It's a funny old league

PROFILE THE PREMIER LEAGUE:LIKE MOST teenagers, the Premier League has had its issues with money and sex of late.

That’s why the return of the actual football at lunchtime this afternoon will come as such a relief to almost everyone involved in the industry: owners get to stop worrying for 90 minutes or so about how they are going to pay their players, and the stars themselves can concentrate on what they are supposed to be famous for.

Since its inception 18 years ago, the English top flight and its member clubs have generated revenues far beyond the wildest dreams of the men who, back then, simply wanted to stop sharing their rather meagre income with the lower divisions.

The upshot has been skyrocketing wages for players, the best of whom have also come to enjoy hugely enhanced celebrity status as a result of the game’s broadening popularity and the growing obsession of the media with personality-driven “news”.

The personal lives of many of the footballers and their Wags tend to generate almost as much coverage as the games themselves these days.

Peter Crouch, no doubt, knew that better than most even before he allegedly hooked up with teenage prostitute Monica Mint in Madrid a few weeks back. His relationship with Abigail Clancy has been well documented in the tabloids, as well as magazines such as Closer, Heatand Now, and he should have realised that the €1,000 she says she was paid was likely to be dwarfed by the fun-sized cheque some newspaper would stump up for her account of their antics in the back of a taxi and then a cheap hotel.

It wasn't all bad news for Crouch. Mint told the News of the Worldthat the Spurs striker was "humble and kind" compared with the Spanish players, who she said were "arrogant divas who treat me like a whore. I don't think Peter is good-looking, but he is a nice person."

She spared a thought for Clancy, too, observing: “I can’t believe he paid for sex with someone like me when he has a gorgeous woman like her at home.”

Meanwhile, Clancy is reported to has sought the advice of John Terry’s wife, Toni, who you might remember, was similarly aggrieved when it emerged last season that the Chelsea skipper had slept with Vanessa Perroncel, the former partner of his former team-mate Wayne Bridge.

The backgrounds of the women involved in the better-known tales of this type vary, but having modelled a bit of lingerie seems to be a distinct advantage to those aspiring to the scene.

THE FINANCIALside of the league is just as wacky.

When Martin O’Neill walked away from Aston Villa this week there were howls of dismay from disgruntled supporters and expressions of sympathy from those inside the game regarding what is widely perceived to be American owner Randy Lerner’s lukewarm commitment to moving the Birmingham-based outfit “forward”.

Certainly Lerner has shown a reluctance to chuck money at Villa in anything like the fashion that Roman Abramovich has done at Chelsea or Sheikh Mansour is now doing at Manchester City. He also charges the club interest of more than 6 per cent per annum on the nearly €120 million he has put in over the past few years, in addition to exorbitant management fees.

Under O’Neill, though, wages at Aston Villa soared, up 40 per cent to €86 million last year alone, which is not great at a club where total revenues were only €102 million. Still, that’s not a bad wages-to-turnover ratio by the standards of the beast. At Portsmouth last year, wages accounted for €79 million, while total income stood at €73 million.

In total, the 20 Premier League clubs turn over about €2.5 billion per year, with most of the income coming from broadcasting rights, and much of that from BSkyB, whose involvement with the organisation has fuelled the bulk of the boom over the past 15 years or so.

Despite that, the latest accounts from the various clubs show that just six were profitable – totalling a little over €150 million during the period covered – with Manchester United, Arsenal and Spurs accounting for the bulk of the combined surplus. United have been crippled by debt since the Glazers effectively made the club pay for its own purchase, and only made it into the black because Ronaldo was sold to Real Madrid; Arsenal’s good showing was down to property dealings linked to its departure from Highbury; and Spurs’ results related at least in part to the period before notorious big spender Harry Redknapp had taken over as manager.

That leaves Blackburn, Hull City and Stoke City, who made some €7.3 million between them. Hull are now on the verge of bankruptcy after relegation at the end of last season.

Current champions Chelsea have run up accumulated losses of more than €800 million in recent years, but Abramovich recently turned all of the debt into equity, and so the Londoners are virtually debt-free even if their stated aim of financial independence from their owner still seems a pipe dream.

Others are not nearly so lucky. There has been talk recently that Liverpool could end up in state ownership if a takeover is not completed soon. The Government-backed banks are growing impatient for what is owed them, while a small but significant part of United’s reported €1.3 billion debt is at interest of more than 14 per cent.

But spare a thought for Birmingham City, which owed just £3.5 million last year, but somehow paid €1.2 million in interest, suggesting that somebody might have borrowed the money over the phone after seeing an ad on daytime TV.

THAT THE PLAYERSaccount for the vast majority of the money becomes a little easier to understand when you realise that the best-paid among them, such as Yaya Toure at Manchester City, earn a reported £240,000 (€290,000) per week. That's a far cry even from the mid-1990s, when Jason McAteer, then playing in the game's second tier with Bolton, went out for a night with his friend Phil Babb – then of Liverpool – and got a glimpse of life in the fast late.

Babb was reportedly on £8,000 a week at the time, with an extra £800 if he played – big money in those days. The bonuses were paid by cheque, and the story goes that when Babb had to find a piece of paper on which to write a phone number he kept pulling £800 cheques from his pockets.

But for all its flaws, the standard among the top English clubs remains high. Barcelona and Inter Milan may have won the Champions League in the past two years, but Premier League sides are comfortably the best performers in the competition over the past decade.

The standard assessment has been that Italian football is technically better, English football is faster while Spain’s La Liga is an exciting blend of the other two’s most endearing aspects. Germany’s Bundesliga, incidentally, is the best attended due to low ticket prices and easily the best run financially, with pretty much every club in decent shape, but hey, who cares about that?

The Premier League’s most dedicated fans tend to believe that pretty much everything else – from the League of Ireland to the World Cup – is little more than a global shop window from which their favourite clubs can pick and choose. There have certainly been times when the abandon of the clubs’ spending has been such that it seems hard to argue.

These days the gap has narrowed somewhat, with the purse strings tightening at most clubs and La Liga, for instance, better able to compete in part because of lower tax rates for top earners. The fact that footballers in England are due to pay more than €1 billion in income tax this year probably goes a long way towards explaining why, despite being members of a strong trade union and enjoying double-digit wage inflation for almost two decades, the vast majority of them seem to support the Tories.

In any case, it’s all about to kick off today with Spurs against Manchester City. And if you have to put the finishing touches to a fantasy league team this morning, don’t rule out Crouch. He may have spent another night on what would want to be the world’s longest sofa, but he just might score again.

CV: The Premier League

What is it?The greatest show on earth or sport's most vulgar circus, depending on your point of view.

Why is it in the news?Because it's all about to kick again, innit.

Most appealing characteristic:Its vast array of expensively assembled talent.

Least appealing characteristic:Its enormous collection of overpaid egomaniacs.

Most likely to:Make the guys at Sky happy that summer is over.

Least likely to:Demonstrate that there are more important things in life than money.