Peak Football

Sorry to start with such a downer — on a positive note one country, Cuba, went through a similar process via sanctions and somehow managed. So if you start growing food in your backyard now you?ll probably shrug off the crisis when it hits by steaming another courgette over your open fire.

Okay, how does this relate to Everton? Well, on two counts, both relating to ?Game 39?. The first is a physical and logistical one. At a time when FIFA is trying to stage carbon-neutral World Cups (The Green Goal Initiative) and environmental campaigners worldwide are trying to find ways of reducing our carbon footprint, the Premier League in its wisdom decided it would be a great idea to send 20 teams to the four corners of the earth every year to play a domestic fixture.

Now while they make a case for the ?promotion? of the EPL at ?home and abroad? on the Premier League website as one of their key objectives, they also state they will:

?Use our power and influence responsibly to improve the game in this country and abroad through partnership with the FA, UEFA and other bodies.?

To me, ?improving responsibly? would address ongoing issues of officialdom, diving, goal-line technology and perhaps the serial releasing of turgid autobiographies by men barely in their twenties who already have more money than they know what to do with, and little advice to impart.

It doesn?t ring true when applied to the 39th game, for reasons stated above. The 39th game is about money and Keith Wyness and his ilk should at least have the balls to say so and not dress it up in business-speak about profiling. At least if he did that we?d start off the debate on an even footing.

I think it?s great that the Premier League wants to keep building a fan base abroad and I?m not one of those people who think everyone should piss off and watch their local team. I don?t think this debate should descend into that kind of blanket xenophobia because it does the cause no good. But frankly I doubt it?s the football-starved teenagers of East Asia that are keeping Keith awake at night — after all, there is excellent EPL coverage pretty much worldwide now on television.

The second count of peak oil relating to football was the one of saturation point. I must admit I find the idea of a 39th game distasteful because it?s so blatantly one that is corporate-led. They may say, accurately, that the demand for the game is there from the ?consumers?, but the key word here is demand. Sure there?s a ?demand? (if you accept the capitalists' definition of ?demand? as ?people will turn up? they?re not out in the streets protesting or anything). But sometimes, if you are acting ?responsibly? you put other issues first: issues like the tradition, the environmental concerns, the (comparative) integrity of the league as it exists at the moment.

It?s all very well for Wyness to bang on about people being resistant to change, as if anyone who doesn?t agree with the plan is some back-country Luddite who points at planes, but his arguments don?t stand up if he doesn?t actually address the issues people are protesting about.

For me, 38 games is plenty, and the EPL uses more than it's fair share of air miles already. To add another ?because we can? isn?t anything to do with the big-heartedness of those footballing missionaries who own the premiership clubs. It?s down to greed, and nothing more.

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