39th Game: Premiership Plot or Pawn in World Game?

Just when you thought it was safe to file the ‘39th game’ proposal into the metaphoric dustbin, then FIFA issue a statement which has given encouragement, in some quarters at least, to the proposers of the so called 39th game. Basically, despite FIFA President Sepp Blatter’s initial deep scepticism, FIFA welcomed the postponement of a meeting specifically to address the issue, in favour of a future date – thus allowing the Premiership to put more detail to the proposal. Note that it was the Premiership who made the postponement.

Whilst RTG remains completely against the 39th game, it got us thinking as to why the proposal has become an issue again, having met such resistance not only from supporters, managers, foreign national FA’s, and FIFA regions, but also principally by our own English FA. Putting RTG’s cynical ‘hat on’, and knowing little, but just enough, about FIFA’s and Sepp Blatter’s modus operandi, the only conclusion is that this proposal will become a bargaining chip, to be traded or bartered with the English FA at some future stage. At this precise moment, the big issue for English football is the World Cup 2018. Anything that jeopardises that is a complete no-no for the FA and, rightly so. It is the one matter that supporters agree with their own FA about.

It’s hard to see any additional benefit that the Premiership can promote in adding more detail to the proposal. Certainly, the absolute incredible, lack of prior consultation, a point that Sir Alex Ferguson was considerably vexed about, and the insurmountable problems highlighted in the English FA’s review of the proposal will not be addressed, so why the postponement? The only thing that the Premiership can do is signal their intent in expanding the revenue earning streams from abroad. Is there a way to do this and minimise the impact on distorting the league competition?

Any proposal that adds to the fixture congestion, RTG believes, should be rejected out of hand. You would need to play a home and away fixture against the same team in the same world time zone, preferably in the same week. There would need to be fixed rules for which teams end up playing these games abroad. For example, Premier Champions against Championship play-off winner, second place against Championship runner-up, third place against Championship champions etc. No, RTG doesn’t like it much either and we’ve not even started talking about the disruption to local national FA’s, a point that we have huge reservations over. But at least it’s fair and equitable for all teams.

Maybe though, this is exactly what the Premiership has in mind. Maybe, as is the modern PR way, the initial plans were to draw out the nay sayers and doom merchants before the ‘let’s get everybody so confused that resistance becomes fragmented and we win phase’ is implemented. But maybe, just maybe, they are really incompetent and they don’t know how to handle these matters, as shown time and again. As Groucho Marx once might have observed about the English Premiership: “those guys might look like idiots and they might act like idiots, but don’t let that fool you… they really are idiots!”.

RTG – The Week’s Events

• Liverpool’s Jamie Carragher has joined the list of professional players to get acquainted with Her Majesty’s Police when he received a formal caution over a violent incident this week in Liverpool.
• Alisher Usmanov, the Arsenal share holding Russian billionaire, has increased his stake in Arsenal by a few decimal percentage points, but by doing so is now the single biggest shareholder in the Gunners. He’s only a few decimal percentage points away from the magical 25% level, which would allow him to block any board resolutions. A place on the Arsenal board cannot be far away. Interestingly, he has also announced a year’s sponsorship of Dynamo Moscow, citing, according to reports, that Dynamo is his ‘first love’ and that he fell in love with them the first time he entered the stadium in the early sixties. Sounds a bit familiar to his pronouncements on acquiring his Arsenal shareholding ie he fell in love with English football the first time he encountered it in 1966….