Brinkmanship: The Bane of the Beautiful Game of Football

The game of football has indeed burnt its bridges. And it happened when unprecedented money,from TV revenues and merchandising, poured into the sports. While this has been grist to the mills of the sports and all stakeholders, it however tipped the balance of power between clubs and players to favour the latter.Unlike in the past when the distinction between players and field athletes was negligible, footballers are now superstar millionaires, who now have an armada of handlers like lawyers, publicists, advisers, stylists, tax consultants, personal assistants, financial consultants, agents and sometimes even therapists. Confined to history, is the period when footballers were only coached on field and attracted little spotlight , nowadays they are also coached off it basking in a bubble of limelight. Players are not only told what to say, where to visit, which dresses they should wear, but are whisked off to magazine set for photo-shoots, meetings with executives of fortune 500 companies, introduced to circles of models, pop stars and Hollywood royalties. Their lives on and off the field are stage managed, sometimes to the detriment of the clubs their primary employers. This was exactly what Sir Alex Ferguson’s feared as he tried to rein in David Beckham when he was on his cusp of becoming football’s first golden boy. When the legendary coach realized he couldn’t clip Beckham’s wing, who was already associated with popstardom, he was sold off to Real Madrid.

But there is certainly no peril in footballers dating models, going for photo shoots or even spotting the latest hairstyle,however the danger occurs when their handlers stage manage them into forcing the club’s hand to offering them better deals. Sadly the dangerous seed of this precedence has long been sown and only God knows what monster tree it would grow into in the future. In the present era of media blitz and social media craze, football handlers know that everything their star players do is news, which they of course use to manipulate clubs. Remember when Cristiano Ronaldo famously claimed he was sad, after failing to celebrate despite scoring two goals in the win against Granada in 2012.It became news sending jitters down the spines of Real Madrid’s hierarchy, who then did not see any reason to offer the Portuguese a better deal than the £10 million a year he was netting. His handlers also followed this up by telling the Portuguese to reminisce about his old Club, a sort of ‘come and get me plea’ raising the possibility that he might return to Manchester United. This ante was upped, when leaks filtered to the press that Ronaldo who was pictured shopping for boxes or whatever, was about to sell his House in Madrid. The media went on a speculative rampage about his imminent departure. But at the end of the day, Ronaldo under the tutelage of his handlers was able to get a better contract from Madrid using both the media and Manchester united as pawns-£15million a year after tax.

In recent time, Danny Alves also adopted the same tactics to ruthless success. The Brazilian and his handlers, when it became clear that Barcelona was not disposed to offering the type of contract expected, put word out that the defender was keen on leaving the Blaugrana. Rather than denying such rumours, the Brazilian added fuel to it by publicly flirting with the idea of signing for other clubs. This piqued the attention of both the media and several clubs including Paris Saint Germain, PSG and United. Expectedly, the strong display of interest by these clubs to sign the Brazilian forced the hand of the Catalonian club to offering the Brazilian a better deal. Again another player got a better contract using the media and other clubs as pawns. Now, Sergio Ramos and his camps have also ripped a page off Alves copybook after contract disagreement with his present club Madrid. It started first when news broke that Ramos had been offered as a secret election weapon to one of the presidential candidates of Madrid’s bitter rival, Barcelona. When Madrid did not budge, news filtered out again that the defender might be interested in signing for Man U, seemingly another ploy to force the hand of his club, a situation presently unfurling in the media.

Then there are also the forgotten cases of Rooney who got Man U over a barrel by using Chelsea to extract a better contract, and John Terry employing Manchester City’s interest in him in forcing a better deal from Chelsea, amongst many. Sadly all these cases of brinkmanship leave a sour taste in the mouths of clubs, many of whom are neck deep in debts. It is a known fact that prices and wages in football are spiraling out of control as footballers are sold for astronomical amounts, while they also earn wages disproportionate to what the general populace could ever make. Brinkmanship is however going to make this trend worse, forcing clubs to pay beyond their means to keep players from being prised away either by local or continental rivals. If this practice is not curtailed, then the financial future of many clubs could be bleak, including the ones at the top of the money chain.