Originally Published December 30th 2012 for For Green Fields clients
Karen Carney's output in the Guardian is a fascinating bastardized hybrid of a teenage girl's personal diary content integrated with the sort of threats that might emanate from of an organised crime boss.
It is truly hybrid.
But.
Is it truly hybrid?
Does one personage play both parts, thriving on a multiply split personality which might be revealed through a whole squadron of aliases?
Who cares?
It's the output, stupid.
"I'm encouraged that the government is providing their full backing to my review" chirruped Ms Carney as she spoke of her "relief" at the manner in which NewCo is secreting its way up the pyramid of the sport while she links to a strategy terminally undermining the grassroots of UK football by invading the sanctity of the Saturday 15:00 kick off slot.
Other sentences in Carney's piece were much less giddy schoolgirl and much more Sicilian: "... do not drag the game to places that aren't in the interests of everyone"; "... we urge NewCo not to miss this opportunity"; "... there is a legitimate question about recompensing the women's game for this missed opportunity for revenue"....
Meanwhile John Burn-Murdoch in the Financial Times talks about the end of football's revenue boom and provides evidence of his view that we have passed the summit of peak football.
"British broadcasters may have paid marginally more than last time but they got 67 extra games for their money" - Kieron O'Connor.
Burn-Murdoch: "The rule currently prevents live football being shown on British television mid-afternoon on Saturdays, the time slot when the vast majority of the country's smaller professional teams play in front of crowds whose matchday spending is their lifeblood. If a future Premier League (or Carney / Colquhoun Women's Super League - FIF) auction offers up the full slate of 380 matches - including three o'clock kick-offs - to prop up revenues, that might come at the cost of the survival of smaller clubs around the country".
The implied threats from Team Carney about invading Saturday 15:00 is indicative of what we are dealing with here - an entity that utlises a threatened coercion that, if implemented, would lead to many more Bury's and lots of money for inappropriates.
It's a destructive power grab over turf.
Put that in your fucking diary.
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