Time to Bring Back a Maximum Wage?

Is the only way for UEFA to really achieve financial fair play to bring in a maximum wage limit across European football?

We are currently in the midst of a three-year transitional period for clubs to move towards breaking even in their accounts. Michel Platini has felt strongly about this for some time, saying that “rampant commercialism” has been “assailing” the game, and the first 3 year section of a transitional period that will last until 2017 began at the start of this season.

According to UEFA, at the end of this drawn-out transitional period, clubs accounts (excluding expenditure on youth development, stadium infrastructure, community development, and depreciation on tangible fixed assets) will show they are breaking even. However, there have already been signs that some clubs might look to find a way round these rules, for example one of the clubs likely to be hardest hit by them, Manchester City.

Looking through the club’s website, it is noticeable that a large amount of the Manchester City sponsors are in fact linked to their owner s.  Etihad Airways have sponsored Manchester City £400m to change the name of the stadium to ‘The Etihad Stadium’ for the next 10 years. This is over twice the amount of the previous record, and UEFA are looking into the deal to see if it breaches their Licensing and Fair Play Regulations.

Gianni Infantino, Uefa’s general secretary claims that the FFP regulations will effectively create a soft wage cap by limiting spending, a view backed up by Andy Green, an investment analyst who writes the Anders Red football finance blog, who says that FFP will be a wage cap by stealth.

However, this view is not shared by Sam Rush, chief operating officer of Wasserman Media Group, whose clients include Steven Gerrard, Michael Owen and Football Writers’ Player of the Year Scott Parker. He does not expect the income of the elite athletes to be affected: “I don't think Champions League footballers should expect their wages to decrease at all,” said Rush. “There are plenty of revenue-generating opportunities that have not been explored in the past so I'm certainly not worried that the elite entertainers in world sport are going to suffer financially as a result.”

Therefore, a worst-case scenario, even after the regulations have been completely put in place, could see clubs still managing to spend incredibly larger amounts that others on players due to sponsorship from their owners, thus being able to offer huge wages.

In this case maybe UEFA should go the whole hog so to speak and put a cap on wages, of say £100,000 p/w. This would stop still allow the top clubs to pay their players incredible sums of money, but at the same time, create a more even playing field between the these clubs. Players would make decisions to join different teams based on footballing and social issues rather than monetary ones, as all the best teams will most likely be paying the same wages.

Due to the power of the top clubs and the players unions e.g. the PFA, the chances of UEFA being able to go through with this are obviously very small. But the same was probably said of the FFP rules that are currently being set in motion, and if all goes to plan elite football’s finances could be entirely different in 5 years’ time.