During the 1900-1901 season, football players in England earned an average of £7 per week.
Different clubs had adjusted to the professional era at different speeds, and as wages accelerated
beyond the national average, an appetite for restricting player earnings had started to
grow. In 1893, concerned by those rising costs and
the threat to the club’s income, Derby County – among others - had lobbied the Football
League in support of a Maximum Wage. It would take nearly another decade, but they would
get their wish.
In 1901, after a Football Association Annual General Meeting, a £4 weekly cap was placed
on the earnings of any footballer playing in the Football League. The aim was to protect
the owners, but also to discourage players from moving clubs and migrating towards the
richer sides. The practice of paying match bonuses was also ended, replaced instead by
a benefit payment or testimonial due to players after five years’ service.
It was a change the players were willing to fight.
In 1898, they had made a first attempt at unionising, forming the Association Footballers
Union. Three years later, however, and despite being able to boast of 250 members at its
height, the union dissolved, having failed to gain any traction with either The FA or
the Football League.
In the winter of 1907, instructed by not only by the limits on their earnings but also their
working conditions and lack of insurance they tried again. At a meeting organised and chaired
by Billy Meredith, the Manchester United and Wales outside forward, a new organisation
was birthed: The association of football players’ and trainers’ union.
It began over half-a-century of antagonism and appeasement, with the maximum wage proving
a familiar battle ground.
In 1919, after the First World War, it was set at £10 per week. In 1920, it fell back
to £9 and in 1924 it receded further, to £8. In the 1950s alone, it was set and re-set
on four different occasions: at £14 in 1951, at £15 in 1953, £17 in 1957 and £20 in
1958.
The regularity of the skirmishes characterised the contentiousness of the issue, but also
the growing militancy of the union and its members.
But the Maximum Wage was not the only issue of the time. The retain and transfer system
remained in effect and, under that system, the balance of power lay solely with the club.
They owned the registration of a player even beyond the end of his contract. If he rejected
a new contract, then - quite unlike today - the player was not then free to move and,
crucially, neither was the club obliged to pay him.
They also possessed the right to sell him at any point. If the player didn’t agree
to that transfer, then – again - they didn’t have to pay him.
In 1956, a 28 year-old Jimmy Hill, who was still playing for Fulham, was elected as President
of the players union, shortly thereafter rechristened as the PFA, and it was with those twin grievances
that he went to battle.
“We were able to turn the arguments from being about money to being about principles,”
remembered Hill in his autobiography. “The first was the freedom to earn as much as an
employer was prepared to pay, and the second was the freedom to leave an employer at the
end of a contract.”
Between December 1959 and November 1960, Hill described the PFA staggering ‘from one fruitless
meeting to another’ with the Football League. In February 1960, the dispute was referred
to the Ministry of Labour. By the end of the year, after an Extraordinary General Meeting
of the Football League on the 8th November, Hill recalled the players being ‘enraged’
by the lack of progress on either front and by the league’s failure to offer even offer
a placating solution.
In response, he orchestrated a publicity campaign. Later that month, the players gathered at
three separate meetings in London, Birmingham, and Manchester to show their support for the
union and the cause. On the radio, on the television and in the written press, many
players also pled their case to the public. Among them, high-profile figures like Bobby
Robson, Bobby Charlton, Johnny Haynes and Jimmy Greaves.
The league returned with an offer, but it was derisory. On the issue of the maximum
wage, it would allow an increase up to £30 a week, but – slyly - that was only accessible
via £2 annual increases if a player remained with his club. If he were to transfer, he
would drop back to the £20 limit.
To Hill, it was spin – an empty gesture. On the evening of the 9th December, after
the Football League had announced their offer, Hill invited members of the media to a Fleet
Street pub, where he outlined why his members would be rejecting it.
And, four days later, on the 13th December 1960, the PFA and its members gave one-month
notice of their intention to strike, beginning one of the strangest weeks in the history
of British Football.
Initially, the Football League was outraged, with its chairman, Joe Richards, no doubt
playing to the public galleries, admonishing the players for their militancy.
“Strikers”, he said “will render a grave disservice to the game and will probably put
out of employment large numbers of professional footballers,”
Fearing an impasse, the PFA plotted ways to protect the players. With the Football League
threatening to replace them with stand-ins, games against celebrities and television personalities
were explored as fundraising measures. The Association also urged players to contact
local businessmen and find temporary work opportunities.
But at the end of the week, the motion to strike was still carried. 694 players voted
for, with only 18 standing against.
The week before Christmas, partly in response to the players’ conviction in their cause,
sentiment began to change – even among several chairmen, too, including Burnley’s Bob Lord.
Under pressure, the Football League began to wilt. They conceded on the issue of the
Maximum Wage, agreeing to its abolition, but stood firm on the transfer system.
The players rejected the compromise 3 to 1. Alan Hardaker, the Football League secretary,
was bullish.
“This is our final offer, we shall budge no more.” Hardaker announced. “I am not
budging on the issue of the transfer system, which will remain as long as there is a league
competition in this country.”
Joe Richards was even more dismissive.
“I have told the player this was the last word. We shall not go to arbitration and if
there is a strike we shall carry on the League as best we can.”
But, despite its strong rhetoric, the Football League was being boxed into a corner and the
strike was still on.
The league’s threat of using amateur players was quickly challenged. The chairman of the
Trade Union Commission, under whose banner so many supporters fell, implored its members
to support the impending strike and to boycott any games featuring replacement players.
The PFA also discussed staging their own games, using adapted team names and makeshift pitches.
Ultimately, there would be no need. On the 18th January 1961, in a meeting lasting four
hours, an agreement was found. Alan Hardaker remained good to his word. The League would
renege on the agreement pertaining to Retain & Transfer and it would take another two years
and a court case to force transfer reform.
But the Maximum Wage was at an end; the union had prevailed.
In the years prior, Fulham’s eccentric owner Tommy Trinder- a famous television entertainer
– is believed to have jokingly rebuffed the contract requests of his star forward,
Johnny Haynes. Were he allowed, Trinder is supposed to have claimed, then he’d happily
pay the England international five times the maximum wage.
But he too was good to his word. In January 1961, Johnny Haynes got his new contract and
became English football’s first £100 a week footballer.
A new era had begun.