The English Premiership is the most successful football league in the world in commercial terms, thanks in part to satellite television and the exposure created by BSkyB. Supporters of the game may wish at times that this was not so and that the ‘beautiful game’ was left unsullied by business imperatives and realities, but this is like harking back to the good old days of amateurs competing in the Olympics. What really matters to most clubs in the Premiership is the bottom line rather than the goal line. In February 2010, I wrote in my blog about the perilous state of Portsmouth football club who were on the brink of administration. In that post I made the following statement, which is as true now as it was then:
No business, whether a bank or a fashion house like McQueen, can spend more than it earns for a long period. If costs are higher than revenues there will come a time when the business is financially unsustainable. A business may represent the heart and soul of a community or be the brand choice of Hollywood stars, but if it fails to make a profit it is dead.
