Asked the question: ‘Do you think the Premier League was sitting there thinking “I wonder how we can punish Everton”?
I don’t think the Premier League agenda is that vindictive or simple as being anti-Everton but people seem to continuously overlook what the Premier League is, it’s a cash-generating machine that has a sole aim: to make money.
It’s a private company accountable only to the clubs that play in it and the majority of these at the bottom are transitory members with very little sway. Its entire revenue generation model is dependent on TV deals and the sponsorships that come with that and they are dependent on eyeballs and the consumer pound that follows that.
Hence we’ve seen football teams in the lower leagues of the pyramid go to the wall without any concern from the Premier League or its clubs whatsoever who could have saved any of these teams in the blink of an eye. We’ve seen plans for the 39th game, the reaction to the Super League teams etc. The Premier League may as well be a big bank, except whilst it can be as equally immoral, it doesn’t have to conform to any of the regulations as banks or other large corporations would have to.
It is in the Premier League’s interests for the teams that bring in the most viewing figures to do well. They are historically the teams at the top: Liverpool, Arsenal, Man Utd and increasingly Man City and Chelsea. That is why Google, UPS and Nivea are partnering with these teams and not Crystal Palace and Fulham.
It is the Premier League associated media’s interest to generate content that attracts these eyeballs. Pro-Liverpool content is great, anti-Everton content is also pretty good because more people will read that than a pro-Everton piece which might get a few readers in L4 but not much wider.
This goes to a wider scale as well. Uefa and their sponsors do not want to see Everton, Fulham, Crystal Palace in their flagship competitions, they want Man Utd, Liverpool, Man City etc.
You can even take it wider and look at the increasing number of last-day finishes now for the title and relegation places compared to previous seasons. People remember the Michael Thomas goal and Blackburn at Anfield as exceptions but, since Aguero in 2011, we’ve now had 3 more occasions when the title has been decided on the last day, that’s 4 in 12 years, a far higher rate statistically than previously.
Similar is happening with relegation battles too and the Chaampions League places, we are not seeing title winners, Top 4 places, and Bottom 3s being decided in March anymore like we used to.
If it wasn’t for the excellence of Sean Dyche, we’d be in another relegation battle now – probably lasting the entirety of the season – which would have sparked new life into the bottom of the table that was looking done by Christmas at the current rate.
All of the news reports about Everton and the points deduction will have driven many many kopite eyeballs to the Premier League’s media channels, and it had the associated benefit of making the Premier League look tough in the face of looming regulation – safe in the knowledge they can upset a member that has zero sway on the success of their product.
The customers that the Premier League work for are the consumer fans of Liverpool, Man Utd, Arsenal, Man City, Chelsea and any other team who can get successful enough to sway the Premier League’s profit and loss numbers when it comes to TV deals and sponsorship renegotiation time.
Anyone who believes the Premier League is some benevolent administration working for the benefit of its 20 members – that just happens to be a bit incompetent – is quite frankly naive.
You don’t become the richest, most successful sporting competition in the world through being incompetent. They know exactly what they’re doing – which is what they’ve always done: favourably ensure the success of the teams that drive revenue on a rotational basis, giving the illusion of fair competition and unpredictability without ever actually having any of these things outside of the favoured teams over a season-long basis.
Sure, Brentford or Bournemouth can beat Liverpool or Man Utd in a one-off game, they might finish above them for one season, but they will never ever be allowed to consistently displace them and deprive them of their revenues (and the Premier League’s associated revenues from fans watching them).
There’s people basically arguing that the Premier League doesn’t conform to capitalism and is somehow some fair moral arbiter. If I had to put my mortgage on whether it’s the former or the latter, I know which one I’d bet on.
This was first published as a post on the Grand Old Team forum.