By Mark Baber
July 31 – Gordon Taylor, of the Professional Footballers’ Association, speaking at an event to celebrate the first goal in the Football League scored by Kenny Davenport 125 years ago, argued football is in danger of “losing its soul” due to an overemphasis on money.
Speaking about his members, Taylor said: ‘When you think what some players earn, it’s my job to look after them and protect them, but I do feel we need to get them to embrace a lot more responsibility for leaving the game in a better place than when they joined it, being more Kenny Davenport-type people, if you like.”
“Tom Finney was a great player, an icon, but would earn less in a career than some of the modern players do in a week. That it is really wrong, with the contribution they make. You have to be careful to not look back with rose-coloured glasses, but the game does have a real social responsibility, bringing people together in a world where there are a lot of tensions, economic, racist, religious, political. Football has to work really hard to put a smile on people’s face and not to be so focused on the question of money.”
Taylor recounted a recent visit to see Gary Parkinson, saying: “The players don’t know how lucky they are nowadays, I went the other day to see one of our former players, Gary Parkinson, who played for Bolton, Preston, Burnley, Blackpool, Middlesbrough. He was working with youngsters at Blackpool all hours and had a stroke [in 2010]. Terrible.
“He has locked-in syndrome. A speech therapist, who’s really good, has been working with him, using ice lollies to work his mouth open.
“Gary can now move his tongue. The difference in him is brilliant. I went to see him the other day and drove away, thinking of some of the cases I’ve got.
“It would just be good if I could say, ‘Just come with me this morning and you’d really appreciate what you’ve got. You owe the game a bit. You don’t need all this, prospective moves, refusal to wear a shirt, different problems with lads twittering because they are not in the team. Try to be a bit more professional’.”
Taylor found hope for football in the support offered to former players saying, “Football hasn’t completely lost its soul when you see football helping Gary Parkinson. The support from all his clubs has been fantastic.
“The way the sport rallied around Fabrice Muamba showed the soul is still there. But we need a few more fairy-tales like Kevin Phillips, a lad still going strong at 40, scoring in the [Championship] play-off final.
“We don’t have a divine right to be that major participant sport. The biggest problem is youngsters. Rather than being couch potatoes, and getting a buzz from drugs, they should be shown how to get involved in sport, particularly football, to see the benefits of team spirit and making a living at it.”
Warning of the dangers of money obsession revealed in the Wonga saga, Taylor said: “Everything is in danger of losing its soul if you’re always going to sell out to the highest bidder. The Church of England is diving in now.
“Football has got its biggest job to keep the soul of the game. To have the highest aggregate attendances in the world for a small island is phenomenal but we don’t have a divine right to be that major spectator sport.”
“Supporters really are the lifeblood of the game. We need to make sure we don’t alienate supporters.”
Gordon Taylor represents a membership of about 4,200 professional players and is the highest paid union boss in the UK with a salary and benefits package that in 2012 was reported as being £1.15 million, almost a third of the PFA’s outlay for its 57 members of staff
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