Notts County, the oldest professional football club in the world, are the latest League Two side to be issued by HMRC with a petition for a winding up order. It gets heard on Monday, they are half a million in debt and the Football League had to help pay the players' wages last month.

The owner has tried to raise funds through loans and is selling off their best young prospect in January.

So far, so familiar (not that anyone's saying the EFL is helping to pay players wages at Pools).

But the owner has come out with some fighting talk in an interview in the Daily Mirror:

“Our petition will be settled ahead of the hearing and that’s all there is to it,” he said.

“Firstly I want to know why this is even worthy of column inches when this is not news at all. Hartlepool and Bury have recently been in the High Court and this didn’t warrant a story, so why is Notts County a story?

“The only story you need to write about is why there are so many football clubs being issued with winding up petitions by HMRC.

“If you search the London Gazette and indeed the court listings you will see the likes of Morecambe, Southend and Bolton have all in the last week or so been issued with petitions.

“The fact is HMRC do not treat football clubs like they do other businesses and you will need to speak to them or the Treasury as to the reasons why, but my feeling is we are low-hanging fruit."

Christ Almighty, the Premiershit has just started milking a TV rights deal worth zillions and yet it looks as if it will be a miracle if League Two finishes the season with 24 clubs still in business.

The Premiership, that self feeding machine.
They won't be happy till they have a Premier League of 10 super clubs and there's nothing else. Football will become an even bigger soap then it already is and everyone will have 'their' club.
It's killing the game I grew up with..... and it's all about the money.

The common denominator is that HMRC are chasing unpaid bills. It's somewhat incongruous to blame the Premier League because you haven't paid your tax bill.

I think the point is that the redistribution of money in football in this country is just ludicrously unfair. The rich get richer for actually doing nothing and everyone else struggles even more year on year. Sky, BT Sports, the Premier League etc all have a huge hand in the state of the game in this country from the top right down to the lowest level of grass roots.


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But Shaun Harvey is helping struggling clubs by introducing B teams to the Checkatrade trophy, attendances are much higher, the poor little helpless clubs in the lower leagues are benefitting financially from having the England Internationals of the future gracing their small insignificant run down stadiums.

That's correct isn't it?

Exactly. The Premier League and the TV companies pay lip service to the idea of a pyramid structure for professional football in this country but it's clear that they see the Prem + Championship as all that is really needed to keep public interest and the gravy train on track.

What do the smaller League One and Two clubs with their stupidly loyal little fan bases actually contribute to this? We're too dumb and traditionalist in outlook to accept that B teams and regionalised lower leagues are the only financially viable way forward.

All that unhelpful fuss about the 'revamped' Checkatrade Trophy! Shaun Harvey would be pulling his hair out if he had any.

Was talking to an accountant the other day about football. He was saying to expect it all to kick off very soon at Premier League level over the use of offshore accounts to help players avoid tax. HMRC have finally decided to crack down on these tax dodging practices.
Think football clubs have had it too easy for too long in this regard. Try running a small business and see how much leeway they give you in paying tax or doing VAT returns!!

Sky's current promotion of "10 games in 10 days" from the football league feature 8 from the Championship and two from league one. Of which all of the clubs involved used to be "big time". It's a joke.


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In terms of distribution of wealth I saw that average Premier League Wage now is 2.75M per year. A couple of less squad players per year per Prem club based on that share of money being filtered down would more or less fund around 30 clubs in the lower divisions in terms of annual turnover (simplistic analogy I know but it puts things in perspective)

I suspect the common denominator is the mega dredger that's the Premiership is sucking up everything it can see ..... Shrimps included.

Looks like this has already started, yesterdays Echo had a story about an image rights 'tax dodging' investigation by HMRC, and naming Rooney in particular.

Ok the premier league is a huge money earner but they aren't to blame for some very poor management of lower league clubs finances. Teams like Accrington prove it can be done without overspending. If every club stopped offering silly wages players would have to accept less.