Cod Almighty | Diary

It'll be tenderly warm 'til it's over

5 September 2014

Mardy Diary writes: As mentioned yesterday, tomorrow sees the return of Non-League Day, when clubs are looking to encourage fans of League teams to try out a local non-League side on their weekend off.

It's a laudable idea and it led me to this nice article about a trip to a match at Torquay. But what really stood out was the fact that it costs £21 for a matchday ticket at Torquay. TWENTY-ONE POUNDS! Sure, they probably do early bird discounts, or you can take 27 kids free or they practically give away season tickets, I dunno. But £21 though. It's not the kind of price that might tempt someone off the street who wouldn't normally go.

Town aren't much better of course, with their £18 on-the-day prices, and it's easy to do the old comparison with more successful clubs: you can get in at Leicester for £15, and Huddersfield and Sheffield United offer £10 tickets. However, this overlooks the fact that as you move further up the leagues, matchday football becomes more and more subsidised. Premier League clubs barely need supporters to turn up – in fact, I think some would prefer that they didn't. But down in the Conference the TV subsidy is so small as to be practically worthless – and so fans foot the bill.

In this regard I can understand Torquay charging £21. Understand, not accept. But these prices stem from player wages, and these are grossly inflated at the top of the game. This inflation drifts down the leagues and creates costs lower down – which can only be met by gate prices that don't truly reflect the standard of football.

One solution is for clubs to only pay wages they can really afford. This does happen at some clubs – especially fan-owned ones. But unless all clubs buy into the ethos it's not going to work: it will be exploited by the dishonest and greedy. Previous measures to cap wages and spending were half-arsed, poorly implemented and easily circumnavigated. I still think the whole Notts County/Munto business was an utter disgrace that allowed them to buy a spine of a team well beyond their real budget. What was the punishment for that? That's right: promotion.

So what do we do? What can we do? There are few genuine, altruistic club owners around today, especially in the top tier, so we can't expect them to do anything about it. Short of collectively agreeing to stop dealing with the likes of BT Sport and Sky (and I'd love this to happen, but I realise it never will, not a lot.

All we can do is continue to support non-League football where we can – even if we are lucky enough to escape it ourselves. And maybe, slowly over time, there may be a shift away from the false glitz of the Premier and back to real, matchday football. Then we can start to price it properly.