Lib Dems demand cheaper beer for football fans

Tom Dart

There was a stunning new survey announced yesterday. Stunningly obvious, that is. Research by the Liberal Democrats found that Premier League clubs charge too much for a pint of beer. Hard to believe that top clubs take advantage of their fans, isn’t it, what with tickets and replica gear being such good value?

That the average price of a pint in the Premier League is £3.19, higher than the £2.84 average charged in rugby league’s Super League, can be explained by the presence of five football clubs from the capital, where the cost of getting drunk, like everything else, is higher.

A pint is £4 at the league's most expensive club, Chelsea - and roughly the same at plenty of central London pubs. Still, less than it cost to buy a non-alcoholic lager at Euro 2008. The top flight’s cheapest tipple is at Wigan Athletic: £2.70. Interestingly, the survey finds that a pint costs £3.50 at Manchester City, 50p more than down the road at Old Trafford. And people complain about the Glazers.

Don Foster, the Lib Dem culture, media, sport and sports booze spokesman, is frothing at the mouth and it’s not just the foam from his overpriced beverage. “When will Premier League football clubs learn to stop taking the loyalty of their fans for granted?” he asks. When that loyalty is no longer there to be exploited, Don.

But while clubs long ago learnt how to squeeze cash out of fans by applying marketing and business strategies used by companies from other walks of life, supporters are still unable to be as hard-headedly pragmatic in return, naively believing, deep down, that their club is basically a charity. Perhaps they think that each Yorkie purchased will give a little boost to the manager’s transfer kitty, when in reality the cost is probably going straight into the pockets of caterers who pay a flat fee to the club each season. No doubt some feel that being tanked-up is the only way to cope with the excitement/disappointment/boredom of games.

Incidentally, why are the food queues always so big at half time of a 3pm kick-off? What is that: late lunch? Early dinner? Third meal of the day? Football has a weird relationship with food and drink. It’s rightly used to promote fitness campaigns and encourage kids to take more exercise – this, the same sport that’s bankrolled by the sponsorship of beer and fast-food giants. For all the advances in diet and nutrition that have helped lift the standard of professional play, catering at most stadiums is stuck in a gristly timewarp. A fan from 30 years ago might not recognise the brand of football but he’d be familiar with the menu.

On the one hand it’s interesting that in an age addled with binge-drinking (particularly at the Stadium of Light these days, one imagines), we have a politician arguing for a reduction in the price of alcohol. But politicians spend a disproportionate amount of their lives holding football to account. Why not bash cinemas for the price of popcorn or motorway service stations for the cost of petrol? Haven’t the Liberal Democrats got anything better to do? No, they probably don’t.

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Robbie Fowler to Grimsby Town as player-coach? There would be something sad about seeing one of the greatest strikers of the past 15 years wind down his career at one of the worst clubs in Coca-Cola League Two, but you have to admire the 33-year-old’s obvious enthusiasm for the game despite the long, slow fade away from his finest days, getting on for a decade ago.

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For a competition that likes to think of itself as the world’s best, the Premier League has not often had the best player, at least in the opinion of the journalists who vote for the Ballon d’Or. Cristiano Ronaldo’s victory is the first by an English-based player since Michael Owen at Liverpool in 2001. Kevin Keegan took the prize twice at Hamburg in the 1970s, but you have to go back to 1968, and George Best, for the previous winner based in this country.

Comments

[Steve]

Why is beer still on sale at football matches?

It's illegal to be drunk in a football ground and to consume alcohol within view of the pitch.

[Paul, Bermondsey]

I find it hard to believe that so many fans want to drink in the stadium, where they're confined to a concrete tunnel without any sight of the pitch, watched over by stewards to make sure that none dares step upwards towards the stands.
Seriously, is it not possible to get through 2 hours without a beer? Especially when, to get one, you have to leave the first half early to beat the queues before polishing it off in a few minutes if you have any wish to see the seond half? As for those who turn up to a stadium early to drink, words fail me... GO TO THE PUB!

[Steve]

Wow! Four pounds a beer doesn't seem all that bad when you compare to beer sold at US football or baseball games. A 12 oz can of beer at a baseball game can easily be $10 or $12, whereas you could get the same at a regular bar for $2 or $3.