Fan Letters: The Premier League ‘cartel’ - should more be done to balance things out?

Dear Roker Report,

I am starting to feel very strongly about the Premier League cartel, the loan market and its usage.

Every opposition fan you talk to on Roker Report all seem to say that their loan players have been standouts so far this season. All of these players seem to come from the Premier League cartel (Man City, Man Utd, Chelsea etc).

I call them the cartel because they have made it impossible for anyone else to join the top table (see Newcastle). They hoover up all of the high potential talent from the lower leagues and then we beg to help develop them with loans.

Modern-day football has gone uber capitalist, horde the wealth and talent to the few and make it look like they are doing everyone else a favour by feeding us scraps. I would love to break up the cartel and make the competition fairer. When we last played in the Premier League we got 13.6 million in live TV money. The Cartel got between 30-37 million each, how is this fair competition when one team gets at least 17 million more plus global exposure for doing nothing, other than being in the cartel.

I think there should be fewer loans allowed, and it should also be made harder for the cartel clubs to hoover up youth players.

Of course, this could never happen as the cartel runs the premier league.

Sigh...

Paul Newman

Ed’s Note [Gav]: I think we’d all like a fairer game but sadly, football feeds on money and the only way a club like ours gets to the top table is by being smart.

I will point out though, that we have a category one academy and that gives us far more weight when it comes to signing young players from other clubs - obviously though, that’s tricky when you’re in League One.

If you’d like to balance yourself out I’d seriously recommend going along to watch your local non-league club. Proper football that, for the majority of clubs, isn’t ran by the money-men. It certainly helps me to remember what is pure about the game!

Photo by Ian Horrocks/Sunderland AFC via Getty Images

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Dear Roker Report,

Totally agree with one of your previous contributors. I hate international breaks as well.

Take the Euros for example. About fifty teams start the competition and it takes two years to reduce that number to twenty-four. Bearing in mind the likes of Andorra, San Marino, Malta etc. would probably struggle to beat Blyth Spartans.

When the tournament starts two weeks and 42 games are played and they manage to eliminate another eight teams. Finally, we get to the business end of the tournament - the last sixteen which lasts another two weeks. Meanwhile, the transfer window opens, friendlies are being played and the majority of fans can look forward to some real football.

The tail is wagging the dog. Club football can survive without international football but international football cannot survive without cub football.

In England, football-wise there is more happening over a normal weekend than happens over the duration of an international tournament.

Added to this is the fact that a lot of international players aren’t even from the country that they are representing. You can play for Scotland if you attended a Scottish school for five years. Pretty soon anyone who owns a Proclaimers CD will be able to be considered.

I believe that FIFA want forty-eight teams participating in the World Cup and UEFA are looking at playing the Euros every two years.

Bring it on!

Andrew Hadfield