We need to even up resources
ILISTENED with great interest to a radio debate on Thursday afternoon. The subject? Is Adam Lallana worth £150,000 per week to Liverpool. Pundits and fans had their say. Meanwhile, I ran on my treadmill shaking my head at where our national game is at.
On the one hand, I can be accused of being ill-placed to talk about the big issues in our game – I joined a club that was 92nd in the Football League and we are still 92nd.
Alongside my career record, I can only point to five games unbeaten since I moved 10-plus out and completed 13 additions when the January window finally opened as evidence that I might have a clue.
Perspective
Here's my perspective. At Newport County, £150,000 is five times what we can afford to pay for a training ground for a year.
Yes, one week of Adam Lallana at that price is what a Football League club has to spend on facilities for five years.
In addition, £150,000 would pay our entire playing squad for nearly two months. Six weeks of one player on his summer holiday would pay our entire squad for nearly a year.
There are only 92 clubs in England and Wales above the National League. Those 92 clubs represent the various regions and geographies from Plymouth to Carlisle, from Gillingham to Newcastle, from Swansea to Norwich, from Hull to Brighton.
Is it really right that some can afford training facilities for their eight-year-olds that put the training facilities for others’ first teams to complete shame?
There is a huge imbalance in the distribution of the vast sums of money in football. To think that one player will earn more in one week than the cost of a poor quality training pitch in Newport for five years just sums it up.
I am not a person who resents successful people. Far from it. But I do believe that those at the top are a product of the wider game.
The wider game gave Jamie Vardy the chance to become a Premier League champion and Lallana the chance to graduate from League One.
There is a duty at the top to recognise the gap that is growing and a duty to help to close that gap.
Certainly in the area of facilities. Every professional club should be given the funding to create playing and training facilities becoming of earned professional status as an absolute minimum. That is my strong point of view.