So, nobody wants Frank Lampard. The statement from one of Barcelona’s board members was unequivocal “Lampard knows he has no chance of moving to any of the big European clubs…there is no other option. He has been offered to us, Milan, Inter and Real Madrid, basically all of the big clubs, but nobody is interested”.
So Frank’s brinkmanship has been found out and his agent, Steve Kutner, is busy backtracking and making conciliatory noises towards the Chelsea hierarchy: “Frank has always said he wants to stay at Chelsea for the rest of his career” together with a more dubious “he will be as committed as ever”. What? That committed!!
The situation shares many parallels with that of Michael Owen who was rejected by all the Big 4 English teams when he was being repatriated from Madrid.
The aim of this post is to address the incentives that exist for modern day top level footballers to choose options other than the maximisation of performance on behalf of themselves and their team. It evidently goes without saying that we, in no manner, wish to suggest that this is a strategy employed by either of the highly professional and motivated players named above.
Organisations that have an interest in developing a corrupt control on top flight football are always more interested in the best players as not only does underperformance of these individuals have a larger impact on a match but also there is a likelihood of a longer and hence more profitable window for the manipulators as these careers can exist at the top of the game for over a decade. As we have stated previously, goalkeepers are a prime target but the best forwards and midfielders are also appreciated particularly if they combine membership of one of the major teams and a solid place in the England set up.
An honest player at the top of his sport may expect considerable wages and merchandising deals throughout his career and, probably, a nice little earner of a ghost written autobiography from the security of his gated community after retirement. In a system that rewards niche sector overperformance, there is logic if not ethics behind this state of affairs.
For individuals who choose or who are forced to work alongside the shadier elements of the bookmaking industry, these basic incentives become markedly skewed as their career progresses. In the early career, the player’s reputation is gained by major performances in massive spectacular society matches that firstly develop and then enhance the status of this highly promising young professional. Enter the dragon in the form of the betting market manipulator and whether via coercion or personal strategy, the incentive spectrum is rejigged. Looking at each of the new components of such a players career is revealing:
• Wages – Over the course of a corrupt mid and late career, a player actually loses out on wages despite the parallel media campaigns supportive of his talents which attempts to offset the effects of deliberate underperformance. The biggest teams represented by the G14(18) undertake extensive analysis of a player’s performances and the culpable stand out as corrupt. Consequently, their late career is spent at second tier clubs that are out of the loop analytically. Such clubs are severely restricted with regard to wage demands and, after the slice pocketed by the agents, a player loses some potential millions.
• Merchandise – A similar structure exists in the area of merchandising as Nike, Adidas and their sort find it difficult to market a football boot bearing a player’s name if that player seems unable to hit a barn door at ten paces.
• Consultancy Fees from Bookmakers – These losses are balanced by the illegal payments received from the market makers that pay handsomely to achieve the match outcomes desired. It should be noted here also, however, that the fees will tail off as the player finishes his career at a lower strata than his abilities suggest.
• Proprietary Trading – Another column in the income account relates to the placing (surreptitiously of course) of bets against one’s team when one is externally manipulated.
Taking these various benefits and disadvantages into a profit and loss format always reveals an enhancement of a player’s career earnings and, if carefully optimised, bank balances may be multiplied by magnitudes through the choice of a criminally corrupt career. We will leave it up to you to plug in some back of the envelope figures regarding the number of straight and corrupt years, the wages differential, fees and the ability to be placing many millions of pounds on certainties in the underground Asian football markets.
We have deliberately withheld the non sucker punch.
Post retirement, corrupted players are a potential liability particularly if they were at the back of the queue when the brains were being given out. In a creative double whammy that consolidates future corruptions by having acquiescent media voices uttering disinformational nonsense and undermining any potential for informational leakage of past corruptions, the criminalised players turn up across the board in the mainstream football media. Hence their income streams are extended significantly beyond the end of their playing days as they help to facilitate the next generation of obedient insider dodginess.
So, what do players lose in this process as it is evidently not money? What are the risks inherent in this abusive system?
The biggest loss is kudos. A promising career never reaches the heights that might have been attained if a player had chosen professionalism instead of financial jiggery-pokery. In the eyes of the public, he is flawed. His teams fail to win the number of matches and, more importantly, the number of trophies than should be the case. But, in his own mind, the corrupted individual knows his true status and, to an extent, the media are able to pump up this myth.
The risks are, however, becoming markedly more prevalent. The observations of the highly professionalised analysts within the power hierarchies such as the G14(18) uncover the corrupt with minimal fuss. They may even choose to publicise their observations.
And, still further, there are groupings like Dietrological that detail individual and group corruptions at different layers within the sport. Although our analyses are determinedly filtered by the mainstream media, the information is made public and, in a major spectacle like English Premiership football, the analyses morph into rumours and spread like wildfire. The outcome soon manifests itself that the allegedly corrupt are forced onto the defensive with puffed up press releases from players and their agents relating to “commitment” and “desire” and “love of the club”. Of course, such statements merely act as a type of regeneration of status which merely precede more of the same manipulations.
There is one even greater holistic impact of Dietrological. Although we have no abilities to directly undermine the corrupt system in the immediate term, we are significantly impacting upon the window that such corruption may continue into the future with a direct negative effect on the crook’s future cashflows.
Incrementalism is as valid in whistleblowing as it is in any other area of business or politics.
© Football Is Fixed/Dietrological
