have to look elsewhere to maximise their income.
Several clubs launched 'bond' schemes in order to finance ground improvements and the conversion to all-seater stadia required by the Taylor report. These schemes consisted of sup porters forking out large sums of money in order to guarantee the right to buy a ticket for a particular seat in the 'new stand. Understandably these schemes did not meet with unreserved delight from the fans, and most have now either been dropped or changed out of recog nition.
Raising admission prices is the traditional solution, and one which has been followed by many clubs. in recession-hit Britain, however, this solution can backfire too. The West Ham directors recently had to cut prices by a third after average attendance dropped by more than 10,000 The deal between the newly-formed tellan idague matches more attractive than British?
Page 10 21 Nov, 1992 No. 32 English Premier League and BSkyB for exclusive TV rights to live games has provided a welcome breathing space for top clubs.
Not only does the deal provide clubs with significant money for the first time from a TV deal - but because of the split of the Premier League from the Football League, a much higher etained by the biggest and richest clubs Arsenal, Manchester United and Leeds have already benefitted by hundreds of thousands of pounds this season.
Monopoly
BSkyB's side of the deal doesn't look quite so good. Murdoch was prepared to make a sizeable loss in the first season in order to pave the way for sewing up a nonopoly - possibly for a future European "Super-League' - and selling matches to viewers on a pay-as-youwatch basis. However, the tiny viewing figures for BSkyB matches this season must have made him think twice.
Channel 4's coverage of Italian Serie double By a vete. Themay note has attracted more than unconnected with the fact that the Italian League has attracted the word's best footballers, and so provides consistenti better football, higher levels of skill and much more entertainment than the average Premier League game. The choice of viewing AC Milan vs Juventus or Arsenal vs Wimbledon is not a difficult one to make for anyone who enjoys good football!
So why should any of this be of conem to socialists and, if it is, what should we be doing about it?
Football was the first mass spectator sport in Britain. Its development closely mirrors the development of the in dustrial working class In its present form, football is a relatively modern sport. Most of our major clubs were founded at the end of the last century or the beginning of this. Many of the big stadia date from around the same time, although there was a big expansion in the 1920s when huge crowds became common, due to the increases in leisure time for many workers. From then to the present day football crowds have been almost entirely working class in composition.
Working class football fans formed their own organisations early in the development of the Football League. These supporters clubs were often very democratically run. They organised travel, social and sporting events, fundraising and in some cases, elected representatives onto the boards of the football clubs.
Over the years, a lot of official suporters clubs have lost accountability ti he tans, and nave been co-optea i tr club structures where their activities can be controlled.
Over the last ten years, however, there has been an explosion of independent self-organised supporters clubs and fansuch organisations often have a very short life, they do represent the authentic voice of a section of the organised working class.
The existence of football as a mass spectator sport and the self-organisation tive experience which young working class people have available to them. The collectivity of the terraces and of supporters organisations represents a gain for the working class as a whole.
As with all working class social formations under capitalism, football crowds are contradictory phenomena. Forms of ruling class ideology - sexism, racism and nationalism rooted in the mass of football supporters (most of whom are white and male).
The ruling class actively encourages nationalist sentiment among football fans and smiles benevolently at racism, sexism and homophobia in class. Their attitude to the collective experience and self-organisation of working class people is, however, another matter.
All-seater The compulsory introduction of all-seater stadia for all Premier and first be justified on safety grounds. It will, however, have two important results. It will price many working class fans out of the game and it will speed up the transformation of football irom a mass spectator sport into aspectacle produced to be passively consumed through a TV set.
Instead of ignoring these issues we should be developing a political gramme for the transformati tball into what it has always had t potential to become - the 'people's Kate Such a programme must start from an understanding that there are no long term answers to football's problems while the game remains under the control of football clubs through their own independent organisations. As a first step. elected supporters representatives should have a majority on club boards. Clubs and grounds should be nationalised municipalised. All debes should be cly- more likely, celled.
TV coverage should not be limited to the big Premier League clubs and proceeds from TV coverage should be distributed equitably across the game induding to women's football.
There should be women-only sections in every ground. Most grounds need big investment to make them safe and pleasant venues. Matches should be stewarded by supporters themselves -ick the police out of grounds Such demands will find a very sympathetic audience among supporters.
They should also be directed at and argued inside the Labour Party and trade unions. Socialists cannot continue to abstain on which are being raised by supporters themselves.