Football: History and Development
The origins of modern football stem back more than a hundred years. It all began in 1863 in England when association football decided to split from rugby to become a separate sport with its own set of rules. From a casual game played by mostly lower-class people, it gradually shifted to being adopted by universities to the first teams forming like Lancaster FA in 1873 and Aston Villa in 1874. The first official competition, the FA Cup, took place in 1871, and in 1888 the first league formed the aptly-named Football League.
At that time no man could predict the phenomenal rise football would have in the next 150 years. Today football is the biggest sport in the world, boasting hundreds of millions of fans worldwide and an underlying ecosystem that generates billions (check the exact number and cite it) each year. Its best athletes are idolized for their on-pitch performances, followed on social media, and receive up to 7 figures salaries (check if this is the correct form to intend more than 10 million salaries). The most iconic clubs like Real Madrid, Barcelona or Manchester United benefit from a maniacal following as a result of having the privilege to employ the most gifted footballers to ever step foot on a pitch.
Naturally, this following (I think it might be better to substitute following with how much money there is in football) did not materialize overnight. It took decades of passion, evolving tactics, exciting tournaments, and great players to show sponsors and TV broadcasters the massive value present in the sport. This led to a rapid increase in both players’ wages and prices. Two famous examples worth mentioning started in the nineties, Moratti’s Inter and Berlusconi’s AC Milan. It is speculated that both of them spent over a billion euros over the span of two decades in acquiring new players in the pursuit of glory before inevitably being forced to sell their teams. They were not alone though, in fact too many clubs went on spending sprees year after year, but, with football having only a winner per competition per year, this state was not sustainable.
For the next 20 years, the overspending phenomenon went on, but even though football kept growing in revenues and popularity, a UEFA report from 2009 (check the date and data, cite different graphs that you can put in the text later on and maybe also show the reports on how much debt there are in different leagues from Deloitte) showed that half of 655 European clubs incurred losses over the previous year and at least 20% of them were considered under heavy financial distress. This tendency to overspend was clearly explained by (check who said and the source, you saw it on the Wikipedia page on FFP) “Club owners are generally over-optimistic about their management abilities and vision for a club…there is a natural tendency to borrow in the pursuit of success, although not all teams can be successful. There are many examples of clubs where the directors (true fans) have “chased the dream”- gambling short-term investment (or borrowing) in the hope of long-term success…”
This situation was worrying to all parties involved because they feared many clubs would go bankrupt and therefore arm the league's competitiveness and reputation. This led UEFA in 2008 (check if it’s correct) to take drastic measures in order to combat this. With the apparent support of most clubs, they drafted a set of regulations aimed at reducing the overspending in football and transforming clubs into self-sustainable businesses, without the constant need of cash injections and the help of so-called sugar daddies.
These regulations were discussed throughout 2008 and finalized in 2009. On September the 15th of that year, the UEFA commission (check the exact title), approved what is now known as Financial Fair Play. In short Financial Fair Play aims to bring more stability to the football industry by imposing a soft budget constraint on clubs, essentially stopping them from spending more than their revenues. However, FFP did not go into effect until the year (check the year).
Even though it had overwhelming support during its inception, Financial Fair Play does not sit well with a large part of football’s stakeholders. From simple fans to journalists and representatives of clubs voiced their concern in the following years after its inception.
