Karren Brady’s EFL argument and the diatribe that would be ridiculed on The Apprentice
Stoke City and Championship rivals are watching with interest as the Football Governance Bill goes through the House of Lords
Karren Brady, if she was a contestant on The Apprentice, wouldn’t have got through the first two paragraphs of an angry monologue about the introduction of an independent football regulator without the camera panning to Lord Sugar pulling an incredulous face.
By the time she goes on to talk about the competitive nature of the Premier League, he would have had to remind her that Manchester City have just won four titles in a row, all three promoted teams are on course to be relegated for a second season in a row and her West Ham team have fewer than half the points collected by Liverpool over 25 matches so far this campaign and haven’t won nor really looked like winning a domestic trophy since the early 1980s.
By the time she goes on to give a thinly veiled threat to the EFL about losing revenue from the Premier League as a consequence of pushing a regulator through, she would have been looking miserable in the back of a black cab.
Brady is either stupid or selfish if she truly believes “there really isn’t a problem in football” as she claimed in Sky Sports podcast, The Boardroom. It would be interesting to know if she would persist with that if West Ham slipped from the top flight and suddenly found themselves with 10 times less guaranteed income.
The EFL has backed the introduction of a regulator in part because of the Premier League’s reluctance to resolve the gaping financial chasm between the top 20 and the rest, obviously including Stoke City.
EFL chairman Rick Parry pointed out last season that the 14 clubs who were non-permanent members of the Premier League had been in that division for an average of 13 years each. The 14 clubs in the EFL with the longest stints in the Premier League also had an average of 13 years at that level since 1992. But in 2023/24 those 14 clubs in the Premier League received £1.8 billion between them in media revenues while the 14 currently in the EFL had to share less than £90 million.
