Western Morning News (Saturday)
Plymouth Argyle chief executive predicts a difficult and gloomy future for game
PLYMOUTH Argyle chief executive Andrew Parkinson says football is facing a ‘very difficult and gloomy future’ as it comes to terms with the devastating impact of coronavirus.
The season was ended when the virus brought football, and the nation, to a standstill with the Pilgrims still to play nine games, four of which at home – including a Devon Derby with Exeter City in front of what would have been a sold-out Home Park.
Hopes of the campaign finishing were ended when League Two clubs voted against that idea last Friday with the £150,000 cost per club of Covid-19 testing simply unaffordable for teams in the fourth tier.
Parkinson estimates that Argyle have missed out on around £800,000 in terms of matchday revenue as Ryan Lowe’s side fought for automatic promotion.
Longer-term, Parkinson thinks things will only get worse with the likelihood that when football does resume it will be behind closed doors.
“For this part of the season, we have been able to take some support from the furlough scheme for a lot of our staff, whether they be in the office or on matchday and so on,” he said.
“But, clearly, without the last couple of games that we had – and some lucrative games, eg the one against Exeter – we have lost out on revenue.
“Sixty per-cent of our revenue comes from a matchday, so that has gone and that was in the region of about £800,000 for those games, so it was quite significant.
“Longer-term, obviously we’ve also got to look at what the situation might be if we are playing behind closed doors for an extended length of time. Financially, as I mentioned, 60% of revenue comes from matchday, so that means our revenue is in the region of £8 million, so we have lost over half of that.
“It is obviously difficult being able to navigate our way through that and in time, we are going to have to make some difficult decisions.”
Argyle are fortunate in the sense that they went into this nightmare in relative health. Owner and chairman Simon Hallett has invested considerable sums already in the club and funded the shortfall employees faced by signing up with the government’s furlough scheme.
Such goodwill cannot go on forever, though, and Argyle are by no means alone, with clubs up and down the country in genuine financial danger. Swindon Town chairman Lee Power, the former Argyle striker, estimates that 30-40% of League One and Two clubs could go to the wall without financial assistance.
“I think we have to tip-toe our way through it, but have a mind on what could happen in the future,” Parkinson added. “It is clearly not just Argyle, but all football clubs will face a very severe financial situation.
“I think the football industry has to face those bigger questions which is, particularly for League One and Two clubs, how do you manage to get financial income into all the clubs?
“You need other clubs to play with and teams to play and they all need that financial stability. At this stage, it is a difficult question to answer as to where that income will come from.
“There could be some support from TV revenues etc but, as I say, 60% of our revenue comes from matchdays, it’s not like the Premier League where it is based on huge media deals.
“It is a very difficult and gloomy picture at this stage, but hopefully there will be some answers in the future.”
Despite the uncertainty, Argyle are still making plans for next season, which looks increasingly likely that it will be in League One.
“Speculation about what players you might be buying, or what the squad looks like is a bit premature really,” Parkinson said.
“Whether we are in League One or League Two, that work in terms of player recruitment was done some time ago.
“What it does come down to is brass tacks and the budgets you may or may not have. We know our revenue is going to be severely impacted and what we don’t know at this stage is what sort of budget we will have to be able to compete.”