Scudamore £5 million leaving gift

[1967Ram]

Richard Scudamore is going to be paid £5 million pounds over 3 years as a leaving gift! 

“The Premier League would like to put on record our thanks to Richard for his exceptional contribution to the success of the league,” the governing body said in a statement.

“Richard has made an outstanding contribution to English football,” added the Tottenham chairman, Daniel Levy. “The Premier League is the most supported league the world and he has unique knowledge and experience which is going to be an ongoing benefit to the Premier League over the next three years.

“We were all very supportive. It was an absolutely fair payment. It was a discussion for the Premier League to make a decision because it’s a central cost and all the clubs were behind it.”

However, there was widespread criticism of the agreement to pay out such a large sum to Scudamore, who it is estimated has earned more than £26m from his salary since taking over the role in 1999. The Football Supporters’ Federation described the proposed payment to Scudamore as “hugely unpopular” with fans, while Liverpool group Spirit of Shankly said “most supporters will look at it and think only one thing – greed”.

I agree with the Football Supporters' Federation, it's a disgrace I think. He's earned bloody £26 million. Unbelievable greed IMO. 

[Sith Happens]

It is a disgrace.

 

[Philmycock]

Disgusting

[angieram]

Footballers earn a lot of money but they have very short careers.

Richard Scudamore is 59 years old and has presumably worked his entire adult life, climbing the career ladder to a job at the top of his tree and being very generously paid for it.

If he hasn't managed to save adequately for his retirement by now that's his fault. I think the whole thing is distasteful and the only thing that I would say in the Premier League's defence is that this sort of pay-off, consultancy type agreement happens at the top level in lots of public and business positions; it's just that we don't get to hear of most of them.

Corrupt, the lot of them.

[Sith Happens]

3 minutes ago, angieram said:

Footballers earn a lot of money but they have very short careers.

Richard Scudamore is 59 years old and has presumably worked his entire adult life, climbing the career ladder to a job at the top of his tree and being very generously paid for it.

If he hasn't managed to save adequately for his retirement by now that's his fault. I think the whole thing is distasteful and the only thing that I would say in the Premier League's defence is that this sort of pay-off, consultancy type agreement happens at the top level in lots of public and business positions; it's just that we don't get to hear of most of them.

Corrupt, the lot of them.

I have no issue with people earning large salaries, but this is shocking.  He has been paid very well to do his job, and he has done a good one and been paid significant bonuses already. 

This just rubs salt in the wounds for those clubs or fans that look for every penny to keep going or attend games.

Its not necessary. I bet the guy living in a tent near pride park would love 5 pounds of that 5 million. 

 

[GenBr]

Don't have an issue with this myself. A group of very wealthy businesses deciding to reward a man who has contributed significantly to them becoming so insanely wealthy is not an issue for me. Up to them what they decide to do with their money. No-one is forcing joe public to hand over their hard earned money every week. Their won't be any protests and their won't be any significant drop in attendances, because in truth nobody actually cares.

9 minutes ago, Paul71 said:

This just rubs salt in the wounds for those clubs or fans that look for every penny to keep going or attend games.

Its not necessary. I bet the guy living in a tent near pride park would love 5 pounds of that 5 million. 

 

I think I read somewhere that half of the clubs in the Premier League don't actually need to charge for tickets to make a profit. this £250,000 per club is an absolute drop in the ocean compared to what the Prem clubs are earning every year. All the clubs in the Prem could lower their ticket prices or even make them free in some cases, but they won't - this Scudamore money won't make a difference to that.

 

[TimRam]

Well done for making the top tier of English football boring and predictable.

[Philmycock]

1 hour ago, TimRam said:

Well done for making the top tier of English football boring and predictable.

Leicester?

[GenBr]

2 hours ago, TimRam said:

Well done for making the top tier of English football boring and predictable.

It was the change from 2 points to 3 points for a win that did the most damage in that regard.

[McRainy]

1 hour ago, GenBr said:

It was the change from 2 points to 3 points for a win that did the most damage in that regard.

Really?

[Sith Happens]

1 hour ago, GenBr said:

It was the change from 2 points to 3 points for a win that did the most damage in that regard.

 

36 minutes ago, Lambchop said:

Really?

Surely not? I think that along with preventing back passes to the keeper being picked up that are probably the two best changes in my life time.

[Comrade 86]

I felt that some of the language used in the original statement was a tad fluffy and ambiguous so I've taken the liberty of re-drafting their press release...

“The Premier League would like to put on record our thanks to Richard for his exceptional contribution to feathering our pockets and of course his own” the governing body said in a statement.

“Richard has made an outstanding contribution to English football,” added the Tottenham chairman, Daniel Levy. “The Premier League is the most supported league the world and is now the sole province of those who can afford to pay £1,000 plus for a season ticket. In transforming football from the people's game into a hideous, commercially driven snorefest, RIchard has made club shareholders such as myself an enormous pile of wonga whilst simultaneously forcing out those awful working class types who used to frequent our stadia. Whilst Richard has been paid a king's ransom for selling what he did not own, and ignoring his astronomic pension pot, we felt it only right and proper that we tax the clubs for a small seven figure leaving gratuity which we are certain that fans in general, especially those of the little clubs, will deem entirely in keeping with the wonderful service Richard has provided'. 

[ilkleyram]

1 hour ago, GenBr said:

It was the change from 2 points to 3 points for a win that did the most damage in that regard.

Was introduced for the 81/82 season. In the 11 seasons before the EPL started, Liverpool were champions 6 times, Everton and Arsenal twice and Leeds once.  But runners up and third place over those 11 seasons included Ipswich, Watford, Southampton, Villa, Reddogs, Palace, Wednesday and Spurs (third twice) so there were many more 'lesser' clubs genuinely involved in challenging for the title than is the case nowadays (source: Wiki).

The change that did the most damage was the decision in the mid 80's (can't recall the exact year) to allow the home club to keep all the gate receipts rather than share them between the home and away teams - the away team got 30% I think.  That was the FA caving in to the 'big' clubs who had threatened to break away - which they eventually did in 1992 anyway to form the EPL.  It marked the beginning of the end of the football 'family' and the drive from larger clubs for ever more income at the expense of any other club and which has inexorably led to the current situation.  Leicester and Blackburn are just the exceptions that prove the rule, that money wins.  And Scudamore and his like epitomise the whole sorry state.

PS Away clubs in league matches are allowed to charge home clubs a handling fee for away tickets sold, apparently.  Approximately 5%, so way, way less than they used to get before 81/82

[Gaspode]

36 minutes ago, ilkleyram said:

Was introduced for the 81/82 season. In the 11 seasons before the EPL started, Liverpool were champions 6 times, Everton and Arsenal twice and Leeds once.  But runners up and third place over those 11 seasons included Ipswich, Watford, Southampton, Villa, Reddogs, Palace, Wednesday and Spurs (third twice) so there were many more 'lesser' clubs genuinely involved in challenging for the title than is the case nowadays (source: Wiki).

The change that did the most damage was the decision in the mid 80's (can't recall the exact year) to allow the home club to keep all the gate receipts rather than share them between the home and away teams - the away team got 30% I think.  That was the FA caving in to the 'big' clubs who had threatened to break away - which they eventually did in 1992 anyway to form the EPL.  It marked the beginning of the end of the football 'family' and the drive from larger clubs for ever more income at the expense of any other club and which has inexorably led to the current situation.  Leicester and Blackburn are just the exceptions that prove the rule, that money wins.  And Scudamore and his like epitomise the whole sorry state.

PS Away clubs in league matches are allowed to charge home clubs a handling fee for away tickets sold, apparently.  Approximately 5%, so way, way less than they used to get before 81/82

Driven (if I remember correctly) by Man Utd - who not too surprisingly benefited the most from the change....one of the (many) reasons I dislike the club so much....

[Wolfie]

1 hour ago, ilkleyram said:

The change that did the most damage was the decision in the mid 80's (can't recall the exact year) to allow the home club to keep all the gate receipts rather than share them between the home and away teams - the away team got 30% I think. 

I had no idea that used to be the case.

[ilkleyram]

5 minutes ago, Wolfie said:

I had no idea that used to be the case.

Yep. Cup games still share gate receipts more evenly nowadays. But league matches altered in the mid 80s, as Gaspode says, led by Man utd.  

It meant that (and this is what the 'big' clubs didn't like) that overall income was more even generally. As was the football. The well attended clubs still earned more income, just not vastly more.  Once the change was made then it was in their interests to expand capacity and increase income. TV money wasn't yet a major factor in those days.  The TV element was, and is, a direct result of the EPL and Sky plus others. The EPL came about because the 'big' clubs wanted even more income and wanted to rid themselves of what they saw as the dead hand of the FA and Football League. They took the Kerry Packer revolution in cricket in the late 70s as their business model. Packer showed that breakaways were not only possible but that TV rights could be packaged and used and that participants could make a lot of money.

[GenBr]

2 hours ago, Paul71 said:

 

Surely not? I think that along with preventing back passes to the keeper being picked up that are probably the two best changes in my life time.

The fact that a win was only one point difference from a draw allowed a lot of the smaller teams to at least keep closer to the top teams if not genuinely compete. We are only champions of England once in a 3 point system. (although still joint top with Ipswich, so I suppose the difference isn't as big as I thought). Ilkleyram makes some very good points which I hadn't considered though.

1 hour ago, ilkleyram said:

Was introduced for the 81/82 season. In the 11 seasons before the EPL started, Liverpool were champions 6 times, Everton and Arsenal twice and Leeds once.  But runners up and third place over those 11 seasons included Ipswich, Watford, Southampton, Villa, Reddogs, Palace, Wednesday and Spurs (third twice) so there were many more 'lesser' clubs genuinely involved in challenging for the title than is the case nowadays (source: Wiki).

The change that did the most damage was the decision in the mid 80's (can't recall the exact year) to allow the home club to keep all the gate receipts rather than share them between the home and away teams - the away team got 30% I think.  That was the FA caving in to the 'big' clubs who had threatened to break away - which they eventually did in 1992 anyway to form the EPL.  It marked the beginning of the end of the football 'family' and the drive from larger clubs for ever more income at the expense of any other club and which has inexorably led to the current situation.  Leicester and Blackburn are just the exceptions that prove the rule, that money wins.  And Scudamore and his like epitomise the whole sorry state.

PS Away clubs in league matches are allowed to charge home clubs a handling fee for away tickets sold, apparently.  Approximately 5%, so way, way less than they used to get before 81/82

There were 16 different winners in the same time period before the 3 point rule change and 9 afterwards. Many different factors affected this as you say - I agree the gate receipts will have been a significant impact as well. 

[cannable]

Apparently the majority of clubs are unhappy with this, so why have they paid him? 

[Van der MoodHoover]

as far as i can see, just completes the conversion of football to a fully fledged business. these sorts of compensation deals are commonplace among CEOs of big companies - reward for "creating wealth". He's just done the same for the PL clubs so unsurprisingly the cheque books open.

Doesn't make it justifiable but its a fact of corporate life.

[ilkleyram]

39 minutes ago, HantsRam said:

as far as i can see, just completes the conversion of football to a fully fledged business. these sorts of compensation deals are commonplace among CEOs of big companies - reward for "creating wealth". He's just done the same for the PL clubs so unsurprisingly the cheque books open.

Doesn't make it justifiable but its a fact of corporate life.

I think I might agree Hants, except:

Which successful businesses outside football pay over 100% of their income on wages, or even over 70%?

Any business relies upon its customers to be successful. The football (especially the EPL) business' sole customer appears to be Sky.

The investors in some businesses eg Persimmon, are increasingly taking a dislike to extravagant compensation deals for senior executives. This deal for an already well rewarded executive seems to me to fall well within the definition of extravagant. And uneccessary and unwarranted. 

In practice football as a whole and especially in the EPL is a long way away from being a fully fledged business as others might recognise.