It is reported that John Terry has signed a new contract which gives him a new wage of £131,000 a week. Some say it's going overboard. What are your thoughts? Personally, I think it is overboard but it's Capitalism at work. We're happy when it helps us, but when it doesn't, the benefit others get seems ridiculous. We can't have it both ways I'm afraid... so I'm resigned to the fact that it is right for a footballer (or anybody) to get whatever he can get.
Considering what he brings to the club it's not that much, what Chelsea should really be concerned with is the money they're paying for Shevchenko and Ballack to do pretty much ******** all. Especially as the club is losing money hand over fist every year.
A player should make what ever the market allows him to make. If EVERY club refused to pay that much, it wouldn't happen.
it's Ridiculous.. No player is worth that kind of money, and the more they earn , the bigger the Ego's are.. everyone who has seen the wages structure in the papers from the LA Galaxy will probably agree.. most people will regard Cobi Jones as synonymous with American soccer, and I think he was only on 10% of Landon Donovans wages.. considering Donovan was only on $400, 000 a year which is only 2 weeks wages for Terry...I wonder what kind of money Steve Sidwell will be on, and he definately won't be getting any appearance bonus money hahahahah, he should have stayed where he was... my old man often says that when a defender scores an own goal or a striker misses a hatful of easy chances, they should be docked a £1000 for every bad mistake,, they would certainly play better for their money.I tend to agree with him
most people here who can remember his stint at Coventry will think it remarkable he finds paid employment at all.
it is ridiculous .......but if a club was offering to pay you 130k a week would you turn it down? I think not
This whole "the market dictates what a player gets so they're worth whatever it is the market awards them" is all very good - on one level, it's inarguable. But it does rather ignore the fact that the particular market we're talking about here is a very, very broken market. It's not "capitalism at work" it's almost the absolute antithesis of capitalism. Chelsea FC plc have, in awarding this deal, agreed to hand over fully 5% of their annual turnover to one employee - and he's not the only one on such a deal. That's insane, no matter how you slice or dice it. Is he worth it? In purely economical terms, no, he's not. Nor could he ever be.
Chelsea FC is still a plc? If the goal is for the club to "make money", then as long as the club is able to make a profit (or not generate a loss), and still pay these kinds of wages, it's fine. If a club is paying what anyone considers insane wages, and is still making a profit, then the reason is that they are getting income from, ultimately, the fans, in order to do so. I don't know how much money the Premier League makes from the US television rights, but I know that I contribute to at least some of it, however miniscule. FSC has the rights, and Setanta has bought the rights to about half of the Premier League matches. I don't have Setanta, but I do have FSC. It's on a digital sports package here in Indianapolis. I pay $7.99 a month for that package (as well as $4.99 a month for the Spanish language package, which has FSE - FSC's Spanish version). I don't know what % of that goes to the Premier League, but some of it does, and gets filtered to the clubs. And that's a tiny $ amount compared to those in Europe, or especially England, who contribute to the clubs' incomes. All TV monies ultimately come from advertising, though, so sponsors pay FSC money because my eyeballs see their ads. Same thing with Sky (or whoever shows the matches in England). Basically, the clubs can only pay the wages because of the amount of people that watch (and pay to watch) the matches. That's us. If people stopped watching, and stopped going to matches, wages would go down. And that's if a club's goal is to be profitable. For some, though I guess not as many now, it's a rich man's play thing. Chelsea and Abramovich have lost an ungodly amount of cash in the past few years, though apparantly less and less each season. I think Roman knew he'd lose money, overall, by buying Chelsea, and I think he was ok with it. He had enough to start with. Ultimately it's "our" fault. If the wages bother anyone, I don't know what you can do except stop putting your money in the hands of the clubs.
Actually no. Of course not, slip of the hand. Disregard that. But that's just it - Chelsea the business doesn't make a profit. It makes gargantuan losses. It's of course largely irrelevant whilst Uncle Roman retains the club as his private plaything, but that doesn't alter the fact that the club's balance sheet is an unholy mess precisely because they don't generate anywhere near enough money to cover these sorts of expenses. They're wages to turnover ratio is north of 80% and they only have 133 employees, of whom just 30 or so are professional footballers. I take your point about the money from fans, either directly or via TV (although that's more advertising than subscriptions), funding such excess but the fact is that it doesn't do so wholly. Most clubs spend more than they earn, so in reality the impact on their behaviour by fewer earnings is hard to be certain about.
We may not like it, but the only alternative is some third party authority arbitrarily setting wages and prices and that would be much worse.
This is nothing new nowadays. It is a sign of the coming of the end of Western Civilization. Paris Hilton, making millions doing nothing with an IQ of a dead rat. John Terry, probably cant even write his own name getting poaid 130k a week. All the kids these days aspire to that level, nobody ever says they want to be an astronaut or a doctor now ..
In capitalism, companies can decide their own payrolls. When you consider that each place in the Premiership is worth one million, that each round in the Champions League is worth several more millions, that shirt sales bring in millions, that pre-season tours bring in millions, maybe he isn't so overpaid after all.
Yes, lovely - well done. Except the figures speak for themselves. Chelsea's income is manifestly not enough to justify such expenditure: three of Chelsea's 133 employees receive 15% of the company's revenue annually. Once Fat Fwank gets his matching deal, it'll be 20% for four people.
You are a little off. I have the full MLS wages for 2007. Here is LA's Los Angeles Galaxy M Beckham, David $5,500,000 $6,500,000 F Donovan, Landon $900,000 $900,000 GK Cannon, Joe $192,000 $192,000 D Marshall, Tyrone $142,000 $149,500 M-D Albright, Chris $142,500 $142,500 M Vagenas, Peter $131,250 $131,875 F Jaqua, Nate $112,500 $119,525 D-M Jazic, Ante $108,000 $114,250 F Kirk, Quavas $75,000 $111,500 F Quaranta, Santino $100,000 $105,313 M Sturgis, Nathan $70,000 $103,000 M Jones, Cobi $95,000 $95,000 D Thomas, Shavar $70,000 $73,750 M Martino, Kyle $52,500 $55,297 F Glinton, Gavin $50,000 $50,000 F Findley, Robert $36,000 $48,500 M Russell, Ian $47,040 $48,040 GK Cronin, Steve $34,729 $42,229 M Harmse, Kevin $40,800 $40,800 F Gordon, Alan $30,870 $30,870 D Roberts, Troy $30,000 $30,000 M Tudela, Josh $30,000 $30,000 D Harden, Ty $17,700 $17,700 D Randolph, Michael $17,700 $17,700 D Veris, Kyle $17,700 $17,700 GK Friesz, Lance $12,900 $12,900 Most people incorrectly think Beckham is getting $50 mil a season. That is only the potential max, he is actually only guaranteed $6.5 mil, though I'm sure with the marketing, it will be much higher, but not necessarily $50 mil. You are right Cobi makes 10% of Landon, but Landon makes $900k a year. The reserves make so little. Can't live in LA for $12500 a year I'm sure
Here's the link to the wages: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/sports/mls/longterm/2007/salaries_07.html
Nope, look up above, leprechaun75 was mentioning Cobi's and Donovan's wages. Regarding Terry, does seem a bit high, comparing his wages to other world class defenders. But its Capitlaism and a democracy and Chelsea can do whatever they want. (Really, its Roman that can do whatever he wants) But it sends a bad precedent and makes it tougher for smaller clubs to buy good players.
That wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for Ballack and Shevchenko. In fact the transfer fee for Shevchenko alone is enough to pay the wages of Terry, Lampard and Ballack for 18 months, even though they don't use him. I think Terry might be worth that much money, but not Lampard. May as well just play Ballack there and sell Lampard. But then I've don't really rate Lampard and don't think him and Ballack can play in the same team. It's all well and good talking about 133 employees, but you can only play 11 players.
And? Look, I know you have a long and indistinguished history of struggling to get stuff, but if you're going to enter a thread, at least try. Terry gets what he gets because that's what he's managed to get. It's that simple. He asked, Chelsea agreed. End of. That's not even the point of the matter. What's at issue is whether or not such a situation is sustainable, let alone good. And in this instance, it is manifestly not. So you're wrong to say that Terry might be worth that amount (because economically, the figures prove he is not) you're wrong to bring in tangents like shirt sales and other components of that overall, inadequate, revenue and you're wrong to prattle on about Shevchenko's transfer fee, because that's irrelevant to the debate of wages to turnover in any given year. But other than that, top marks as always.
His wages aren't even that high when you compare him to players on American sports teams with similar revenues.
Yes, because the way American sports are organised is almost indistinguishable from the way English football is run. So that's a cracking parallel to draw, congratulations on another top notch contribution to my life.