In a few months' time, most likely before the final game of the Barclays Premier League season on May 24, the new television deals will be fixed in to place.
They will fetch record fees and some financial analysts are even predicting that the overseas TV rights (currently £2.23billion over three years) will be bigger than the domestic rights (£3.018bn).
Either way, from the start of the 2016 season, the Premier League clubs will be caked in money. In return, it is time to give the game back to the supporters who pay through the nose to watch their teams.
The Premier League are rightly proud that the average number of tickets sold at their games last season was 36,695. More than 14 million supporters passed through the turnstiles at stadiums in the top flight. It is still boom time
for the money men.
Attendances run at around 95-96 per cent of capacity, which is an impressive statistic given the cost of watching a team in the Premier League. Amid all this, it is sometimes easy to forget that only 25,311 turned up to watch Aston Villa draw with Southampton last month, which is their lowest attendance in the league since 1999.
There is one executive at a Premier League team, anticipating the guarantee of £100m in TV rights a season before a ball is even kicked in August 2016, who is considering freezing season ticket prices. Jacking them up again will not go down well.
Other than mainstream American sports, there isn't another industry in the world where 20 businesses are guaranteed
that kind of turnover in return for 38 days' work.
According to the recent Price of Football survey by the BBC, season tickets in the Premier League have risen by 15.8 percent in the past three seasons. Good on Manchester City, for example, where supporters will be charged £299 for a season ticket in the third tier of their new south stand.
This season Manchester United froze season ticket prices, but they still generate £109m from matchday income. The Glazers could easily lose a few million on those figures and it would barely register on the record revenues of
£420m that will be announced on Wednesday.
By 2016 a team the size of United, who already boast 12 major commercial partners, could have a turnover approaching £500m when the new TV deal kicks in. Don't forget the fans in all of this.
Arsenal (£93m matchday income), Chelsea (£71m), Liverpool (£45m), City (£40m) and Tottenham (£33m) could still do more for their loyal support. Arsenal routinely claim that the official attendance at the Emirates is just over 60,000, but an audit last season revealed that the true average is actually 53,788.
The Arsenal Supporters Trust have previously declared that the reason for the no-shows is the price of tickets to watch the team (the highest season ticket is £2013 and the highest individual ticket price is £97 at the Emirates).
Still, the Gunners pay £2.50 towards the cost of every ticket for away matches, which is a token gesture of goodwill and appreciation. Gone are the days when Junior Gunners could stand in the paddock next to the North Bank for a quid, but the next generation - the 16-25 year olds - should not be forgotten.
At Newcastle, where the family enclosure seats 8,200 and is believed to be the biggest in Europe, a dad and lad can watch the Toon Army in all 19 games at St James' Park for £417.
This is an era when we routinely throw around figures about £250,000 a week contracts to Wayne Rooney, to Robin van Persie to Yaya Toure or whoever happens to be signing next.
Transfer fees are also inflated because Premier League teams have more far more money sloshing around than any other league in European football. It is easy to spend all that
free cash. Around £835m was spent in the blink of an eye last summer as clubs competed for the biggest talents at home and abroad.
Sadly, our game sometimes overlooks the fans who find the money to watch their team up and down the country. The next TV deal is time for the big pay-back. We have stopped blinking when it comes to super-sized salaries and swollen squads with players picking up big wages when they haven't a hope of getting a game at the highest level.
In Europe there is a brutal reminder that fans come first. The cheapest season ticket at the Bernabeu is £175; at Barcelona you can watch Lionel Messi play in 19 La Liga games from somewhere up in the gods at the Nou Camp for
around £105. Most of their income is drawn from commercial contracts and broadcast rights with some of the biggest corporate entities in the world. In return, the fans get to watch the best players on the planet at a fraction of the cost.
Here in England, to maintain the Premier League's status as the best in the world, then the time has come for to remember the biggest supporters.
Source:
www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2876023/Barcelona-fans-watch-Lionel-Messi-just-105-season-let-Premier-League-supporters-Wayne-Rooney-less.html
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