Michel Platini voiced his concerns on the English game when the subject of England hosting the 2018 World Cup arose. He quite rightly asked the questions where are the English Clubs and English players to justify holding the tournament in England. English Football has been given over to foreign owners and investors who as businessmen are, with the odd exception, seeking a return. The milch cow for soccer is satellite television and the advertisers who finance it. The killing of the police officer in Sicily and the recent riots by supporters in Italy must cause concern to advertisers and sponsors. A similar incident in England may have advertisers running scared; in such circumstances the Premiership edifice would come tumbling down. One only has to look at the situation the clubs outside the Premiership found themselves in when ITV Digital pulled the plug. It is not only clubs in the lower divisions that are under threat, the Premiership is balanced on a knife edge

Tom Doherty, Derby, England

Excellent article but not quite correct as far as Swindon are concerned. The club's major shareholder, Sir Seton Wills, has an advisor who is, or at least was, banned by the DTI from being a director of any company. He now calles himself the general manager of Swindon Town, although that does not appear on any official club documents. A company was set up called Shaw Park Developments to oversee the new stadium in Swindon, unfortunately the local council refused permission after SPD had attracted a £2.5 million loan from a leading building company. SPD and Swindon Town FC have some of the same directors so the link is obvious. It would appear that whoever buys the football club also needs to pay back that loan plus cover the other debts, a £900,000 CVA agreement and almost £2 million to the inland revenue! Just when we thought the latest takeover was going through the present directors demanded, allegedly, £1.5 million plus the rights to redevelop the stadium!! No wonder they walked

Ron, Swindon,

This article is probably the most accurate summary of football today. I was born within a Bruce Rioch free-kick distance from Kenilworth Rd. and have lived with the ups and downs of a football club that has experienced the highs of promotion and a huge League Cup win over Arsenal in '88 and the lows of relegation and 2 administrations. Yes, a lot of money has been raised through player sales from Luton's one time production line of talented players-some doubts about which pockets have been lined- players who if put together would make up an entire Premier team. Sky's obsession with Premier football and the subsequent influx of foreign players has 'killed' the market, and so the 'oxygen' supply is strangled for clubs like mine. .....and so the English team is forced to choose from fewer players: Wake up FA, before the game dies from the roots up!!- eventually the whole plant could die an agonising death- would Sky stay around then?- I think not!
UP the Hatters!!

Maurice Woodcroft, Newport, South Wales

From each according to his ability, to each according to his need, comrades. Or perhaps football should face the inevitabilities that all businesses face (and they are businesses, have been since the dawn of the professional era). Swindon et al will go to the wall because their costs are too high and their product too poor to attract fans, apart from die hards who believe it is a mark of character to support a mediocre football club. The fact that so many clubs are in trouble suggests they are ripe for consolidation. The alternative Mr Liddle proposes is to take wealth generated by big clubs with big fanbases and give it to clubs who have done nothing to earn it. It is the sort of subsidy the sane amongst us decry when it is offered to inefficient EU farmers or the like.

Let these clubs go under, and while die hard supporters of mediocre clubs rage against the tide, the rest of us will just continue to spend our money on the entertainment we want

Chris, London,

Excellent article as usual from Rod . He is so right but that seems to be the top and bottom of football now.
I'm glad I don't contribute to the obscenity of the 'money game' - no longer the beautiful game !

Alan Markham, Liverpool,

I follow my local team Barnet, a prime example of how money is made at the top and stays there. Although the Bees have a fantastic chairman who personally bankrolls the club, and it has recently been granted long-awaited permission to redevelop Underhill, it is still in need of finance to survive. In order to break even Barnet needs crowds of 3000 but on a good weekend attracts a total of 2200.

Money needs to filter down, but a start would be from Leeds United, who still owe Barnet £200,000 for the 'purchase' of Tresor Kandol. It also lost players in the summer because the club were unable to give them long term contracts, with some going for vastly cut prices. The sooner the FA realises that there is teams struggling financially at the other end of the 92 the game will be all the better for its attention.

Dan Raywood, London,

Just a few suggestions to even out the playing field so to speak.

- Institute some form of salary cap to reduce the chances of the richer teams hording all the talent.
- Have a system of revenue sharing were all teams benefit from the success of the sport - not just the big teams.
- Limit the amount of foreign players (non-UK) allowed on a squad or on the pitch at any one time - this would allow for a greater chance for home grown talent to shine and for some of the lower clubs to pick up some talented foreigners.

Just some suggestions from an outsiders perspective. The sport in its current form cannot survive if the rich keep getting richer and the poorer clubs fall by the wayside.

Andy Duffield, Eugene, OR, USA

A League club that gets 5,000 or so every week is getting crowds of a size that many professional sports clubs can only dream of. A cricket county would think it was Christmas and their birthday rolled into one. Most European football leagues have lower crowds at a similar level.

There is actually plenty of money coming in, it's just that football clubs have traditionally not been run in a businesslike way and have competed with each other in spending more than they earn.

Frank Upton, Solihull,

@Richard, Plymouth:

I did the maths: the Top 4 in the Premiership's attendances this weekend came to close to 170,000, compared to the whole of the Championship (187,000), and that was with Arsenal and Liverpool playing away fixtures.

The totals speak for themselves: Premiership: 363,000; Championship: 187,000; League 1: 70,000 (inlcuding 32000 at Leeds alone!); League 2: 34,000 (there were 5 games in the premiership that had more than the combined League 2).

That is why the Premiership is such a self-licking lollipop and will only ever get bigger, whilst the rest of us, even in the Championship, will never become established in the top flight without massive injections of cash from a sugar daddy. Those that do, such as Reading - fair play to them and best of luck. That is purely down to economics and business - the FA/Football League being complicit in selling the media rights for the big teams for as much as they can whilst willfully ignoring the rest.

Ben Full, Oxford, UK

In response to Marcus from St Austell - Your right, we did spend.

However, in the last 3 seasons we've also sold - £13 Million worth of players. But where is that money now? It's in the back pockets of the directors who have decided to stick us into administration because they discovered their new ground, plus acres of warehouses, was unlikely to ever gain planning permission.

At the end of the day, we've had directors after directors more interested in the possibility of moving Luton to a new ground rather than securing a future for the club. And every time it's the fans who are left fighting to keep it alive.

When will people stop the us and them mentality, and realise football should be fighting a greater evil, the money men have taken the atmosphere along with the ever increasing amount of money.

Personally i'd like the big four to go and have their Euro Super League. I just want football back.

Marv, Bedford,

Great article, really hits the nail on the head. Sadly though, you cannot change the opinions of most "Big 4" fans that reside hundreds of miles away from the clubs they profess to support. Armchair supporters will not care about the plight of their local clubs as long as they've got 4 or 5 live games to watch every weekend. As a Plymouth Argyle fan, I put a large portion of blame on Sky for the state football is in now. Too much money going to too few clubs has poisoned the structure of the game - will there ever be a time when Arsenal, ManYoo, Liverpool or Chelsea finish outside the top of the Premiership? And when can a club like Plymouth, who have tried to advance themselves organically without a sugar daddy, ever really hope to compete at the top end of the pyramid? I fear that we've gone too far down this money-lined path, and that there really is no going back now. Still, I hear Rugby Union is still competitive...

Andrew Holland, Saltash, Cornwall

I'm a Swindon supporter and this article's spot on. We're literally a couple of days from being wound up, but you wouldn't guess it by the main media.

I used to rate the Daily Telegraph's football coverage, but often on many days it's wall to wall Premiership coverage with little or no coverage of anything non Premiership. I actually think Henry Winter believes the Premiership is the only football this country has.

Peter Wilson, Didcot,

wages is not the issue ay swindon, it is the greed of men named sir seton wills and mr mike diamandis. 3 failed takeover bids in 6 months and our proud club is closer to extinction than any club in the pyramid. STFC is not for sale for £1, the problem is its for salr for£18 million. not a bad price for an insovent company. greed is killing football.

mex, swindon, england

Great piece!
Football is eating itself. It's a pity that it suits media careerists to reinforce the role of money in all of this, rather than taking a more critical approach.

Boh Diddley, Dublin , Ireland

The solution is obvious, stop clubs spending what they don't have.

KC, Perthshire, Scotland

We don't use reason very effectively, do we. We harbour many prejudices and other fixed positions that have no rational basis. So, whether we use induction or deduction, the end-result always is that the solution or the expanation must fit the prejudice.

We attribute the success of teams to the brilliance of individuals within the team, completely ignoring the input that team organisation has on success. Do you remember when Brian Clough took a team of unknowns at Derby to the League title. Suddenly, all these minor names MUST be fantastic players, because to think otherwise would be to admit that co-operative efficiency is far more important than individual skill. And the sort of brain-power that improves co-operation is not egalitarian enough to be treated as heroic.

Tinkering with what we've got will do no good at all to football in this country. Start from what we want to achieve and develop a prejudice-free hypothesis of how to get there. Test it abstractly. Then adopt it.

Simon Stephenson, Windermere, UK

I couldn't agree more with those sentiments. My own club Plymouth have been existing within their own means and as a consequence find ourselves at a distinct disadvantage. Clubs that are prepared to risk all for a Premier League place are de-stabilising the clubs like us who are living within their means. Our better players are lured away by clubs paying them 3 times as much as us by running up huge debts to do so. There are solutions but the FA don't seem to be interested in the lower leagues where their talent is nurtured. They give millions to clubs that fail in the Premier League rather than distribute it to other clubs. The 92 club league is sustainable if sensible wages are paid but I fear the inevitable break-away to a European League by the elite will shatter all but the elite clubs dreams

Chris Dennis, Truro, Cornwall

you have to blame in part the fans that support the clubs in the lower leagues because if you was to add up all the fans that go to these games week in week out,it is the same number that go to watch the premiership clubs.so how many of the fans that support the lower league clubs subscribe to sky sports?I would say quite a lot.I have said for a number of years all lower league fans should get rid of sky sports and once on mass you hit them in the pocket and tell them why,they would soon redistribute the money giving the lower leagues more of the spoils.

alan, bromley,

This article is spot on. I can't be bothered to do the mathematics, but what is the combined attendence of the Football League versus the Premiership ? I bet there is not much in it. The Football League clubs mean so much more to people across the country and are the real "grass routes" that the FA are always waffling on about. Their scouting networks and Youth Teams give the country's kids a real chance of making it as professionals. If we lived in a fair world, the Premier League would pay each league club a grant to run their scouting and youth academies.

Richard, Plymouth,

Excellent article - and so true that so few are aware of (or care about) the plights of clubs outside the 'mighty' premiership. I am a Swindon fan and every day we're one day closer to it being our last...................

Sinead, London,

Excellent article....and spot on when it comes to identifying the gross distortion in the modern game, lack of integrity within the media, etc......RIP football - it used to be a sport you know??

Warwick, London,

Excellent article. Clearly the FA cannot quite get their heads around 2+2; the day after the Croatia defeat we had the 'root & branch' announcement & in the same press conference the Chief Exec of the Premiership said that the Prem was the finest league in the world & could in no way be blamed for England's problems. Well that helps the inquiry no end, the body that handles 95% of the cash in the game has no direct responsibility for the slow death of the sport. No doubt the blame will land with some bizarre facet of the game - I noticed Mr Ferguson got a mention in for the fact that Man Utd are not allowed to claim kids from the full length of the country as the prime reason for England's demise. The fact is that the Premiership IS a great success, for the 4 clubs that get to cement themselves at the top forever. Everybody else (including the national team) is sacrificed to that end. And we shouldn't kid ourselves that this is competitive sport anymore, it is simply entertainment.

Mark, Basel, Switzerland

while i sympathise with any supporter who faces seeing their club go to the wall i cannot help thinking"told you so"i remember for example before luton had to sell off their star players and were doing very well in the bottom two divisions they were spending crazy money that they simply didnt have,when joe kinnear was manager and luton finished second to plymouth he had spent ten times what plymouth had despite only having half the gates,what an unfair advantage they had ditto coventry,cardiff and swindon,now they are paying the price.thats just tough.maybe these clubs should have learned to cut their cloth acordingly.so its not by the grace of god etc but just like individuals who are now feeling the pinch,its simple DONT SPEND WHAT YOU DO NOT HAVE,these clubs enjoyed the unfair advantge of spending others money now they must reap what they have sown.

marcus, st austell, cornwall

Good article Rod, and you are always welcome at Kenilworth Road. I think the three strikes (or administrations) rule is a bit of a myth. This is the third time since 1999 that the Hatters have been in administration. Hopefully the news is encouraging as there are a handful of groups who have expressed interest in buying the club, and thus taking on responsibilty for the relatively huge wage bill. The club has had its fair share of crooks, charlatans and incompetents in charge over the past decade and it is important that this time the administrator chooses the right team. To think that just over a year ago Luton were in the play off positions in the championship with a chance of financial salvation the following seasons. I suspect our history would have been very different if we had not been relegated in 1991 and avoided the first ever Premier League by the narrowest of margins.

Rob A, Croxley Green, Herts

well said its about time FA did some sort of serious investigation in the structure of the game.

If that means finally them to admit they destroyed the game with SKY the better.

I have some radical proposals which could help and it is not pretty. In some ways controversial to boot. the process and logic is to get debt cleared from small clubs. Its about time big clubs put some effort into putting something back into the game they rape financially. Also we should see more players who ending there career at 34 stop leeching premier wages in the reserves of top clubs getting bit parts. They should also go to league 2 for league 2 wages also.

1 with the fa all clubs who have gates of 25,000 average should be forced to play pre-season friendlies at cash strapped clubs.

this would give thes clubs a much needed cash injection. Another one more controversial in the fa cup third round I would stage it so biggest gate clubs play at home to the smallest club in financial mess

anominous, grimsby, ne lincs

May I congratulate Mr Liddle and the Sunday Times for bringing this deplorable situation to the fore. It cannot continue much longer and needs urgent action. I just can't understand how the Football League can just twiddle their thumbs whilst more and more clubs are falling foul of the abomination they created. A creation that allowed the Premiership to reap all the rewards and glory whilst the League have condemned their own members tocertain administration and going out of existence. Action not words are the order of the day.

Art Birchell, Montpellier, France

Never have more true words been written. My Father is a Frickley Athletic fan and he forecast this in 1993. I am a Sunderland fan and can honestly say that the best place to play football is the Football League.

Good luck Coventry, Luton Swindon et al

Iain Affleck, Wakefield, UK