Johnny Nicholson: Premier League’s big brand shopping is fine, but it’s not proper football

Chelsea's Hakim Ziyech (left) celebrates scoring during the Uefa Super Cup match at Windsor Park, Belfast, last night. Picture: Niall Carson/PA

It was a great start to the EFL. As unpredictable as ever, here we are in August with absolutely no idea who will end up in the top two of each of the three divisions, and no idea who will finish in the play-off places either.

We will all make our guesses and some teams are more likely than others, but basically, you could make a case for virtually every team, in any of the leagues, to get promoted or to get relegated. Fans of most clubs can dream of success. And dreaming is all we really live for as supporters.

Even a couple of months into the season, sides near the bottom of all three leagues can and often do recover to get promoted, or alternatively, go on a long losing run and get relegated.

As great as this is, it is unremarkable, because every season is the same. This is how football always has been, always will be. It is why football has been so popular for 150 years. Unpredictability is at the core of football.

But contrast this outlook to the Premier League, where we can be pretty certain that Manchester City, Manchester United, Liverpool, and Chelsea will occupy the top four places.

That we don’t know the order they’ll finish in is sold to us as an example of how competitive the league is compared to other European Leagues, but it isn’t most people’s idea of what competitive really means.

The truth is all the major European Leagues suffer, to a great or lesser extent, from the same affliction of largely the same clubs finishing in the top four, in the last few seasons. There is some variety, but not much.

Why can’t it be Southampton, Newcastle United, Everton, and Leeds United in the top four? Well, you know why not: Money. The financial inequalities hand a huge structural bias to a few clubs, not just here but across Europe too. If you’re backed by a country or state, the financial advantage is phenomenal.

It’d be great to think that any of the other 16 clubs could have a chance of finishing first, second, third or fourth but they can’t. Not now. Not ever.

Football at this level has been ruined by big, bigger and now massive money.

However, while you’d think this would disgust many, it seems that fans of the other 16 totally accept this as the way things are and don’t really care any more. Whether they finish seventh or 17th makes little difference to them, rightly so, because there is no tangible difference for a club to finish seventh to 17th.

As a result, you get your kicks when you can. A last-minute draw away to Liverpool, or a late winner at home to Chelsea delivers massive joy, the way a cup win for a lower league side does over a top side. That’s now what it looks like. If, say, Southampton beats Manchester City, it almost feels the same as if Oldham Athletic have.

Leicester City’s league win — though a godsend for Premier League marketing lies about competitiveness — was an aberration, an outlier to the mean. So a draw or win against those top four sides is now such a big achievement, and so relatively unlikely, that those games have become almost the whole point of playing the season.

And if you’re a fan of one of the other 16, you’ve got to get your buzz on somehow in the face of the reality that your season is really only going to be about not being relegated. You might have a cup run, but your chances of winning either of those are not very high, given if you’re not Arsenal or those four, there’s no recent history to make you believe your name is on the trophy — apart from Leicester, again being an exception. But how long can anyone hold on to Leicester as hope that this season will be their season?

With zero chance of doing well in the league, let alone winning, little chance of aiming to win a cup and with at least a couple of the three promoted clubs odds-on to get relegated, so you’re not likely to go down either, the big games against the big four really are your season highlights, especially if you don’t have a derby game. There’s nothing else for you.

Maybe it really doesn’t matter to anyone any more. Maybe just being in the presence of £100m (€118m) players is thrilling enough for fans.

Just to be blessed by their presence is a satisfying return for the ticket money.

We’re geared to worship big brands and these clubs are just that now, no longer the community clubs of yore. But really, is this situation what everyone really wants?

Is this a reason to get promoted from the Championship? Is this the reason why as many people still watch non-Premier League football as watch the top flight, despite all the hype that pushes the Premier League as the best league in the world?

Is it why fans of clubs in the Championship now often feel that they’d love to win the league but are not fussed about going up. They want the money, but in contrast to the leagues they’ve risen from, the top flight is rather unattractive by comparison with only survival to ever play for. Maybe. The financial leverage now happening post-Covid doesn’t ensure it 100%, but it makes it ever more likely that this is how it will always be, unless some serious changes are made to how clubs are financed and owned.

Big brand shopping is fine if that’s your thing, but it’s not proper football. No-one should be able to so accurately predict the top four at the start of the season.That we can, shows how far the Premier League is from the game in all other divisions and offers a reason why so many turn their back on it and relatively few, in the UK at least, watch it on tv.