Why aren’t cash rich PFA helping to pay for testing in lower leagues?
THE Professional Footballers’ Association could pay for every club in Leagues One and Two to be tested for Covid-19 each week for the next five years, maybe as many as 10, and not run out of money. Nobody is suggesting they should but they could do a lot more this season. Sitting on reserves of £55million, with chief executive Gordon Taylor earning £2m and his organisation so financially secure there has been no talk of pay cuts, redundancies or furlough during the pandemic, the idea that the PFA could aid both its members and their clubs by paying for weekly health checks was first floated by Sunderland chief executive Jim Rodwell last May, as a way to avoid curtailing the season, and met with a deafening silence. League One ended prematurely with Sunderland narrowly outside the play-off places. Now the new season has begun, and
the PFA remains aloof from its members with games being lost at significant cost. Some lower division clubs playing in the Carabao Cup have refused offers from Premier League opponents to have tests — perhaps for fear of what might be found — jeopardising the security of the famous ‘red zone’ area at grounds. What union would stand idle with its members, and their families, at risk like that? Phil Wallace, chairman of League Two Stevenage, summed it up. ‘I paid out £3,500 for tests to ensure the welfare of our players for a few days, at a time when our club is scrambling for every pound,’ he said. ‘If the PFA’s main role is the welfare of its members, one might wonder why they are not paying for these tests. ‘If testing costs can be driven down so that a squad and management costs less than £2,000, testing the whole of League One and Two weekly during the season will see them with well over £50m left.’
And the PFA do good work with their money, few would deny that, but these are exceptional times. Taylor cannot stand apart, pontificating about the way the clubs conduct business — remember his ‘£20m is welcome but we believe it could be far bigger’ sneer at the Premier League’s charitable donation during the early weeks of the pandemic — without acknowledgement of who also owes a responsibility to footballers.
On issues such as head trauma and abuse, when the PFA should have been in the vanguard, it has been slow to react. It seems perfectly placed for arcane us-and-them battles with club owners, Taylor the shop steward, but it is sluggish when faced with newer challenges. Taylor is ideal for a row over who should pay for Covid testing, but deaf to the idea that sitting on £55m of his members’ money and in the middle of global health and economic crisis, it could be him.