The Chinese Way

When Wayne Rooney retires from professional football it is unlikely that he will be writing any letters to the great and the good begging for work or money. Yet one of his predecessors in an England shirt was reduced to that as recently as 1970 when Tommy Lawton wrote to Chelsea director and film star Richard Attenborough, asking for a loan or a job. Lawton[1], whose career saw him score 231 goals while playing for Everton, Chelsea and Arsenal among others and who scored 22 goals in 23 England games, was by then trying to make ends meet in the furniture trade. When Lawton retired in 1956, the maximum wage for a professional footballer was fixed at £15 and it was not until 1961 that the ceiling, by then £20, was abolished. Too late for Lawton and a whole generation of top class players who extended their careers after they were no longer able to play at the highest level by signing for Southern League clubs like Romford who at various times were able to field such famous names as Ted Ditchburn, Trevor Ford and Malcolm Allison.

Tommy Lawton during his Arsenal days. Picture: Arsenal FC

While Malcolm Allison went into coaching and television, many retired players of his era, most in fact, had to find work outside the game. Ditchburn ran a successful sports shop in Romford and many of his contemporaries went into various other careers, becoming publicans or salesmen and the like. Common among them was the necessity to find paid employment after their playing days were over and while top players are now often sought after for jobs in the media, a lot do not have the pressing need to find a well paid job to maintain their lifestyles. And if today's top players ever feel the need to increase their earnings while they are still playing, there are always clubs somewhere in the world, sometimes in unlikely places, willing to give them another payday. At one time it was Italian clubs who represented the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, Spain has always been another country where untold riches could be had by the top players and of course with sponsorship and Sky TV money the English Premier League has in recent years been a big draw for world class players. But now there is a new kid on the block, an unlikely one perhaps, but one which is attracting some big names and paying big money for them, and that is China.

Romford FC 1961 featuring Ted Ditchburn, Trevor Ford and Malcolm Allison.

Football the Chinese way has seen Chinese Super League side Jiangsu Suning pay a record £38 million for Alex Teixeira (who preferred them over Liverpool when he left Shaktar Dontetsk) and  Guangzhou Evergrande have signed Atletico Madrid’s Jackson Martinez for £31million, while former Lille and Arsenal forward Gervinho recently joined Hebei China Fortune from Roma for £13.7m. Ex Chelsea and Newcastle forward Demba Ba signed for Shanghai Shenhua for £9 million from Besiktas and Chelsea offloaded Ramires to Jiangsu Suning for £25 million. Apart from the players, Chinese clubs have also been able to attract top managers like Luiz Felipe Scolari (Guangzhou Evergrande) and Sven-Goran Eriksson (Shanghai SIPG). So while the Chinese economy may have hit the buffers in recent months there still seems to be plenty of money sloshing about, in football anyway. Take Hebei China Fortune, for instance. Formed only five years ago, they have been able to splash out £13 million on Gervinho and have also paid big money for the Brazilian, Edu thanks to their backing from real estate developers China Fortune Land Development, a company worth US$12.7 billion.

Alex Teixeira. Picture: Evening Standard

So why, with all that apparent wealth in Chinese football, did Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne announce a £3 million grant to grassroots football in the country last September? I confess that the story passed me by at the time, but it has gained more publicity since the recent transfer window saw Chinese clubs start waving their cheque books. Back in September, Osborne said "Grassroots football plays an instrumental role in UK life, and it is brilliant to be able to spread that to China. This fantastic scheme which will bring new opportunities to young people across China will also help bring increased awareness and investment into the UK football sector." Osborne is right; grassroots football is important in the UK, so rather than invest £3 million in the game in country five thousand miles away and where the game is already apparently very wealthy, why not invest the money here?

And if Chinese clubs can spend up to £38 million on a single player, can they not invest their own money in their domestic grassroots game? Meanwhile in England, grassroots football has seen player numbers fall, clubs disband, facilities and pitches fall into disrepair or be closed down and non-League clubs hit recently by appalling weather which resulted in non-League clubs  Ramsbottom United and Tadcaster Albion being flooded out of their grounds. Yes, there is money invested in grassroots football by the Football Association, last August they announced plans to spend £260 million in the next four years on what FA chief executive Martin Glenn said at the time would target "facilities, coaching, participation and developing the football workforce." To put that figure into perspective, Premier League clubs spent £859.25 million on transfers in the summer and a further £185 million in January.

Tadcaster Albion's flooded ground. Picture: Andy Charlesworth.

In comparison with the FA's £260 million grant and with the news that the Premier League will invest “at least £1billion” of its £5.1billion television revenue for 2016-17 to 2018-19 on grass-roots football and the like, the £3 million that Osborne is giving to China is small beer and perhaps it is churlish to begrudge it, given Osborne's justification of the spend, that it is "just one example of the ways we can work together with China to benefit both our nations." Except of course that the aim of increasing Chinese awareness of football in the UK inevitably means awareness of the Premier League and is going to be of very little benefit to any part of the game outside the top flight. As far as I can see, neither Ramsbottom United nor Tadcaster Albion received any financial help from the football bodies nor the government in putting right the storm damage to their grounds and one has to question exactly how effectively these large sums of money are being spent sometimes.

The Football Association's investment is scarcely new money anyway; they already spend £50 million on grassroots football annually with very little evidence of tangible benefit given the fact that it continues to decline. Unless at some point in the next few years there is feedback provided on how the FA's £260 million and the Premier League's £1 billion has been spent, with proof that these funds have resulted in clear and sustainable benefits, and confirmation that the £3 million lobbed in China's direction has been of benefit to the English game I am somewhat cynical as to how effectively these monies are being spent. Money flowing from China into English football is only likely to benefit the very top clubs anyway, as the purchase of a 13% stake in Manchester City by China Media Capital Holdings (CMC) and Citic Capital at a cost of US$400 million tends to prove. Certainly I cannot see Chinese entrepreneurs and companies queuing to help Ramsbottom United and Tadcaster Albion repair their flooded grounds.

This is where money is needed...

...this is where it goes. Picture: Manchester City FC.

Given the hand to mouth existence of many clubs outside the top flight of English football, it won't be ex-players like Tommy Lawton writing begging letters in future, more likely it will be clubs; perhaps they should start mugging up on their Mandarin.

---

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Lawton