All Our Yesterdays
Jun 12th, 2007 by 'holic
I have been reading Bob Wall’s 1969 book ‘Arsenal From The Heart’. For those not familiar with Bob he was the first man I ever heard called ‘Mr. Arsenal’. He started working for Herbert Chapman in 1928 and was the Secretary of the Club until Ken Friar took over in 1973. Some of the contents make fascinating reading.
“Compared with abroad, football in England is sold cheaply. I am not going to say too cheaply because, after all, it is our job to sell the best football at the cheapest price possible, so that the man in the street can afford to watch.”
Bob was comparing the finances of the club forty years after he had originally joined. In 1928 the total wage bill for the players came to £16,000, and the adult terrace admission price was the equivalent of five pence. By 1968 the wages had climbed to £114,500 and standing room cost you twenty-five pence.
By the end of next season another forty years will have passed and the comparisons will be mind-boggling. At least one player, who shall remain nameless because I am sick of reading about him this last week, earns in a week the equivalent of the entire wage bill in 1968. The cheapest ticket, which rose five-fold either side of the Second World War, has now climbed considerably quicker to thirty-two pounds.
The reason the numbers are attracting my attention is because I am wondering how much further ticket prices can be pushed before ‘the man in the street’ is priced out? In 1928 that five pence would have represented less than one percent of the average weekly wage, and forty years on had crept not much higher than one percent. These days it’s around five percent. That doesn’t sound much when you say it quickly, does it? Think about it for a moment. That is just your ticket. Now add your travel, food, etc.. Got kids? Now it’s starting to hurt isn’t it?
Bob Wall would be delighted that we are now charging a more realistic price for top quality football. I’m not so sure he would be pleased to see so much money flowing out of the game into the hands of avaricious players and agents. I just hope I’m around to do the next comparison in 2048!
One Response to “All Our Yesterdays”
You’re comparing it to a time when most fans would walk to the ground and pay at the gate. You certainly didn’t have to pay to join a membership scheme for the privilege of paying again to buy a ticket if you aren’t a season ticket holder. Nowadays you can’t help thinking that the working mans ticket is probably the price of his Sky subscription.