Today is a historic anniversary for football fans and especially for footballers themselves! Today the football profession should toast the diamond anniversary of the day the Professional Footballers’ Association under the stewardship of its leader Jimmy Hill, after a steadfast, shrewdly fought campaign, defeated the Football League and won overdue reform of the terms of its employment. I repeat here bits of an article in Telegraph Sport:
“What Hill achieved was a revolution, but there had been earlier rebellions, ruthlessly suppressed. In 1950, Manchester United’s Charlie Mitten and Stoke City’s George Mountford and Neil Franklin, the England centre-half, went to “El Dorado”, the renegade Colombia league, at the end of their contracts. The federation had left Fifa, which allowed it to operate beyond its grasp, and offered players who had lost their peak years to the war, indentured on £12 a week, five-figure signing-on fees and four times their Football League salaries.
For men who had played through the post-war attendance boom and noted that record gate receipts and increased royalties from the pools companies were not trickling down, their decisions were justifiable. But when Colombia hung them out to dry by rejoining the “Fifa family”, they went home to be shunned, banned and sold.”
Jimmy Hill was an industrious Fulham inside-forward, nicknamed “the Rabbi” by one Craven Cottage wag because of a rare, beatnik beard, (- he’d have fitted in well today!) was elected chairman of the PFA in 1957. Within a couple of months, he outlined his members’ case to the 92 clubs for the abolition of the maximum wage, a League-wide agreement that had been in place since 1901 and a concept that operated only in England.
“He also pressed for reform of the retain-and-transfer shackles that allowed a club to keep hold of a player’s registration indefinitely after the expiration of his contract, with no obligation to pay him should they choose not to sell.
The League strung the players along for three years, thinking it had the upper hand, that it was easier for 92 to remain united than Hill’s 3,000 members.
He pointed out the absurdity of their lot in March 1960 when Denis Law was transferred from Huddersfield to Manchester City for £53,000. The player was limited to a £20 signing-on fee, £20 a week during the season and £17 in the summer.
Little wonder that John Charles, the best player in Britain, had already left for Juventus and £70 a week plus bonuses, an apartment and a car — and Jimmy Greaves was inviting similar approaches from Italy. In November 1960, the Football League offered the bait of an extra £10 a week on the maximum, but Hill argued for the involvement of the government conciliation specialist to arbitrate the dispute and he skilfully held his members “
I particularly like this retort to those who would question player’s earnings — granted they’ve gone a bit excessive since those days:
“… Tommy Banks, the Bolton and England left-back, made a tellingly pithy contribution to the Northern Area meeting when a lower-league player questioned why footballers deserved to earn twice as much as his father, a miner.
“If thi father wants to know why we want more brass,” Banks said, “tell him to come and play against Brother Matthews in front of 30,000 fans. That’s why we want more money.”
The League folded under the threat of strike action, abolished the £20 ceiling and a truce was hammered out at the Ministry of Labour, one that the clubs tried to renege on before and after it was implemented. It took the case of Eastham v Newcastle United in 1964 to award players greater rights at the end of their contracts.
Hill’s victory has been portrayed as a Pandora’s box moment for the game, blamed for the decadence of the past decade. It was nothing of the sort. It was a triumph of fairness over feudalism.”
A real eye-opener!
[Post edited 19 Jan 2021 9:50]
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