The Game 39 proposal of the English Premier League (or how to extract more money from Singaporeans)

By Les Tan

Earlier this year, it leaked out that the English Premier League was planning to play a 39th game at venues around the world, particularly in Asia, with Singapore mooted as a possible venue. A regular English Premier League football season involves 38 games for each of the 20 teams in the league.

Called the “Game 39 proposal”, it was presented by the Premier League chief executive Richard Scudamore to the Premier League clubs as a way of making more money, extending the tentacles of the EPL deeper into pockets of Asians already hypnotised into coughing up money for their weekly addiction without complaint.

Quite rightly, the heads of the Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and the Asian Federation Confederation (AFC) all choked on the idea, seeing it as a money-grubbing attempt by the English Premier League clubs.

Said Sepp Blatter, president of FIFA: “The Premier League is richer than the others, they have more responsibility and what they are trying to do is contrary to this responsibility. This is something I cannot understand and definitely the Fifa executive committee will not sanction such an initiative.”

The president of AFC, Mohamed bin Hammam, in particular, was one of the fiercest critics of the controversial suggestion, since he knew full well that the proposal was targeting the Middle East and Asia where Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal have significant number of supporters.

In February, he was quoted as saying, “It is my belief that it is not a good idea to organise domestic leagues in territories other than their own. My recommendation to the AFC executive committee would be to reject any initiatives of this nature.”

The president then called on all the 46 member countries of the AFC to block the Premier League’s plan to play a 39th game on their soil, saying that Asians should focus on building their domestic leagues.

Earlier this month, stories came out that he would welcome the 39th game, a stunning turnaround.

Why?

It turns out that the proposal was leaked before Scudamore could consult AFC, which raised hackles. Bin Hammam confirmed it as much, saying: “”We had no contact or dialogue at all with the Premier League before they launched the proposal.” Scudamore, moving as fast as Ronaldo’s step overs, has since met with the AFC president and probably said all the right things, so much so that bin Hammam is now saying that “we should be partners.”

Having described the 39th game proposal as “putting money before responsibility and dignity” and saying that he would “vote strongly against” it, what has changed bin Hammam’s mind?

He goes on: ”I want all the technical assistance they can provide. We want them to convey their experiences to us. We want them to share with us their secret of success, to tell us what are the keys that can help our football, by showing us administration, technical level and supporting our coaches.”

”One way is if they support our initiatives to develop the game across Asia and close the gap between Asia and European football. This is quite a convincing argument to us.”

Please. Are we so naive as to expect that Manchester United, Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal and company will spend the time and effort in technical assistance to “close the gap between Asia and European football”? Their eyes are only fixed on the potential payouts – estimated at £5 million (S$12.4 million) per game – of playing the 39th game in Asia, not raising the standards of the Asian leagues. What ever clinics they hold while in this part of the world will be just for the cameras. After that, they’ll be off shopping at Sim Lim Square and then checking out nightspots at Orchard Towers.

Will Singaporeans embrace this idea? The Singaporean can be quite schizophrenic. While he complains bitterly about government ministers getting million-dollar salaries, he happily opens up his wallet for Manchester United and Liverpool so that Rooney and Ronaldo, known for sleeping around with prostitutes, can earn S$20.5 million and $23.3 million a year respectively.

By contrast, there are 20 cabinet members in the Singapore government. Paying each of them $2.5 million for a year’s work adds up to $50 million a year for the whole lot. Yet, reading all the belly-aching and complaining online about their ministerial salaries in Singaporean blogs and forums, you would think they robbed the bank. But you don’t hear a peep about EPL salaries. Are Singaporean men so far gone on the EPL drug?

StarHub paid an estimated S$250 million for the local rights to broadcast the EPL from 2007 to 2009. They of course turned around and charged Singaporeans subscribers for it. An estimated 240,000 households on this island pay StarHub $26.75 a month or $64.2 million a year for their EPL fix, a mind-boggling amount.

To get some perspective on how much money that is, the operating expenditure the Ministry of Community Development Youth and Sports (MCYS) set aside for the Singapore Sports Council (SSC) for FY 2008 was $88.81 million. In other words, just on subscription fees alone, not counting other EPL-related spend, we are willing to fork out for the EPL 72% of what SSC spends in a whole year for local sports, with no discernible benefit for Singapore sports.

In all likelihood, if AFC smokes hard on the EPL pipe and inhales, the 39th game will be a done deal. The Football Association of Singapore (FAS) would probably fall in line and private companies in Singapore will bid for the rights to host the game. Millions more Singapore dollars will then be washed down the drain, to the detriment of the local sports scene.

The English Premier League should stay where it belongs – in England – and us Singaporeans should wake up to the fact that our sports scene has shriveled up because of our collective neglect.

REDpoll

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