I’m annoyed that Susanna Dinnage shied away from being Premier League boss.. she could have shattered the glass ceiling. WHEN Susanna Dinnage was announced as the next chief executive of the Premier League she wasn’t just about to kick a hole in the glass ceiling she was going to shatter it.
Her decision to pull out was terrible disappointment to those of us who have struggled to show that there is nothing in football administration that should be the exclusive territory of men.
Had she backed down in the late 1990s when I was managing director of Birmingham City and probably the first woman to take a senior role in the game, I think I’d have said “Don’t blame you, Susanna.”
Curses have been spat at me, abuse sung and chanted at me. By phone, on paper and latterly in social media, I’ve been targeted in language that once educated me in the literacy or otherwise of people with nasty minds but which I now blithely ignore.
Truly, knowing what I know now, I don’t think I’d have bothered. Perhaps it was a kind of suffragette spirit that in those days kept me and a few others going. Success at making a breakthrough was not to be thrown away.
So I was annoyed when Dinnage shied from one of the major jobs in world sport only a couple of weeks before taking over. She decided that the challenge of remaining global president of Animal Planet, a section of a group of television companies, was enough to be going on with.
The Premier League is England’s most visible business, such a wealth-creator that everyone wants a bite at it - FIFA, UEFA, the FA, the Government through taxation, foreign billionaires, players, agents, communities and even our richest clubs who want a bigger cut. Building a £7.6bn giant from a fledgling 20-club league, Richard Scudamore earned every penny of his £5m pay-off.
He was quite a boss to follow and Chelsea’s highly capable chairman, Bruce Buck, given the task of finding a successor, was as delighted as could be to appoint a woman who had an ideal background. Pity she bounced off the glass ceiling and left him groping at fresh air.
There are tough negotiations and some whips to crack for the next chief exec. Jealously eyeing England’s coup, FIFA are pushing their own hugely sponsored competitions to tempt major clubs with sackfuls of dollars. UEFA are to introduce a tier-two Europa League. The FA and the Government want more home-grown squad players.
These are juggernauts in the international sphere and perhaps Dinnage was daunted about standing in front of them and saying no. FIFA have plans for capping agents’ fees, too, and this will remain high on Premier League agenda.
Using a little arm-twisting has cleared 34 weekends for our domestic leagues. Protecting these from predators who relish prime days for their competitions is a constant battlefield and will be increasingly in the future.
Scudamore always recognised that his strongest suit was the regularity, ruthless competitiveness and unmatchable sporting entertainment of his league.
Like a poker champion he played these qualities to the television companies, the paymasters whose world-wide audiences loved getting their weekend kicks but weren’t so thrilled about mid-week. Still, the winnings kept rolling in.
Follow that, then. Perhaps Dinnage was anxious that she couldn’t carry the weight of a nation’s football love and decided against going to the altar.
Who knows? But I am sorry because a woman’s perspective would have been important on matters such as racism, crowd trouble and young players and their difficulties.
The persuasive powers that won her Bruce’s admiration could, too, have won special rights for professional football in whatever Brexit might have in store.
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