Money, power & politics: Inside the world of a Premier League CEO | The Football Boardroom

Welcome to the football boardroom. Today, we're joined by one of the Premier League's most experienced chief executives, Paul Barber of Brighton and Hove Alpion. We explore with Paul what it takes to be a CEO in the Premier League. We talk about the Southampton spygate scandal. How would he have handled it? We talk about managerial recruitment at a time of the famous managerial merry-go-round. And finally, we get into the politics of football. Where is the Premier League in its discussions with the EFL? Don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss any of our new episodes and we really hope you enjoy the show. So you'd be good to see you after your little Scottish surgery on. Did you find Nessie and did you find some better curtains from what we saw you on last week's episode? Which is why we are a day late today because you've just got back from your Royal Tour of Scotland. I have. It was brilliant, but I'm very glad to be back down in London. And even more happy today to have such an illustrious guest because we are joined by Paul Barber. And if you've been hiding on a different planet for the last 25 years, you might not know what I'm about to tell you that Paul has had one of the most illustrious careers in football management in this country. He is 14 years into his tenure as the CEO of Brighton and Hove Albion Football Club and is Deputy Chairman too. Prior to that, he had two years running an MLS club, Vancouver White Caps, five years as a senior director at Tottenham Hotspur Football Club and four years in a senior management role at the FA. And even before that had a very senior career in banking and advertising. So it really is a privilege to have you here. And as the football boardroom, you are one of the people who've occupied most football boardrooms. And we're going to tap into that experience to shine a light on some of the issues in the game. Paul, one of the obvious issues this week has been spygate. How would you as a chief executive have handled a situation like that? Well, first of all, it's not been good for football as a whole for English football, certainly not good for Southampton. I think these things are very difficult to know how you're going to handle until you're actually in the thick of it. And I think as always with these things, there are very sort of difficult and complex reasons that clubs take decisions to do certain things. And there's no doubt that this one was not a good decision. It's hard to see how it would have significantly benefited them. And obviously the punishment is very, very severe. So it's a chief executive and as a board of directors, I'm sure Southampton are very, very sore this morning and brewing some of the decisions that they made. But there's one thing the actual event itself. And then it's how you handle the fallout. Obviously the board didn't know anything about the spying. But actually the fallout, how do you handle that? Should there be more on the front foot because they didn't really even put a holding statement out? Well, again, every club has its own culture, its own sort of style of communicating. I can only speak from Brighton's point of view. We would have tried very quickly to get on the front foot with the communications and be very transparent in what we were trying to achieve. Investigating exactly what happened, finding out who was involved, who sanctioned it, why, what the details were of that. And trying to keep our fans and staff informed, I think again, the wider football public have absolutely a right to know what's going on in these situations. But I think much closer to home, I feel for Southampton staff and players, you know, they would have been hoping at the very least for a chance to restore their Premier League status. Most clubs, certainly ours, will have clauses in staff contracts and player contracts, which involve significant reductions if you're relegated from the Premier League to the championship. And then those salaries are restored if you make it back to the Premier League. So I feel for Southampton staff, you know, they would have been hoping I'm sure for the chance to restore the levels of pay that they would have enjoyed for some years previous. And I feel for them. And obviously, I feel for the fans because they were looking forward to what is one of the best days out, I think in the football calendar, the playoff final. I've not experienced one myself, but I've certainly been in the playoff semi finals and suffered disappointment. So I know just how much it means to clubs to get to that to get to that final at Wembley in front of a full house. It's an amazing opportunity. So yeah, the whole thing is very, very sad. One of the things I do, I did it actually when I was still in the game, but I do it even more now, you'll probably understand this pool is I kind of put myself in that hot sea. I tried to imagine what I would have been thinking sort of war gaming, the scenario where I guess about 10 days ago, you know, that famous photo of a young man standing by a tree taking a picture. And I always say it in the CEO, our audience loved to kind of understand what it's like to be in that hot sea. And you and I know what that means, it's always seems to be us that gets that phone call or so and the knock on the door from the comms guy saying, boss, I need to talk to you something something serious is going down shots the door walks in you think, oh my god, what is it now and it's kind of the spybuster moment here who you're going to call I now think it's one of the biggest stories to affect football in decades. And my instincts would have been and you learn those instincts because it's such a tough job. You got to get on top of this and want to find out very quickly if this is as it looks that we're guilty. And just try and just try and get ahead of the narrative and I thought they didn't do so and it became very obvious very quickly that you know throw Southampton out was becoming was becoming a viable narrative. And I think if they'd handled it more quickly, perhaps admitted guilt early, perhaps rooted out the culprit and made a sacrifice of that culprit. And I think maybe that would have headed that off might have helped I think as you know Christian one of the best things about this job is that you're at the front and center of pretty much everything that goes on in the club. The worst thing about this job is that you're on the center of everything that goes on in a football club so phoning Tony and saying you believe what's happened. It's not it's not easy in those situations because you know your first instinct is to protect your clubman to protect your staff, protect your owners, protect your fans. But you've got a responsibility as achieving executive to get to the bottom of what's happened as quickly as possible and then to get on the front foot and communicate. You're you have many skills and when I tried to summarize your background there Paul you are you are you are literally a marketing guru and so I know you would have understood that the external world were going to be all those stakeholders outside the building will be forming a view on this very very quickly and shaping that view. I think your actions sometimes speak louder than your words and they did nothing and said nothing. And so that was a basic mistake yeah I mean I don't know their reasoning and maybe they've got legal advice you know that told them that's what they should be doing but certainly from all of the times I've worked in football in a crisis situation and prior to working football in a crisis situation where you leave a vacuum avoid it will be filled and usually it's not filled with good things. So at the very least if you're on the front foot and you're trying to communicate you're trying to get ahead of the story you're trying to be as transparent as you can in difficult circumstances at the very least you're filling the void that would otherwise be there and therefore you're giving some balance to inevitable negative impressions that are being given. There will be of course a narrative from other stakeholders in the dispute that will be negative towards you and your club and I think as a chief executive as a football club as any organization you've got a responsibility to try and neutralize that as much as you can but there's no doubt that you know this story has ramifications not just for Southampton or the F L but for the whole of football in England and it's really frustrating and disappointing that you know we've got this damage to our sport. Whatever the rights and wrongs whatever the sanction whether that's justified unjustified harsh or not harsh no one can dispute that this story is damaging English football across the world and that's a great shame but you sorry you say it's damaging but actually haven't the EFL come out of it well because they've shown strong governance and we're always debating governance Premier League FA EFL the EFL has actually shown it and there's a sort of almost a culture of cheating on field and off field and actually someone has said no we're not going to have a question. No, we're not going to have this. Yeah, I think their actions are a demonstrable response to saying, "No, we're not going to put up with this." And from that point of view, yes, there is an argument that says that they've handled it well, and strongly. I think just to fall out from it, the ramifications I feel for whole. Their preparations for the final have been significantly impacted. Their fans' enjoyment of looking forward to a big day out of Wembley has been impaired by not knowing who they're playing, when the game's going to be played. What travel that they can book and hotels that they can book. I feel for whole coaching staff who've had to technically prepare to play two different teams in a final where, by definition, you should be preparing and focused on playing one team. So I don't think any of that is good for the game's image and good for the game's reputation. And it's just such a shame that we find ourselves talking about this issue when we should be focused on one of the biggest games in the English calendar, which, frankly, no matter where you sit in the pyramid, you all look forward to, because as Christian knows, the stakes are so high, the jeopardy in the game is so vast. And maybe-- and we talked about it before-- we started the Pogcast. Maybe it's the sheer size of the prize that is driving some of the behaviors that we see. I think so. Before CPU coming on the money, you built that amazing training ground at Lancet. I was down there a couple of weeks ago and had a coffee with your amazingly ridiculously young looking manager by the way. Was security an issue when you built that? Very much so and you know, insofar as you ever can make your training ground as 100% secure, you certainly take steps to build the fences as high as the local authority will allow. You try and create an additional perimeter beyond your own perimeter to give yourself an extra bit of security. So in our case, we had land next to our training ground. So, demilitarized over and over. Almost, yeah. We have a piece of land next to our training ground that we owned. We sold it for property development, but we bought the first row of houses that bound that are along the boundary of our training ground. And that gives us not only accommodation for our young players and staff, but it also provides a degree of protection over what they can see in those houses. But it's not always possible and you know, training grounds now over many, many years have become vast pieces of land. We've got 16 pitches at our training ground. And invariably, the land that you're trying to build that training ground is expensive. So you take as much as you need, but not much more than you need because it's expensive. And invariably, it's boarded by other properties. So there's always going to be a degree of risk that somebody will be able to get into one of those properties or onto that land and see what you're doing. But we take as many precautions as we can to stop that. Okay, final question on this war game because I think it is a massive story and I really do feel privileged to have you here, Paul, to set me right here. If you're the CEO and in those first five minutes, you establish beyond any doubt that the person taking the pitch is a member of staff. He's been authorized to do so by the coach. And you fired that coach and put out a statement, the club have been made aware it's totally unacceptable. It's wrong. We've taken internal action and we'll cooperate fully with the league on this matter as we prepare for the final. A is that viable and B do you think it would have made it much less likely that they would have been defaulted? I think decisive action in those situations is certainly desirable. Due process has got to be followed so you can't immediately move to make certain judgments without a thorough investigation. How thorough is thorough? Is it hours, days, weeks if the evidence is so obvious, putting, you know, launching that internal investigation but preliminary suspending the coach? Again, I think as much as you can do in that situation to show that you're taking it seriously and to show that you already understand the seriousness of what has done the prove of the action. I'm sure there will be legal advice around that will actually be urging you to keep your options open to not be too prejudicial in some of your early statements, not to put yourself in a position where you can't argue your case in front of a disciplinary hearing. As always, Christian, as you know, these things on the outside look sometimes quite simple and quite obvious to do. On the inside, they can be far more complicated in terms of how you have to go about managing the process. That's on you and me. That's ultimately the chief executive responsibility. This is the boardroom and it's not easy. Sometimes, I think, on the outside, some of the decision-making in football, particularly businesses generally, can look quite obvious, but on the inside, it's never quite as simple as that. There are many, many different factors that we have to take into account. Reminds me, we had Sean Dishon here who said something very memorable, which was, you know, because he's always being told by people how to do his job. I'm sure you and I know that we walk into any party anywhere in the last 20 years and people tell us how we should do our job. He said, "When a plumber comes round to, I don't tell him how to mend my boiler, but everyone tells me how to do my job." Let's segue from the very specific case of how you and I, thank God, didn't have to manage the South African story, to this issue, really, of the role of the chief executive. Something we've talked a lot about on this show is really what we've come to call the triangle, the crucial relationship between chief executive, coach or manager and sporting director. I wonder whether you share my view that firstly, the CEO role itself, a guy like you or I who came out of football, is used to managing both the football and the commercial side, an old-style football CEO, are we a dying breed Paul? Well, I definitely think the job is getting bigger and more complicated. And I think, you know, from our responsibilities perspective, my job is to set a clear vision for the club, to with the chairman, the owner, determine the values, how do we want to deliver that vision, what kind of behaviors, and then work with an executive team, which includes the technical or sporting director to come up with a strategy that's going to deliver the vision. And a big part of that, let's not forget, is winning football matches. So for me, everything that we do every day has to drive towards helping us win football matches. And sometimes, I think, in football, we can get lost in the fact that we are now quite big businesses, high profile businesses, we come under a lot of scrutiny. But every time we kind of get lost in that maze of decision-making, the simple question that I ask, my staff to ask themselves is, is what we're doing today going to help us win on Saturday or Sunday? And if the answer to that is no, then we have to think even more carefully about why we're going to do what we're going to do. If it's yes, then it's a very clear, let's get on with it. But again, so many things now around the industry of football, particularly in the Premier League, are about generating revenue. And inevitably, when you're doing that, there will be from time to time conflicts with football, which ultimately is what you're there to deliver. So the job's complicated question. And I would say that the triangle that you talk about, I can totally relate to, for me, it's more of a square. So I've got the coach who's managing the week to week, the sporting or technical director that's managing the longer-term sporting vision. And I've got the owner as well. Well, I was going to come to the owner. And to me, it's an important sort of part of the process when it comes to what we want to spend, how much we can spend, what reasonably do we think we can deliver in the time frame that the owner's expectations are set at, and then delivering it? Does it help that the owner is or hinder, that the owner is a fan of the club? Both. I honestly think it's both. I think it helps massively, because you've got that emotional buy-in, that connection, which is not just the club, but to the wider community. I think it hinders in the sense that every defeat hurts that much more. And therefore, every perceived failure is that much more personal. And it can be a big positive, and in Tony Bloom's case for us, it's a massive positive. But I also have seen over the years, missing out on promotion to the Premier League in 2016, how much it really hurts him as well. And so, for me, as a chief executive, I care hugely about Brighton Hove Albion, but I will never be able to care as much as Tony that has grown up in that city, grown up with that club, has family connections in that club going back half a century, I'll never be able to sort of hurt as much as him. So part of my job in those situations is to help pick him up as well. Owners that are less emotionally engaged, perhaps more detached, won't necessarily have that same impact when the worst happens. But you talk about this emotional engagement, when Chris Houton kept you up. I wrote a piece saying, you know, very supportive of Chris Houton, I thought Tony Bloom, it was very unfair that he was ushered out of the door very quickly. And I got a call from Tony, and he was very measured, but actually made the point that in a way he couldn't have the emotional engagement, even though he was a fan, even though he was expected and liked Chris as an individual. But actually, you had to get on with planning, and it would have been slightly unfair to have kept Chris in the building when you're actually looking at, you know, transfer targets. Absolutely. So where is the balance with someone like Tony? That's where Tony is brilliant, because on a match day, you know, I often joke, and it's not a great joke that, you know, awful things could be happening in the stadium, but Tony's focus would be totally on the football and watching the game, whereas I would be worried about how to deal with whatever awful thing was happening. And when we are not playing, Tony sort of flips to sort of business mode, and the focus then is on the long term health of the club and the decisions that we need to take to make the club better. And Chris did a fantastic job for Brighton, an absolutely fantastic job. But we felt that we needed to evolve how we played football, how we entertained our fans in order to grow our business. And that meant a different style of football, different type of coach, and I suppose history in some ways has proved Tony right that we have evolved, not that Chris was bad and everybody else that's followed has been good, but just simply we're on a journey. And after the the Christian years, we went on to the next stage of that journey. Potter, Deserby and Nell Hertzler, they've all been part of that same journey, but each one of them has evolved the club's style of football and how our fans expect us to play on what expectations they have of us, ever so slightly differently each time. Where you're square, your words, my word the triangle, has been notably successful is in the recruitment of management. And I've told age this story, you may have forgotten this, we were both in Dubai together during the World Cup. I think both of us took our team, the residual of our team when the World Cup was going on for effectively an elongated training We can ask with our new manager and you with your new manager. And we play each other. in a pick-up game. And I think it was the first time that Deserby had essentially put a bright and 11 on the park, following on from Graham. And we'd seen Graham in action at Villa for a couple of seasons. And it was so striking how you didn't miss a beat. And is there something in that, that something in you, Tony, maybe James Town, identifying links between styles and coaches to minimise the risk of managerial change? Yes, there is. And we take as much care recruiting coaches as we do players. We use as much data as we can to help us with that. But I think there's a more significant reason that we need to do that, is that very often football clubs will move from one coach to another. And what then follows over a course of one, two, sometimes three, transfer window is a significant upheaval of the squad. And the cost of change, as you know, Christian, is very, very significant. So for us, we're hiring our coaches to a large extent fit the squad that we've got as well. Because we don't want that cost of change, we can't afford that cost of change. We actually need to be able to evolve our playing style, largely with the same squad. And so from Hilton to Potter was, you know, a very, very significant change. And that was deliberate. But from Potter to Deserbie, Deserbie to Herzler, those changes have been far more incremental. And that was also deliberate. And again, you know, it's not to say that we're asking the coach that comes in to work with exactly the same squad, but we're asking him to work with largely the same squad. And very importantly as well, largely the same backroom team. Because so many football clubs will spend a huge amount of money moving six, seven, eight, nine, ten members of background staff in. And then within a couple of years, moving those same seven, eight, nine, ten background staff back out. And then repeating the whole process. What we try and do is keep the number of coaches we bring in in the core group as small as possible. And then support them with what we call club staff, club coaches, club medics. People that will be there consistently through coaching changes. Absolutely. Absolutely. Through on to our chase. Absolutely. Because that cost of change is a bit like stamp duty when you move house. It's kind of dead money. And you know, you can't you can't replace that kind of money side. The obvious risk to on field results. Absolutely. And yeah, the the cost of change for a lot of clubs when a new coach comes in can be very, very significant. And at times potentially catastrophic. Because you're not only taking a hit on the transfer fees you might have paid and contracts being paid up in some cases or wages subsidise. But you're then bringing a whole load of new players in on potentially even bigger trade transfer fees and even bigger wages. So you've you've got the double whammy. So you plan everything. So you have succession planning. So do you actually have you identified who Fabian's successor is? We we always are very open when a coach comes in that almost as soon as they arrive, we're thinking about who they might be replaced with. And that's not to say that we're we're setting them up to fail or want them to fail or even want that to happen anytime soon. But we need to constantly keep looking at who the best coaches in the world are. Playing the certain style that we work with who might make the players we've got even better than than they already are. And of course the irony for us is that the more successful our coaches are, the more likely we are to lose them. And so it's common sense to Tony and I that we should plan for Fabian's replacement. Not only is he one of the brightest young coaches in the Premier League. He's one of the brightest young coaches in Europe. It's not the world. He's 33 years of age. He's already guaranteed another top 10 finish in his only second Premier League season. We've given him a new contract because we believe in him and we want to reward him for what he's done. But we're under no illusion that there'll be other clubs, bigger clubs, richer clubs across the world that will be looking at what he's doing, looking at his age, looking at how he's helping to develop young players and saying, yeah, he's on our radar. So by definition, we need to have other coaches on our radar to cover that eventuality if and when it happens. But how do you balance that in the minds of fans when it's almost like a summer fling that they come to Brighton and it's a nice, you know, they're coming to England and it's a step into the Premier League. I mean, you are more than a stepping stone. We are and we have to be open and transparent. It comes back to the start of the conversation. I think communication in any business, but particularly in football is critical. And if there's one thing that I have been consistent at in all my career, it's being on the front foot and trying to communicate. And sometimes that's been difficult to manage in certain situations, particularly at the FA, as you'll know Henry. But most of the time, it's still the right thing to do because people will value your openness and your transparency, even if they don't like what you have to say all of the time. And I think at Brighton Tony, I've always had the belief that we're going to be very, very clear about what our vision is, how we intend to get there, that there will be some bumps along the way. But also that not everyone that's with us on one stage of the journey will necessarily be with us on the next part of the journey. And that's not a bad thing. That's not a terrible thing. That's not a disrespectful thing. That's just a fact of life. And part of our way of countering that, of negating the effects of that is to be good on our succession planning and good on our communication about that succession planning. That's how we work. Okay. This is the real nub of the issue for me. I want to dig in further on this notion of Henry's point about sometimes it can be difficult with fans when just as it's looking rosy, people leave. And if we move from managers to players, we talked in our show last week about the impact of the Jamestown Analytics model. And you have been very articulate on this poll publicly around the essence of your financial model depends on buying well and selling well. No club has been more honest about in the regulatory world we live in the need to sell players for profit not only to finance succession, but to comply with regulation. And nobody has sold better than Brighton. But I'm interested in whether as somebody who's also worked at one of the so-called big six and also at the FAA and the new understands the hierarchy in football. Do you think that model is more manageable at Brighton? Do you think it's easier to say to your fan base, even your coach, Moises Caesarethal and Alexis McAllister are leaving to Chelsea and Liverpool after our best ever season. We're sorry, but this is our model. Do you think it's easier at Brighton than it would be having that conversation with Unai at Villa or with Arnie Slott at Liverpool? In theory, yes. In practice, not always, because the one thing I've learned from more than 25 years working in football is that every professional footballer and coach I've worked with are hugely competitive. And therefore, any sense that we're diminishing their ability to compete is a slight. And therefore, having to sort of restate what our model is, what we've all signed up to, how we sustain the model, how we sustain the club, how we build the club for the future is a really important part of that process. And you talk about selling well and you're right, we have to sell well, but well doesn't always necessarily mean the monetary value. It means the timing. It means who we've already got in the building before we make that sale. Because there's nothing worse in any business, but particularly in football than making a big sale, Caesarethal to Chelsea for a British record transfer fee of 115 million. And then going out to look for his replacement when it's burning a hole in your pocket. And everyone can see that your pockets are bulging. So you do that really well. But again, from the outside looking in, I don't know this and perhaps you can tell me, it felt like that really pissed off Roberto Deserpie. And in the end, that relationship didn't take long to end between Brighton and Roberto. Was it a factor? I think when you decide to sell good players at a time when the team is moving in the direction the coach wants, there's always going to be a degree of tension. We can't ignore that and then or deny that. But at the same time, it comes back again to what we've all signed up to and being transparent about how we work, what's the light. And when you're entering the coach, you're going to see it. Absolutely. That's the most important time, I think, to make it clear that this is our model. This is how we will work. This is a squad now. But in terms of our squad planning in two summers time, three summers time, four summers time, these are the players that we might expect to sell all things being equal. And all things being equals is quite an important statement in itself because it's not just about the timing being right for the player or his agent or the club that might want to buy. It's about being right for us as well. And people forget that we resisted selling Moises Crusader to Arsenal in the months before he was ultimately sold to Chelsea because it didn't suit us. It might have suited Moises and his representatives and certainly would have suited to Arsenal at that time. But it didn't suit us. So we resisted that. So it's not just about selling when the price is right. It's about the circumstances for our club as well. And that's the important balance that we have to get right on every single transfer window because we don't. don't want to diminish our coaches or our players or our supporters ambitions, we just simply have to manage them in a slightly different way. We associate Brighton with data recruitment with James Tan Analytics. How do you balance the data with the sort of the all blacks, no dickheads policy? It's the most difficult part of any recruitment process, whether you're recruiting players or staff, people can, on the non-playing side, sell themselves really well in interviews, but once they come into the building, it can be a very different person. You've had that? Absolutely. On the playing side, again, they can be the most technically gifted player, the most tactically aware player, the most athletic performer that you can imagine, but if you haven't got to the heart of what they're like as a character, as a person, then it's possible that you could still fail no matter what data that you use. We try and minimise that risk as far as we can by talking to their former teammates, talking to their former coaches, talking to media who might have come into contact with them over years, going back to sponsors that might have worked with them. We try and build up as big a profile of the person as we do on the data that leads us to actually seeing them as a great left-back or a beautiful centre forwards, can score lots of goals. But it's not a foolproof process, Henry, because people coming from a vastly different country into a different culture, a different dressing room, eating different food, living in a very different community or environment might not work for reasons that are not about their character. It's just about the adjustment that they've made, not working. And sometimes, not even about the player, it can be about their wife, their girlfriend, their kids. So many of these things can impact performance, which in turn impacts the success of a particular transfer. So, so much of our work, and not just us, top clubs across the world, these days, is about how can we actually create the best possible environment for that player to succeed off the field as well as on it. And so, player care teams, the support staff that goes around elite athletes now, is growing because I think clubs not just us, but across the Premier League and across the world are realising that to get the best performance out of people, we've got to make those people as happy and as settled as we can, as quickly as we can. You seem to have almost some on-field mentoring element. You look at sort of well-behak and henshawood. And you've got sort of four or five players in their 30s, almost 40, I think, in James Millen, the Duncan Steel. How does that balance, if you then got younger players coming in, like Henshawood, early 20s? And you've got like a 13-year age gap. And coaches want ready-made battle-hardened players, 26, 27, 28, which is their peak. Yes, they do, but they're expensive. And in our model, we can afford a large crop of early 20s, with great potential, great ability. And we can also afford a smaller crop of 30-plus players who can help mentor them and develop them, not just on the pitch, but off the pitch and around the football club as well. But there's a fantastic job at that. Dunc, there's a fantastic job. Gross, James Milner. I think James is actually twice Jack Hinchwood's age. And yet, you know, James is still performing at the highest level. And just as importantly, he's still connecting with those young players because of what he's done, what he's achieved, how long he's stayed in the game, how he's lived his life. And those young players want to learn from players like James Milner. So for us, that blend is important, but we're also very open with the coaches about those peak players, 26, 27, 28, 29, proven winners are by definition the most expensive in the world. And a club of our size, with our budgets, we've got a bottom six budget still for wages, are going to find those players hard to come by. So we have to do a different way. We have to compete in a different way. We have to be a bit smarter. And yeah, we work very, very hard at doing that. We don't get everything right, but we hopefully get more right than we do. Are you generous with bonuses? We have to be, to some extent, because we can't pay the base salaries that the bigger clubs play. But of course, if we're winning and we're successful, we're only too happy to share in that success with the bonuses. Let's shift gears and talk a little bit about the regulatory environment that you have to compete in. We've alluded to this. Again, one of the things that I think our audience probably don't realize is even with this model you've described being sensible on purchases and capitalizing on sales at the right time for the club at the right price. I think Tony is well established that Tony's in for maybe half a billion pounds into Brighton. So I think people need to understand that. You know, a club widely viewed as the best run in all respects, including financially, the owners put 500 million pounds of real money in. It's an absolutely unbelievable sum. And competition remains very difficult. Where do you see financial regulation today, specifically in terms of balancing this big word sustainability at the heart of a lot of the arguments for regulation, stopping clubs going bust in plain English, with allowing clubs to compete with the elite? Where do you sit on that? To really complex map. For me, on the one hand, football clubs are absolutely integral to their communities. And we know that they're more than just a group of players, male or female that turn up every week to play football. They're more to the community than that. So protecting those clubs in their communities and ensuring their sustainability is vital, we all know that. The other side of it is that we want leagues to be as competitive as possible. But we can't have it, in my opinion, it will be very damaging to the game, is if a small group of clubs become so wealthy, so powerful that the competition is diminished because we just simply can't get near them. No one wants to turn up and see X, B, Y, 7, 0. It might happen once in a while and it's a great story and everyone looks at Match of the Day and thinks it's incredible. But if that was happening every week, and predictably so, the same team's getting the seven and the same teams getting the no goals, then I think attendances would drop, TV audiences would drop, TV rights fees would fall, the value of the sport would start to decline. That hurts all of us. So achieving the balance between financial sustainability that stops clubs disappearing from their communities, but allowing every club to spend enough in order to compete with each other, but not too much as some break away, is really difficult. And you know from your time, Christian, on the inside of both the Premier League and the FL, it's a constant battle between clubs that are big and powerful, wanting to become bigger and more powerful and richer and therefore protect their positions as the biggest clubs in Europe. Versus those of us that are aspiring to compete every week and to have a little piece of that glory, that a little piece of that excitement and the rules, therefore having to be balanced to allow that to happen, it's not easy. And you know, have we got it right right now? We'll see, you know, the latest changes are yet to bite, yet to take effect. There is an answer you concerned about the change. I am. I'm a little bit concerned because we didn't vote for the top to bottom anchor, the ability to stop the biggest clubs becoming even bigger and even richer and even more powerful financially. For both large exponents of this Henry, I know it hasn't really gained much traction, but we felt very, very strongly that an overarching protection to cap the ratio between the highest spender in the league and the relationship to the lowest spender in the league would be a protection when all else fails in terms of regulation that we don't see the gap get too wide. And you voted for that. Absolutely. Absolutely. And the reason I still believe that that's important is because I don't think it's in the biggest clubs interest for them to run away with everything either because by the same token, if the winning of the league, the winning of the cups qualifying for Europe, qualifying for the Champions League was so predictable every year that everyone knew what was going to happen before we'd even kick to ball. Again, in my opinion, as a football fan, that's going to impact on my desire to watch those games to watch those leagues. And if I'm a TV executive, and I've got an audience that is broadly knowing what's going to happen before it happens, I'm not necessarily going to pay the same level of rights fees either. And I think what we've got, what we've created is an environment both in the Premier League and the AFL where actually the TV company still love our product because it is so competitive. The fact we're going into the final day on Sunday where we, Brighton, a small club by some of the biggest club standards could still force our way into a Champions League place. And if we don't, Bournemouth could. And at the same time, we could even not qualify for Europe if results went very badly for us and very much against a lot of jeopardy. That's incredible. And Tottenham, one of the biggest clubs in the country, going into the final day, a club that I grew up supporting and still have a lot of affection for. Going into the final day, not knowing whether they'll still be in the Premier League at the end of that final day, that's remarkable. And that is creating storylines, narratives, interest, excitement around the world. That's valuable. And all of us should have a responsibility and an overwhelming desire to protect. that value because that's our business, that's what we've all invested in. But you can't just look at the Premier League, I mean the games about the Pyramid. Absolutely. Christian's old club, Aslan Villa last night, I was going through their players, so many of them, well, a couple of them were in non-league and they've climbed up through the divisions as a club, certainly the top two divisions, but also individually as players. We can't just have 20 and a 72. Totally agree with that. And one of the things that I used to talk about so much when I worked in Major League Soccer in North America was the Pyramid, the value of the Pyramid, the excitement of the Pyramid. And I can remember so many times my colleagues, former colleagues at MLS would ask me to talk at league meetings about relegation and promotion. And they would be fascinated by it, enthralled by it, but didn't want it. Because of that jeopardy, and for me, working at Brighton, what I've been able to learn so much about is the value of the dream of clubs that are currently in the third or fourth tier, thinking that they can replicate what we've done, what Bournemouth has done, what Brentford has done, what Crystal Palace has done, and progress through those tiers. Even Manchester City, if you want to go back to the time when they are in league one, and of course, their world's been transformed in the way that we know. But nevertheless, creating and sustaining the dream for the fans of some of the smallest clubs to follow a pathway to the Premier League is one of the greatest assets that we have. And that's why again, we're very open to supporting the entire Pyramid from the Premier League. So why hasn't this new deal been done? Because I think, to be honest, Henry, a combination of expectations that may be too high, and a lack of understanding of what additional monies might be required and for what reason have created this impasse. And where the David Cogan and his team can help bring the two sides together to facilitate a deal quicker than we've been able to achieve, we'll see. But for me, we all are very aware of the value of the Pyramid and want to protect it. But what we're more concerned about, I think, is if additional monies are going to be passed over, whatever level that might be, where will that money go? Because for us, spending more money on player salaries, more money on agents fees, isn't going to create a more sustainable Pyramid or a more competitive Pyramid. What we'd like to see is more money spent on facilities, more money sent on stadiums, more money sent on training grounds, more money being invested in women and girls football, more things that actually help to grow the sport and create a better environment for fans, for players, for coaches, rather than necessarily spending more money on what we've already got. I absolutely would have bet my house on, and we talked a lot about this when we were working together, that you and Tony in particular would know that it's about time that relationship between the FL and the Premier League was updated. The so-called cliffhedge has become so extreme that to pick up on your point about competition, you've really focused at the top end of the league, the fact that anyone can beat anybody. But at the bottom end of the league, it was getting to the point and there are always exceptions and they're dangerous because they give people an excuse for the status quo, but in general it has become rather predictable that we have a set of teams that yo-yo up and down, and I don't think that is great for the Premier League. And of course we know the EFL, I think it's terrible for the EFL, but I would have expected you to be really banging the drum to get that new deal across the line. And this leads to a tricky question, but it relates back to our triangle point and your square point, the difference between being the chief executive and the owner. And I'm fascinated whether Paul is a statesman of the game, you find it sometimes that it constrains you, you work for Brighton, you work ultimately for Tony Bloom, and Tony and you may have wildly different opinions on issues that affect the game. Do you find that constraining in any way? Do you do you one day hope that you'll be able to just you know, sit above that and say what you really think? Because I found it really liberating being out in the end and being a complete free agent with that, which I can't understand when you're being paid. But I mean, to be honest, one of the reasons I guess Tony and I have worked together for so long is very often we see things very similarly. And you know, I've now got a small ownership stake in Brighton much much much more than Tony's I hasten to add, but that was again the reason we sort of created that structure is because we we are aligned on 99% of things. That doesn't mean to say that we don't disagree sometimes on the tactics. We don't necessarily always agree on the nuances, but largely we're pretty well aligned. And I think when you've got a majority owner in my case, I'm under minority owner in my case, who also happens to be the guy responsible for running the club day today as aligned as that. It's a pretty healthy situation because we're comfortable in each other's company even to disagree sometimes. And that that I think is good for the football club. I think where you get other problems or where maybe the the chief executives ambitions, maybe to support the coach on a day-to-day basis are misaligned with the owner's expectations or his ability to support or his desire to put more money in or whatever it happens to be. That's when football clubs can tend to be more difficult. But Tony has never ever said to me, I don't want you talking on that particular subject or I don't want you to offer your opinion on that. We've never ever had a situation 14 years where that's occurred. Usually as I say, because when we talk about something, we find ourselves aligned, we look at things through the same lens. And on the odd occasion that we don't, he'll sort of say explain to me, why do you think that? Or what is your reason for thinking like that? Because he's the sort of guy that wants to understand even more. And he's not running the club day to day. So he he will very often say, ah, you're much closer to it than me. I understand that now. That makes more sense. Or occasionally he will say, no, actually this is going to be our position. And he's the majority owner. He, as you say, has invested over £400 million in the club. He's just committed to another £85 million to build a women's stadium. If he sees it one particular way and I don't, ultimately money talks. Absolutely. He's the owner. Yeah. Well, I was really, I was really alluding to the fact that football is very competitive. And I've been in the room. And so have you with owners who, at the most basic level, think that writing a check for an owner in the championship who next week could be their direct rival in the Premier League makes no sense. Particularly when a number of Premier League owners look down the league and see championship owners who are richer than them. I don't think you and I see the world quite that way. It is more nuanced. We do take a longer term view. We both don't forget from where we've come. But that isn't always true with owners. And I, I, I want to see you bang in that drum because I think the new deal should have been done when we were sitting in a room together in the summer of 23. And we were one vote away from getting it done. And maybe wouldn't have needed a regulator at that point. And you know, we'd have all moved on. But it feels further away than ever. Do you agree? Yes and no. I mean, I think I think both sides probably took a very public and determined position quite early in the process, which then made it quite difficult to move. That's my personal opinion. That's not necessarily Tony's opinion or anyone else in the Premier League. But I think when you've got one party holding out for X and another party saying absolutely no way, then and that's both public, then I think it becomes quite difficult because it becomes a degree of who's going to blink first in that situation. Whereas if we've been able, maybe to keep all of those ambitions, targets, whatever you want to call them, far more private, dealt with things in a in a in a in a more concilitory way earlier. Private and immediate. Absolutely. Absolutely. Then maybe we'd have got to a solution faster. But I understand why the FL would create a position because they're doing the best for 72 member clubs. I understand why Richard and his team at the Premier League would also take a position for its 20 member clubs. And let's also be clear that this isn't just about Premier League to Championship Christian. As you know, this is Championship to League 1. This is League 1 to League 2. What about the national league? What about three up, three down, giving an opportunity for clubs in the national league to progress into the FL? So we want to see if we're going to put more money in, a much more structured and systematic answer to the question is what is the money going to be useful? Paul, just on you, you mentioned you've got this small financial stake in. Very small. But still it's very it's a commitment. You also have an emotional commitment. You've been there a long time. Tottenham is your club. Your dad took you there in 75. You've worked there before. What they're going through at the moment obviously hurts you as a as a spurs fan. We've seen players come and go at Brighton. Managers come and go at Brighton. Have spurs ever approached you? Well, it's a club you're right. I went to for the first time in 75. I witnessed the the relegation two years later. So I was very early on sort of brought up to understand that you know, if you support any football club, I'll learn Tottenham. There's going to be pain as well as glory. Look, you know, for me, I love Tottenham as a fan. It's always going to be a club that I I support when we're not playing when Tottenham's not playing Brighton. But for me, the last 14 years have sort of somehow created a connection with Brighton. It's very very hard to shape. Tony Bloom's, in my opinion, one of if not the best owners in in World Football. The facilities we've got are amongst the best in World Football. The staff that work for me are amongst the best in world football. And I work in a community and in an area of the country that I really, really enjoy being part of. Not just from a football point of view, but I play other sports in Brighton. I've got a lot of friends in Brighton. I enjoy the lifestyle on the South Coast. So I've been very, very fortunate that every single year I've been at Brighton. We've done something a little bit different. We progressed a little bit more. And then before I've even had a chance to think about moving on, Tony said on, by the way, it would be great if we could build a women's stadium. What do you think? And therefore, there's another project now that's going to keep me to the end of my contract in 2030. So you won't move before 2030? My contract is until 2030. And so, you know, the women's stadium is we're planning to open in 2030. At that point, I've agreed with Tony that we can reevaluate where we are both in terms of the club. My life, his life, his ambitions are what mine are, and we'll see where we are. But that emotional pull to tighten them. It's always there. But at the same time, lots of things, lots of things have to be right and timings have to be right. And at the moment, my total focus is on Brighton Hoverlbian, achieving what we call our vision 2030, which is a big part of that is building the women's stadium. And honoring my contract, Tony, because he's been very, very good to me and my family. We've worked together now. This will be the 15th year. There aren't many partnerships in football that go back that far. And as Christian knows, I'm probably now one of the oldest and longest-serving chief executives around the Premier League table. And I feel that I owe it to Tony to honor my contract in so far as I possibly can. And also in so far as he wants me to. I've seen your England trips. You obviously worked with the FA very successfully in the early 2000s. Would there ever be a pull to go back there? I would say after Brighton and Tony, the FA is my other sort of love, if you like. I love what the organisation stands for. I played grassroots football, coach grassroots football, did my refereeing badges, my coaching badges. And I just love the English game. And the FA, for me, is the embodiment of the English game at every level. Who knows, at some point in the future, a return there in some capacity would be amazing. I've really enjoyed serving on the FA Council. I never thought I would say that when you and I used to meet regularly in my job at the FA as Director of Communications and Marketing, the FA Council at times were quite difficult for me. Just one quick question on England, because we've got Thomas Tuchel announcing his squad on Friday tomorrow. First, Shadani Welbeck, be in it. And secondly, what did you think of someone who obviously was there during the Sven period and slightly pre-Sven period about handing a manager a contract extension before he'd actually delivered a tournament? Well, first of all, Danny has been amazing for us. He's still an incredibly fit, able, competent athlete who's on the top of his game. He's also a fantastic character. And you and I both know from being away with England at tournaments. Character is really important during tournaments. It's not just about the best players. It's about the people around that camp that will keep that camp focused and ready to play at all times because they're good people. And Danny's definitely one of those. And in Thomas's case, I've been lucky enough to meet Thomas many times. I think he's an incredibly good coach. I think he's done a great job with England. I think he conducts himself really well. And so I certainly had no problem in the FA extending his contract because I think he's one of the top coaches in the world. And why wouldn't our national team want that? I understand. In an ideal world, you'd love that coach to be English. Garath did a fantastic job. Was English. We took a decision at the time Garath wanted to step down that the best coach available to us wasn't English. We did that back in 2001 as well. And you know, why not? We have to get the best person for the job. Well, let's hope he vindicates that decision with bringing it home. And it's been absolutely brilliant having you on Paul. I wish you all the best for Sunday. It is staggering what the range of outcomes are from one day of football. But it looks pretty good for Europe. And you never know. It may even be the Champions League. And we wish you all the best. And that's all for today. Focus. See you next time.