The English Premiership has never been so afloat with money. While Russian oil billionaires are falling over each other (well, those that aren’t doing a 50 year stretch in Siberia that is) to splash their cash in Blighty, there has been a quieter movement of large scale investment from English chairmen as they try to reduce the gap between the old guard “big clubs” and the cash rich upstarts like current Premiership champions, Chelsea. Since it’s only been a couple of years since that very club nearly imploded under a mountain of debts and Leeds were relegated after a hasty firesale staved off liquidation, we have to ask ourselves: which Premiership club is most likely to keep on gambling until they also do a “Leeds”?

Last season’s run to the Champion’s League must seem like a long way away to David Moyes and his Everton squad as they face the reality of a relegation dogfight after a distinctly lacklustre start to the 2005/2006 season. Saddled with huge debts and constantly involved in a “will they/won’t they” situation over trying to recruit neighbours and arch-rivals Liverpool into a new stadium groundshare, the Toffeemen have spent relatively big over the past few seasons for a club without two pennies to rub together. Big money players like James Beattie and Simon Davies have failed to reach the standards expected and with boy wonder Wayne Rooney a distant memory and the money they received for him being used to service their debt, you have to ask yourself who are the sellable commodities in their squad? Kevin Kilbane? Lee Carsley? David Weir? All solid pros but none will bring in the kind of money Leeds were able to generate, even at a discount, in selling Mark Viduka, Alan Smith and Paul Robinson.

New stadium should be a dirty word around the famous marble halls of Highbury as the red half of North London play out a disappointing final season at their old ground before their budget busting move to Ashburton Grove. Cruelly dubbed “Cashburden Grove” by rival fans, the new development is probably the biggest gamble in the club’s history and with Mr. Wenger feeling the penny pinching in his transfer budget for two seasons in a row, coupled with the loss of Patrick Vieria and the potential loss of Thierry Henry and Robert Pires, it isn’t hard to imagine the threadbare Gunners squad missing out on a Champion’s League spot altogether this year. Financially it would be a blow that could topple them as the massive debts they have taken on to build the new stadium have to be funded by the income from Champion’s League football. No Champion’s League, maybe no Arsenal?

Most observers favourites for the role of “next Leeds” have to be Freddy Shepherd’s perennial underachievers from Newcastle United. Continual trophyless seasons, a transfer budget that has seen over ?200m spent on transfer fees in only ten years and no prospect of European football this season make the future look decidely dark for the boys in the black and white. With injuries this season to key players Michael Owen, Emre, Albert Luque and Scott Parker plus the fact that Alan Shearer can’t go on forever, there appears to be no light at the end of the tunnel fr Graeme Souness, much like his predecessors Sir Bobby Robson, Kenny Dalglish, Ruud Gullit and Kevin Keegan.

Large transfer fees, extortionate wage bills, constant player dissent and bad feeling and, of course, no trophies. Sound familiar? Maybe Mr. Shepherd should have a word with Peter Ridsdale and see how he dealt with things as the band played on the deck of the Leeds United ‘Titanic’? Shuffle the deckchairs and bring in Terry Venables maybe? Stranger things have happened.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 4th, 2006 at 7:30 pm and is filed under General Football Articles. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. Both comments and pings are currently closed.