BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE – DOES THE END JUSTIFY THE MEANS? by Ken1945
With the debate about premier league footballers’ salaries and what should happen during this unprecedented time of the coronavirus, there have been accusations, proposals, counter proposals, predictions of one sort or another, the state of the game when it return,s and the feelings of the average supporter regarding the outcome of it all.
Let me make it clear and unequivocal, premier league footballers in general are overpaid performers, who have lost reality with the world of the average person. They have a wonderful life that most of us can only dream about and could, without any trouble at all, donate a year’s salary to any cause and still not affect that status.
I want to approach the subject from a different standpoint however and ask this question “what would it achieve, if the players of our club were to take a 25/30% pay cut and who would it benefit?
First of all, there is the moral view and I am 100% behind the belief that they should have acted from the very first day of the FA postponing football indefinitely. Make no mistake about that!!!
Now, if they had accepted the reported proposal that was put to them (12.5% cut), who would have benefited from that decision? As it is being reported, the club would have – meaning Kroenke, our billionaire owner. On top of this, it was alleged that further cuts would have been made if the club failed to qualify for either of the European competitions – further money that Kroenke would not have to find.
As far as I can tell, the census on here is that the fanbase is 100% behind getting rid of this absent owner by any means possible – so I cannot see why we should be making his present plight any more comfortable by insisting the players take a pay cut.
In fact, what they are doing, not deliberately I know, is ensuring that Kroenke is getting no assistance in his current situation – that of paying all of the direct staff their agreed salaries.
This will decrease his wealth across the board considerably, especially if you take his portfolio of sport ownership into consideration – the building of the new stadium for the Los Angeles Rams and Chargers is estimated to be costing him an estimated $4,963 billion dollars and planning to be opened in July 2020…to what?!?!? At the moment, coronavirus is not allowing any kind of sport to be played, so it’s another drain on his billion-dollar empire.
So, where I am coming from on this, is I don’t want the players to take a wage cut of any kind whatsoever – HOLD ON – what I want them to do, is make contributions from their nett pay to help the NHS etc in its hour of need.
For those who want/need to know what each individual is giving back to our society, the players themselves can let us know what they are contributing and I expect it to be more than 12.5% of their gross salary – I would be looking at donations matching that of the Newcastle lad – 30% of said salary at least.
Now I am looking at a wider issue than the players, in as much as I want to see this man leave our club as soon as possible – they want to ensure that their contributions don’t go to him, but to the NHS etc – just by taking a wage cut, neither of these goals are obtainable.
It needs our players to start acting in a responsible way by, first of all, showing they care, then donating from their nett earnings, and let Kroenke decide if he can keep his investments afloat, or cut his costs and sell The Arsenal.
Kroenke’s estimated loss at The Arsenal is put at £74.8 million if the league is declared null and void, no wonder the club want to claw some reported 12.5% of players salary back into his coffers.
We have to remember that this pay cut, as it stands, benefits only one-person, Silent Stan – if he decides to use it to prop up the Los Angeles Rams, what is the point???
Perhaps some will view my idea of “skinning the rabbit” in a time of crisis to over the top, but we are where we are and if the final outcome is seeing Kroenke have to sell our club, why not???
Whether you agree or not, the time for our players to act is well gone – this should have been sorted weeks ago, unless they see it the same way I do and are not prepared to subsidise a multi- billionaire in any way.
Ken1945