Domestic focus urged as Finn Harps join European clubs’ lobby group

Finn Harps have become one of the latest members of the Union of European Clubs (UEC) - a representative body for non-elite professional football clubs across Europe.

Harps Chairman Ian Harkin recently attended the second edition of the European Professional Football Forum in Brussels and believes

The recent forum was attended by 120 clubs and stakeholders from 26 different countries.  Across the globe, Harkin says the rich are getting richer while “smaller clubs are stripped of their biggest revenue streams”.

Changes to UEFA’s solidarity payment structure have alarmed clubs like Harps.

While the amount in the pot for the League of Ireland will rise to €4m from €1.4m, the new arrangement has a cap on the amount that would go to First Division clubs. Indeed, the figures suggest that the annual figure given to clubs in the First Division could fall by as much as €30,000 per annum.

Harkin says First Division clubs were “completely taken aback” when the news broke.

He said: “Just a year ago we were being told of increases and now we’re are being told we may get nothing, or rather we are at the mercy of the premier clubs of whether or not they themselves decide that we might get €45,000 instead of the €75,000 we got in previous years.

“In Ireland we have been dividing our solidarity equally between all clubs in the island since the program began. All clubs have used this funding to build their academies.

“As a rural club based in north west Ireland we don’t have a large urban base to support us, large corporates to sponsor us or large city corporations to build our stadium. We have to do everything on our own.

“The funding provided by the FAI each year from prize money, TV and travel budgets is barely enough to employ a single person. I don’t blame them, but that is what it is. Comparatively, solidarity money is significant and taking it off predominately rural clubs is not what the ethos that UEFA likes to portray themselves as.”

The UEC described itself as ‘an independent representative body founded to improve support and advocacy for non-elite professional clubs across Europe’ and cites good governance, competitive balance and financial sustainability as key objectives.

The morning after shareholders of the Finn Harps Co-Operative Society Ltd gave their blessing to a knew ownership model and membership structure, Harkin caught a flight to Brussels to attend the second edition of the European Professional Football Forum.

“I had watched a video of theirs and had spoken with Dan Lambert from Bohemians and he highly recommended attending,” Harkin said. “At the event I met so many clubs all at similar levels to ourselves, similar problems and the learnings I got from those two days was incredible.

“I learned more about solidarity but I learned that if we are do to anything we must do it in spite of everyone or everything in our environment that provides a challenge: Not so much ‘get over it’ but get on with it, develop your plan, show what you do for the community, start making hires and ask for support.

“There were a good mixture of fan owned clubs and definitely a feeling of solidarity in that room. Compare that to the greed you see at the top table.”

Harps and fellow League of Ireland First Division club Treaty United are now members of the UEC, while Bohemians have been strong advocates for the last couple of seasons.

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Harkin said: “We have a lot of resources we can pull on and advisors we can refer to.

“What stood out for me is that we are focusing on Europe as the holy grail, but we need to focus on our domestic league. A 10-team Premier with four Dublin clubs, maybe five if UCD go up is boring, playing each other four times is boring and the First Division is worse still.

“The FAI have as top of their priority list a third division. From what I’ve heard it will be mainly second teams from Premier clubs. A third division would be good, but I’d have it way down the list of priorities and introducing second teams would completely kill any relevance to our second division.”