Warbs: dirty dozen... you’re fired

FORMER City whizz kid Mark Warburton reckons the dazzling sums may have added up for the Dirty Dozen – but their business savvy would have got them quickly fired by Lord Sugar.

The QPR boss – who was a successful currency trader with various international banks before switching full-time to coaching – cannot believe the big club owners just did not know the basics of the business they are in.

Warburton insisted: “It was a shocking misjudgment. To not seem to understand what the strength of the negative reaction would be was astonishing.”

Deloitte calculated the dozen clubs earned an incredible £4.8billion in 2019/20 but the likes of Joel Glazer at Manchester United, Liverpool’s John Henry and Real Madrid’s Florentino Perez risked their reputations for the lure of even more.

Warburton (right) said: “These people were thinking from a purely business viewpoint. But this game is actually about the fans.

“These clubs are businesses. When clubs moved onto the stock market and their share price became a factor, the value of a new player or a new tournament could suddenly influence a share price. But these are people who didn’t understand the integrity of competition within the game they are in. It’s absolutely vital.

“When the integrity of any competition goes, and you have a closed shop, then a huge mistake has been made.”

Adding to the owners’ blunders, says Warburton, was the assumption that a massive leap in players’ wages would be seen as acceptable in a pandemic.

“I was told that a player on £200,000 a week now, might be able to earn £1million a week in a European Super League,” added Warburton.

“That’s an obscene increase and it undermines any pretence of a relationship with the supporters.”