Down through the years the League of Ireland has been referred to as many things, supporters called it The Greatest League In The World, we even have our own hashtag of the same name when referring to it on social media, but the league has also been referred to as “a difficult child” by those in charge at the FAI. You know you have a fight on your hands to promote the league when those in charge are using such language to describe the national football league.
As supporters I think we would all agree that the league has been neglected for many years, the promotional and marketing aspects are practically non-existent for along time and any such attempts of marketing the league usually fail at the first hurdle.
But we keep going, the clubs are doing their best to stay afloat, they are doing their best to offer players contracts for as long as possible, the normal contract will see a player obliged to stay at their club for the season, that means that they are contracted for the 36 games of the league or maybe additional games for europe or a cup run.
Over the last few weeks, the topic of players contracts has come to the forefront again because of the business being conducted by clubs during the July transfer window, we have seen transfers announced with Danny Mandroiu of Shamrock Rovers leaving to League One side Lincoln City for a mere 30,000 pounds and the transfer of Promise Omochere of Bohemiens to League One side Fleetwood Town, reportedly for a five figure sum also.
Its also the case the once a players contract has expired at the end of the season that they can move on a free transfer meaning their club will recieve no compensation at all.
So, why am I writing about this? I would like to discuss this issue in-depth and maybe suggest some ideas, hey, what would i know about football?
The Current Setup
At present each club in the league looks after their own transfer business, league administration, ticketing and marketing , they get little or no assistance from the governing body and most of the promotion of the club and merchandise is handled internally.
With all this comes a cost of employing staff, negotiating contracts, marketing deals such as sponsorships and merchandise deals and while also looking after their own club promotion via social media and through other media sources. All of this comes with an overhead of peoples time and the cost of employing people.
We all know that the rewards for winning the league is approx. one hundred thousand euro and to win the FAI Cup is approx. twenty-five thousand euro, out of which expenses are paid and any fines incured, but those clubs who are not lucky enough to win silverware must raise the money to survive by other means.
In most cases if a club from outside the league makes an offer to sign a player for a five-figure sum in the case of Promise Obochere, depending on the club, they may not have any other option but to accept it if they are financially struggling. Im not saying that Bohemians are financially struggling but that money could go along way and its better than getting nothing at the end of the season if the player was out of contract.
Overall, the league has little or no money and the governing body, FAI, offers little support to clubs in this respect, especially given the fact that the FAI have no money of their own!.
So what can be done?
Centrally Controlled
There are many leagues around the world that have a governing body who runs the league and manages the contracts for the clubs and other functions on behalf of the clubs, La Liga in Spain being one of them. What they do in Spain is very interesting, when a club wants to bring a player into the league they first will send the transfer request to the league governing body for approval.
The League Authorities will assess the financial burden of the transfer on the club and the benefits of the transfer on the league. The system used in La Liga is known as La Liga Manager, this is a centralised portal that the club directors can access, they upload the details for the player transfer no matter if they are on a free transfer or if a deal is being negogiated between the clubs.
The deal is then visible to the entire league and can be tracked, all the relevant paperwork is uploaded and the correct FIFA and UEFA rules must be met in order for the transfer to be approved.
The interesting part of this system is that any club, no matter their size or financial strength, can object to any transfer if they deem it bad for the league or if the money being offered is “financially unfair.”
This system is controlled by the league governing body and all transfers are approved by them, they must confirm that the financial burden of the transfer is not damaging to the club, that all paperwork is above board and that all rules are complied with.
Something like this approach could be good for our league, it means that clubs from outside the league who wish to approach a club about a player have the potiential negotiation power of the league body on their side and could ensure the player in question is sold for an realistic price.
Basic Contract Terms
As each club within the league is responsible for offering contracts to their players and essentially drawing up those contracts this can put the club in a position were they might not get the best deal if the player decides to move during the contract.
Agents would be looking for additional terms to be added, for example, buy out clauses, to ensure that their client would be in a position to move if a club was to offer the money to meet that clause.
If the league was to enforce a minimum contract requirement into all the contracts within the league, for example, every league of ireland player will have a minimum buy out clause of 100,000 euro and any club wanting to buy the player from outside the league must meet this clause.
Also, additional sell on clauses could be required in the event that player is sold on in the future for a higher fee ensuring the LOI club receive additional financial pay-outs.
Basically, a better way of thinking when it comes to contract negotiation is required.
A New Body
A system like this might help the League of Ireland, but first we need a governing body who is solely in charge of the league and with the best intentions of the league at its core.
The FAI have shown that they are not the right entity to govern the league so maybe its time we established a new one to run the league on behalf of the FAI, a body that has the funding availble to market and promote the league correctly and one that can centrally represent the clubs and assist them with the day to day administration and contract negotations among other functions require to run a club.
This would be a similar approach taken by the GAA in relation to its member clubs, they do rely on assistance from the central body but have the autonomy to fund raise locally as required.
My thinking behind this idea is that there is a central portal for all the clubs to manage their functions online and managed / overseen by the central authority of the new governing body, it would ensure that all transfers are visible to the league, all paperwork and rules are complied with and any money that was gained from competition is distributed accordingly.
Funding.
It has long been an issue within the league that funding is non-existent and many clubs hope to land in one of the european spots at the end of the season to try and bolster the bank accounts for the following season. Its not always an option for every club and many clubs are working from season to season to stay afloat, many of them hoping that they secure financial backing from investors, but that is dreamland for many.
The discussion of TV Rights has come up before, but with a lack of promotion / marketing in the league why would any broadcaster want to pay substantial money to broadcast league games?
The only other time when TV Rights are discussed in when a league club has put together a european run and has the chance of qualifying for the group stages of the UEFA competition, other than that, there is little interest from broadcasters to pay to distribute live coverage of the games.
Over the last two years we have seen the establishment of LOI.TV, a streaming service that is essentially operated by each club with the assistance of a broadcasting company to stream the footage online over the LOI TV platform, and its brilliant, we have been asking for this service for some time, but it took a global pandemic to push the incentive to establish the service.
Look, funding has and will always be an issue within the league, i dont have the answer for this, im not sure anyone has, but we need to start discussing it, it needs to be brought up again and we need to at least find a way to increase the financial rewards for the clubs within the league and cup competition.
In the last few years we saw the establishment of the Unite the Union Cup, a cup competition that essentially faced off teams from the League of Ireland against teams from the Irish League in the north, the price money was in the region of fifty thousand euro and the trophy up for grabs cost alot of money to create, Dundalk FC are the current holders of this trophy and by all signs the only winners.
Why? This is were i get really annoyed now.
The competition was meant to be held this year, Shamrock Rovers, St Patricks Athletic, Linfield and others were to compete. But Shamrock Rovers decided that they wouldnt compete, they decided that it wasnt important enough, essentially snubbing their nose at a potential prize of approx fifty-thousand euro, the competition has been cancelled and may never return.
Whats my point here? As a league what has little or no money available within it, we cannot, no matter a clubs financial position, turn our noses up and a potential financial injection.
We can be our own worst enemies at times.
Conclusion
So, to wrap up. I know i have been harping on a bit, but overall we need a new way of thinking within the league from the top down. Its not working and it cant be sustained into the future.
If we want to grow the league and bring it to new generations of young people, if we want to bring in new fan bases and promote the league generally than we cannot continue like we are.
If we want other leagues to take us seriously when it comes to transfer and contract negotitaions, then we need a new way of thinking.
If we want to develop stadiums around the country to rival those of other leagues around europe than we need a new way of thinking.
We cannot continue as we are, something has to change and if that means the FAI are no longer governing our league than so be it.
The definition of Insanity is, “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
WE NEED A NEW WAY OF THINKING ABOUT THIS BEFORE WE ALL START GOING INSANE!
End.