Adedapo Adesanya
By Adedapo Adesanya
English Football League (EFL) needs to wrap the current season before July 31 because the coronavirus pandemic will make clubs face a £200 million financial hole by September.
The chairman of the league, Mr Rick Parry, made this known when he gave evidence to the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee (DCMS) of the English government on Tuesday, May 5 in a bid to convince government to allow club complete the present league season, which was suspended in March.
“We would like to emerge stronger and leaner, with a proper reset post-COVID.
“We are heading for a financial hole of £200 million by the end of September,” Mr Parry said.
“Our end date realistically is July 31 because of the situation with contracts,” added Parry. “We can’t go beyond July,” he stressed.
“Players and staff have been furloughed and to expect clubs to bring them back in now, to forgo the furlough, only to then find in a month they can’t play would be a complete mess.
“We need within days to be taking decisions,” he further said.
He also emphasised the need for a “proper reset” due to the impact of the pandemic on the sport, saying it was difficult to answer how many clubs might go out of business.
Speaking on the plans to resume the leagues behind closed doors, he acknowledged playing games behind closed doors could actually be a loss-making venture for some clubs who rely on fans’ purchases and loyalty.
He said the aim of the league remained to resume play when it was safe to do so, but it was necessary to factor in some decisions.
“Clubs are stacking up creditors and there are a great deal of uncertainties,” he said.
Mr Parry said he hoped players would be willing to take pay cuts despite previous resistance.
According to him, the EFL was on board with the Player Football Association (PFA) appointment of financial services firm Deloitte to look at clubs’ books to assess if there was genuine need for a club to be deferring wages.
“We all need to share in the pain,” Mr Parry said.
“We are really having an open-book policy, and we are going to show [the players] how deep the pain is. We are absolutely on board with the Deloitte process,” he added.
The league chairman said the EFL still expects three clubs to be promoted from the Championship to the Premier League.
There have been reports that top-flight clubs want to play out the season with the threat of relegation removed, but Mr Parry said it would get very “messy” if that happened.
“We expect three Championship clubs to be promoted – the Premier League are aware of our position on that. The Premier League expects three clubs to be relegated,” he said.
Asked what would happen if the Premier League’s position changes, Mr Parry noted that, “There would be a degree of outrage from a number of clubs in our Championship, and it would be a breach of the tripartite agreement.
“The safe answer is that it would get very messy. Our expectation is there would be three clubs promoted from the Championship.”
