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Why Aren't The Football Authorities Doing More?

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vortex | 12:48 Thu 26th Jan 2017 | News
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Nobby Stiles story is a moving one and there are other examples.

Why are yesterdays great players treated so abysmally, some by the clubs that players gave long service to? Is this how we repay them?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4158004/Betrayal-true-English-hero.html
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It's life.
They have enough money to help, i hope the article shames them into it.
If you take the emotion out of this story, you are left with a man who has worked at his job, retired, and has opted to sell his medals to leave money to his family.

Only emotion indicates that he is a 'hero', or that his former employers should support him - not a situation that applied to any other walk of life.

Yes Rooney et al are paid millions, but that is simply down to the changes in football - it cannot automatically mean that someone who played decades ago should suddenly be entitled to the millions that re earned by modern players.

Where would that stop?

Should snooker players - who endure a similar gulf between wages then and now - all be compensated because modern players earn more?

And now about reversing the ratios - in popular music for example -

Westlife have had fourteen Number One Singles, the total sales of which do not exceed any individual one of The Beatles' Number One singles - should Westlife be compensated because The Beatles sold more records than they did?

It's ludicrous.

If you take out the emotion, and look at the facts, it is simple economics, to which we are all subject, and the 'injustice' is not actually there at all.
It's disgraceful that a former "hero" of club & country has been hung out to dry like this. The (sweet) FA aside, it wouldn't exactly break Man U to offer some assistance. While they bought his medals for their museum -

http://tinyurl.com/35bh8xp

- I haven't heard (quite happy to be proved wrong here) that they've done much else for him, even after his stint as a youth team coach, helping the development of Beckham, Giggs, Butt, Scholes, the Neville brothers etc.

The FA & PFA also need to be more forthcoming with regard to the progress of the "investigation" into whether or not the repeated heading of heavy leather footballs could have been a contributing factor to both Nobby Stiles' condition & the death of Jeff Astle, to name but the two blessed with names well-known enough to have made headlines.
Pop music has an association like the FA with deep pockets?
i was mucho confused by that story. Why sell your medals to leave money to your family before you die - just leave them the medals, and they can sell them if they want to. If he has liquidated his assets, he'll probably use it up paying for care!
RandyMarsh - //Pop music has an association like the FA with deep pockets? //

No it doesn't - if you think of the multi-billion pound enterprises in the world, the FA is the exception in having an umbrella organisation.

But that simple fact does not make it beholden to 'look after' ex-employees on the basis that they succeeded in their profession.
According to lik's link he made nearly half a mil selling his medals, so not so shabby!
Also, what are people expecting the FA to do exactly - ? He doesnt need money (at face value reading the articles), can't be visited, so what would you like them to do?
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Andy Hughes - although I states in the OP that the article was a moving one, I purposely did not include that Stiles should be perceived as a 'hero' because I believe that that term is applied in too much of a throwaway fashion. Granted, he was a fine footballer who was part of an England team that won the World Cup final, a feat which has not been repeated, but I think to label him a hero is typical of how the use of the word is easily attributed.

I made no comparison to the riches of todays game nor do I believe that his former club should be beholden to him. However, I do consider that at least as a fine gesture, the club would have sent him complimentary tickets to a home match as referred to in the link.

My main criticism is this:-

//His son, Rob, is particularly frustrated by the limited efforts made by the FA and the Professional Footballers’ Association (PFA) to investigate the increasingly apparent correlation between football and degenerative brain disease.

It is more than 15 years since the two ruling bodies of the sport first promised a joint study, following the sad death of former West Bromwich Albion and England striker Jeff Astle. //

If this was the case, why has very little been done?

I hope this clarifies my view.
a-h @ 12:53 - no, what's "ludicrous" is that you're trying to use economics to make a point, when that *isn't* what the story is about - it's about the lack of appreciation shown at the end of a career.

a-h @13:04 - //But that simple fact does not make it beholden to 'look after' ex-employees on the basis that they succeeded in their profession.//

Where has anyone suggested that Nobby Stiles //should suddenly be entitled to the millions that re earned by modern players.//?

No-one to my knowledge has ever suggested that the world of music (record labels?) owes something to - say - Paul McCartney because he can no longer sing as well as he once did, or indeed that Ray Reardon should be compensated by the WPBSA because his career earnings were approx 1/18 of Steve Davis even though they both won 6 World Titles.

It's irrelevant that Nobby Stiles once earned £20,000 per annum, while, eg, Wayne Rooney (reportedly) earns £28,000 per *day*. How much he made from the sale of his medals & what he used (or is using) it for is also irrelevant to the fact that as my post - and the OP's link - indicate, there's a suggested direct correlation between the *required practices of his sport* & the condition that Nobby Stiles is in today.

I simply believe that he's owed *at least* better appreciation by club & country for his performances - for instance, Man U couldn't even throw him a couple of tickets to a match without charging him full price? Now *that's* disgraceful.
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Lie-in King

You have referred to the main point I was trying to address.

Those footballs were heavy in those says! How did Sir Bobby Charlton hit shots so hard?!
Lie-in King // ... for instance, Man U couldn't even throw him a couple of tickets to a match without charging him full price? Now *that's* disgraceful. //

I confess I overlooked that point in the link, and I would entirely agree, Mr Stiles should have been given free access to any game for himself and his family, for life.

Surely the kudos to the club in having such a famous ex-player appearing at games would more than make up for the loss of the ticket prices.

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