Salary caps, toys and prams

A cuddly giraffe flies over your shoulder, followed by an elephant. Some Lego Star Wars figures nicks off your eyebrow, before you’re battered by a cascade of random board pieces from Mousetrap.

You look around to see a pram and in it: Portsmouth chief executive Mark Catlin, lobbing this assortment of toys out of his giant buggy.

Of course, Catlin isn’t the only one to be complaining about the salary cap, but over the past few weeks he has certainly been one of the noisier ones.

Salary caps are controversial, but a hard hand from the EFL is needed after years of clubs flouting their soft guidance. Bury have gone, Macclesfield have been driven out and Charlton are in dire straits. This is likely only the tip of the iceberg. Something desperately needed to be done.

The hard cap now being imposed by the EFL may lack in subtlety and could cause issues in regards to the gap between League One and the Championship, but drastic action has been needed for some time. While the EFL have been negligent, clubs and their bottomless pits of financial mismanagement have essentially forced their hand into a drastic action.

It was not so long ago that Portsmouth were teetering on the edge. Their fans were able to club together to help bail them out but his is by no means an example to follow, and there are not many sets of fans who would be able to do this. Their average attendance in League One during 2018/19 was 18,098. Fan buyouts should not be an expected get out of jail card.

And while short-termism big boys like Sunderland, Portsmouth and Ipswich may take offence to not being able to financially bully their way to promotion, most would agree that more competitive balance is probably going to make for a better and more interesting league.

Although it’s hardly like the financial muscle of Sunderland, Portsmouth and Ipswich has managed to bear much by way of results over the past couple of seasons.

And at the end of the day, a salary cap doesn’t stop them being a ‘big club’ in that division. If it’s a choice between crowds 35,000 at the Stadium of Light with luscious facilities, or 1,500 at the Crown Ground with a run down portacabin, what do you think players will be choosing?

It’s also worth remembering that this is a salary cap. They can still invest in academy facilities, training grounds, backroom staff, scouting and analytics. These kinds of investments will give clubs an edge which could - if done properly - help a lot on the pitch.

Or maybe fix a few leaky roofs, or do up the toilets in the away end. Why not invest in the club as a whole more to make it a more sustainable entity?

So it’s not exactly like the big boys are being brought to exactly the same level as Accrington Stanley, who are unlikely to max out the £2.5 million wage cap anyway. They are still a bigger club with bigger crowds, and more potential to invest in better facilities.

So why not see this cap as a chance to grow the club from the inside. A well functioning youth academy, targeted recruitment, performance analysis, sports science and much more to help on the pitch.

Enhance the experience for fans. Do up the stadium, cut ticket prices, have a few more prize raffles or half time competitions.

At the end of the day, clubs who are making more money will still have an advantage. It’s just means that they will have to be marginally more imaginative.