PLAYERS FACE SUMMER CRISIS
With 1,400 footballers out of contract this month, what does future hold?
FOR Paul Heckingbottom and many others involved in football for the past few decades, the game’s Covid-19 crisis has provided an unwelcome flashback.
In the summer of 2002, football was also in a state of flux following the collapse of ITV Digital earlier that year, with the situation having a knock-on impact for Heckingbottom and many other professionals.
Heading towards the end of his deal at Darlington, Heckingbottom – then approaching his mid-20s – had several suitors in the second tier keen for him to elevate his career.
All that changed with the demise of ITV Digital, who had earlier struck a huge deal worth £315m with the Football League to show matches from the Championship, League One and League Two exclusively.
Almost overnight, the financial landscape for Football League clubs changed and their cloth was quickly cut.
Especially for those players coming towards the end of contracts, it brought in a new reality and made for an uncertain time.
Having experienced the fallout from that, former Leeds United and Barnsley head coach Heckingbottom has particular sympathy for those 1,400 players now contemplating the next step at the end of their own deals.
Heckingbottom told The Yorkshire Post: “I was 24 and out of contract at Darlington.
“I’d got a few things where there were Burnley, Preston and Norwich there (interested). Then it all collapsed and Preston and Burnley pulled out and I ended up going to Norwich on a fraction of what it was initially meant to be.
“It will be the same again (for players). My advice to any player is to just make sure you have got a contract and just stay in the game until it corrects itself and there’s a bit more money there for you.
“It will give different perspective to people at different stages of their careers. Will it push some to go back to university and college to start studying and learning a profession and trade?
“It could be they are not forced to stick around and they make a tough decision to have something else to fall back on.
“There’s probably been a big spike of players getting in touch with the PFA (Professional Footballers Association) over this sort of thing.”
For the players of today, coping with safety issues and not just the financial uncertainty of this present crisis engulfing football represents an added key factor.
It all makes for a situation which is not straightforward or comfortable for many, with a number of high-profile players having publicly voiced fears about football’s return.
For some whose deals are ending, there is a further pertinent issue. Do you decide not to play beyond the end of June and jeopardise a future move by getting injured?
Among that number is Charlton forward Lyle Taylor, out of contract at the end of 2019-20.
He has said he will not play again this term to avoid damaging his chances of securing a “lifechanging move”, according to Addicks chief Lee Bowyer.
But for the vast majority of those who are lower down the pyramid, the reality is different.
Heckingbottom added: “It is tough and splits everything.
“Some (top-level) players are saying if they don’t feel safe, they don’t want to come back and I get that, 100 per cent. If anyone is not safe, it should not be happening.
“But they are in a position where they can choose not to go back as they are millionaires and can sit back.
“In the lower leagues, they have got different pressures and they are desperate to go back and might actually be having to be held back as they would work whatever as they are trying to earn a contract or have got a mortgage to pay.
“They are like any other person really – electrician, plumber or whoever – who is desperate to get to work, earn some money and stick with their living. It is different and I feel for them more than the Premier League boys.”
With his wife Claire being an NHS key worker, Heckingbottom is afforded a sense of perspective when it comes to talk of Covid-19 and how it affects people’s working lives.
In his view, it means following advise and adapting to the ‘new normal’ in whatever occupation that you work in.
“There is no getting away from it. When your wife has been working with Covid-positive patients and getting tested herself, you know it’s here,” he added.
“It also gives you that sense of perspective that we have all got to try and fight it and beat it.
“While that is staying safe and being responsible, it is also about the economy moving and getting things back to normal, while also being diligent and safe.
“Otherwise, we will roll over and be defeated and we cannot do that, either.”