Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- A guide to prices, 1870–1914
- Part I An overview
- Part II The development of professional gate-money sport
- Part III Sport in the market place: the economics of professional sport
- 8 Profits or premierships?
- 9 All for one and one for all
- 10 Paying the piper: shareholders and directors
- 11 Winning at any cost?
- Part IV Playing for pay: professional sport as an occupation
- Part V Unsporting behaviour
- Part VI A second overview
- Appendices
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
9 - All for one and one for all
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 February 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- A guide to prices, 1870–1914
- Part I An overview
- Part II The development of professional gate-money sport
- Part III Sport in the market place: the economics of professional sport
- 8 Profits or premierships?
- 9 All for one and one for all
- 10 Paying the piper: shareholders and directors
- 11 Winning at any cost?
- Part IV Playing for pay: professional sport as an occupation
- Part V Unsporting behaviour
- Part VI A second overview
- Appendices
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Sports cartels emerge from the mutual interdependence of clubs in the sense that the revenue of any club depends on the performances of every club. Clubs may be sports competitors but they can be economic partners; and in an effective cartel, although all teams cannot win, all clubs can make profits.
The initial step in determining whether cartels operated in British sport in the period under study is to establish the basic functions of an ideal-type, profit-maximising cartel against which the British sports organisations can be assessed. Four interrelated features can be postulated. First, there has to be a central, decision-making organisation with powers to discipline members for rule infractions. Such powers are necessary because there is an inherent conflict between group and individual club interests in that the costs of reduced uncertainty caused by an overly strong team may be borne primarily by the other clubs. Second, the cartel will act to influence profits by cost-minimising regulations, usually some form of labour market intervention designed to prevent undue competition for players between member clubs. Such devices include limitations on payments to players, territorial restrictions on recruitment, drafting systems, maximum team rosters, impediments imposed on player mobility, and, of course, the size of the league from which the demand for labour is derived. Third, on the other blade of the profit scissors, cartels can attempt to maximise revenue by improving the product offered for sale.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Pay Up and Play the GameProfessional Sport in Britain, 1875–1914, pp. 112 - 153Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1988