Football, in case you didn't realise, belongs to football fans - not the TV companies, Premier League chairman or the governing bodies - but the fans for the game invented by ordinary people kicking pig's bladders around codified by the FA into the organized game we love today, belongs to football fans all over the country & across the world.

In the most welcome and positive Premier League news this season for football fans, the hugely unpopular Pay Per View scheme has been scrapped and every top flight game will be televised as they were during the first lockdown in March until the New Year at least:

This news has been warmly welcomed by football fans across the nation, who protested in their millions at the introduction of a ludicrous £14.95 charge per game back in October and decided to give their money to Foodbanks across Britain rather than further line the pockets of wealthy Premier League clubs & TV companies raising around £500,000 for those in need rather than fuelling football's greed.

Yet while this is a positive step, it does not go far enough and while there is one game - Everton vs Fulham on November 22nd - that will be televised on terrestrial TV on BBC1, there should be more games made free to air for all on TV - say one game from each of England's top four divisions each weekend - to spread the joy of live football to those who can't afford it and to spread football fans' attention across the football pyramid.

There has been a lot of discussion & upheaval in the English football world and wider European & world game recently with many of football's underlying issues of how it is set up, financed and governed brought to a head by changes caused by Covid19 and in many ways it feels like a chance for change in the game for better or worse.

'The Big Picture' plans led by Liverpool and Man United that curiously emerged the weekend after possibly the greatest Super Sunday in Premier League history as Manchester United were thrashed 6-1 at Old Trafford by Jose Mourinho's Spurs then Champions Liverpool humbled 7-2 by an Aston Villa side who avoided relegation thanks to a blind Hawk Eye, threatened the existing Premier League structure and exposed the naked greed of those who would see artificial predictability replace true meritocracy.

Thankfully, that was rejected - unanimously apparently - by all 20 Premier League clubs including those who had raised it in the first place yet the looming threat of a European or World Super League breakaway lurks on the backburner if the English game isn't protected from those would prefer profit on a balance sheet to the glory of the beautiful game.

Just this week Greg Clarke the FA Chairman was forced to resign from his post after making ill-judged and out-of-touch remarks about "coloured footballers" , the LGBT community and the career aspirations of Asians in the football world, against a wider backdrop of MP for Gateshead Ian Mearns calling for "a Root and Branch reform of English football", reiterating the need for the Government to be involved in English football and ensure the participation of football's greatest asset - the fans - in a promised Fans-Led Review in his letter to Prime Minister Boris Johnson mid week:

“We have seen this week representatives of the three main bodies who currently govern football in England appear in Parliament, and the resignation of Greg Clarke as a direct result of his contribution to the DCMS Committee on Tuesday,” Mearns wrote.
“Sadly, I am no more confident following this week’s Parliamentary scrutiny that football in England is capable of self-governance. Indeed, the evidence given to committee this week goes further, in that it brings to the fore the absolute urgency for a full review of football governance at the earliest opportunity.”

This letter is certainly a welcome step for the Fans-led review is absolutely essential in reclaiming English football back for the people it belongs to - the ordinary fans across the length and breadth of the British isles who support their local football teams, take their kids to football practice week in, week out for grassroots football is the lifeblood of the game, and are part of the football playing and supporting communities everywhere for the health of the entire football pyramid is the health of the professional game.

Gary Neville, ex-Manchester United player now part owner of Salford City, is a man who understands this perfectly and is a product of the very English football pyramid he represented so well for the England national team & he has been a leading voice in the debate launching a group manifesto called 'Saving Our Beautiful Game' to usher in the essential changes he sees as necessary to reforming the game including the introduction of an Independent Regulator to oversee the national sport:

“If the EPL [English Premier League] is to perform its role as the pinnacle of the domestic game, its responsibilities and financial contribution to the wider game need to be more carefully defined," says the manifesto.
“It also needs to be complemented by an effective and independent body to oversee the financial regulation of the game. The FA lacks credibility and has proved to be largely ineffective as a governing body. It has not modernised and is not sufficiently independent.”
"The principle is that we don't trust that football can govern itself and create the fairest deal for all, whether that's the Premier League, EFL clubs, non-League clubs or the fans,” Neville told Sky Sports.
“It has been proven over this past six months that football has struggled to bring everyone together and proven to be incapable over a 25-30 year period of transforming the money in the game into something that works for everybody.
"I want the best Premier League in the world, but I want sustainable football clubs. There is enough money in the game to be able to have an elite Premier League, a sustainable and competitive EFL, money passed down to non-League and grassroots and where fans can get a fair deal.
“That's where an independent regulator, with that spirit at the heart of it, can come in and say 'that's not fair'.”

That sense of fairness and fair play for all must be at the heart of any football debate and its essentially the message that football fans gave to The Premier League with the firm, unequivocal rejection of PPV, which may well prove a watershed moment for English football when fans & fanbases united across the game for the good of all.

I was in a privileged position as Social Media Manager of the NUFC Fans' FoodBank to help kickstart the #CharityNotPPV movement after Newcastle fan @ToonPolls on Twitter suggested on the Friday night of the 9th of October that PPV was launched that instead of paying the ludicrous £15 fee for the Newcastle-Manchester United game the following week, that fans give to the @NUFCFoodBank instead & it would spectacularly take off and raise £23,000 for The West End FoodBank, Britain's biggest and busiest and the one featured in Ken Loach's 'I, Daniel Blake', a feat celebrated around the world:

Crucially, it was a cause that united fans from all 20 Premier League fanbases and it was the organisation of all 20 working in unison towards the same goal but different FoodBanks organised by myself & Villa fan Kerry Lenihan that was key to its success:

Once the fanbases were united against it and a clear message sent, PPV was doomed which shows the power of football fans united and the same principled stance which motivated the movement of fans on this issue can be applied to others to achieve great change for good in the modern game, hand-in-hand with those players, managers, pundits, journalists, Chairmen & women, whoever they might be, who have the best interests of the beautiful game at heart like any fair-minded and true football supporter who should only want what is best for the game we all share and deeply love.

Lets Reclaim The Game Together For The Good of English Football! Stuart Latimer.