Manchester City’s guilty verdict brings football’s great sell-off crashing to earth
The recent guilty verdict against Manchester City for financial irregularities has sparked a broader debate about the commercialization and privatization of football. The author links the club's corporate structure to wider economic trends of selling off public assets.
Why it matters
This analysis connects sports governance to political philosophy, questioning the impact of private ownership on community-based institutions.
Clubs like City, formed in the Victorian smog of industry, were sold off just when football finally had enough wealth to go round. Composite: Guardian Design/Getty Images/Shutterstock Clubs like City, formed in the Victorian smog of industry, were sold off just when football finally had enough wealth to go round. Composite: Guardian Design/Getty Images/Shutterstock The Saturday read Manchester City Manchester City’s guilty verdict brings football’s great sell-off crashing to earth On the day Andy Burnham spoke of the wrong turn Britain took under Thatcher, football was facing a day of reckoning over its own story of corporate acquisition
It was somehow fitting that Tuesday’s damning ruling against Manchester City landed in the heart of the Labour party conference, in the afterglow of Andy Burnham’s rapturously received prime minister’s speech.
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