Football and the Coronavirus

Caporegime
Joined
1 Dec 2010
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Gary Neville is right on this one imo, clubs who have furloughed staff or cut players wages, should have a transfer embargo placed on them.

It’s wrong for a club like Spurs to say they can’t afford to pay their staff and then a few months later, splash out millions in transfer fees. It’s actually pretty insulting.
 
Don
Joined
9 Jun 2004
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46,154
His idea is flawed. Football transfers are a fundemental part of running a football club. Put Spurs to one side and look at some of the smaller PL sides that have furloughed staff, although the same point applies to Spurs whether they qualify for Europe or not. Some of these sides rely on selling players in order to survive and if they cannot buy in cheaper replacements it will directly effect their performance on the pitch and massively increase their chance of relegation. What do you think happens to staff numbers and pay when a side gets relegated. A club will probably cut non playing staff by 30% if they're relegated.

And where do you draw the line on furloughing staff because for all the headlines around certain clubs, if you dig a little deeper you'll find that a lot more clubs have indirectly furloughed staff. I read the other day that both Arsenal and West Ham's matchday staff are employed via a 3rd party who have furloughed the staff. A similar story has come out regarding Everton over the weekend. In contrast other clubs have guaranteed to pay all matchday staff, directly employed or otherwise, in full.

And then you come to the bigger question of whether taking advantage of the goverment furlough scheme and taking sub £1m of tax payers money is more immoral than clubs that are avoiding paying 10s of millions in tax through creative accounting. Man Utd have confirmed in their latest set of accounts that they're currently being investigated by HMRC for tax matters around players salaries (almost certainly around image rights). Should Bournemouth be punished for taking £500k of tax payers money in this crisis but not Utd who have avoided paying possibly more than 20x that in tax?

And to be clear, there's probably a lot more clubs being investigated by HMRC too - Utd are just the one we know for certain.
 
Soldato
Joined
30 Mar 2010
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Exile
And where do you draw the line on furloughing staff because for all the headlines around certain clubs, if you dig a little deeper you'll find that a lot more clubs have indirectly furloughed staff. I read the other day that both Arsenal and West Ham's matchday staff are employed via a 3rd party who have furloughed the staff. A similar story has come out regarding Everton over the weekend. In contrast other clubs have guaranteed to pay all matchday staff, directly employed or otherwise, in full.

A lot of london teams matchday staff work for an agency(I forget the name of it). And will be working at 3 different clubs over a weekend. So which club is responsible for paying them when their agency refuses to as they're on zero hour contracts?
 
Don
Joined
9 Jun 2004
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46,154
A lot of london teams matchday staff work for an agency(I forget the name of it). And will be working at 3 different clubs over a weekend. So which club is responsible for paying them when their agency refuses to as they're on zero hour contracts?
Easy, each club pays the hours they would have worked for them had matches been played.
 
Don
Joined
9 Jun 2004
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46,154
That only works if the employees schedules are done say a month in advance. The chances are most don't know where they're working in 2 weeks time.
The football clubs will know how many of these matchday staff they employ, the hours they work and the pay they receive. Clubs then pay the agency the fee they would have paid. The agency can then distribute that pay based on whatever means they have - whether they know which staff would have worked x games or based on previous averages or a even split.
 
Soldato
Joined
9 Mar 2012
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18,556
Apparently all the senior arsenal players have been asked if they can take a 12.5% paycut for one year.

However, if they qualify for CL, they get there money back, qualifyfor europa, they get 7.5% back.

I kid you not!

One year is a bit much but lets have it right....they arent "working" as such. Id expect this to happen to most clubs.

And yes, i get it the owners are worth XYZ and should do their bit but whoever can take a hit...should.
 
Soldato
Joined
7 Apr 2008
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Lorville - Hurston
One year is a bit much but lets have it right....they arent "working" as such. Id expect this to happen to most clubs.

And yes, i get it the owners are worth XYZ and should do their bit but whoever can take a hit...should.
Is it not the owners responsibility to pay for staff? Your basically telling some of your own staff to pay other staff
 
Caporegime
Joined
22 Oct 2002
Posts
26,810
Location
Boston, Lincolnshire
The furlong system is there for companies and owners unable to pay there staff without going bust,

I'm pretty sure Stan kronke won't go bust..

My company has furloughed staff as well and they had a net income of 50 million last year. It is not just football teams. Problem is it is us the tax payer that will be picking up the bill.
 
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