THE CATFLAP CHINWAG WITH...

Ricky Tomlinson

So what about the amount of foreign players in England?

Personally I think there's too many foreign players in English football. I would have it along the lines of cricket, with only two or three foreign players in the side. Because at the moment now you name any of the big four, they won't bring someone through the ranks. If someone comes on the market for £30m they'll go and get them. Cricket's a better game for bringing them in and it's also a fairer game because it gives local kids a chance to get in their local teams.

 

Sound like you've still got quite a passion for the game...

I love the game but I have this one-man bloody protest about paying 40 or 50 quid to go and see them. For a couple of years I've been offered a seat at Wembley for the finals, and I've said no. I can't be taking someone's seat, who's gone every week in the wind and the rain. And I mean it. I don't do it to be a smart arse. I do it because I don't believe I should be taking someone else's seat.

 

So has the game completely left the working class behind?

Oh, it's absolutely well gone from the working class. You look at the names of the stadiums like The Emirates, and in a few years' time you're probably going to have something like the Pot Noodle Stadium.

 

Many fans have complained that the new Wembley is too commercial...

Well, I was talking to someone in the field of television. He was at a big match in a corporate box, and they could turn the sound of the crowd down! What's the point of a football match if you're not going to get immersed in the action and the sound and the excitement? I mean, years ago when I went to the boys' pen in Liverpool the toilet facilities weren't adequate, and we did need bringing into the 21st century but not the way it's gone now, not at all. Don't steal it from the working man. It's his game. It's his passion and that's it.

 

When do you remember it starting to become too commercial?

It's one of these things that has crept in and let's be fair, do football clubs need to charge the fans what they charge them when they're getting tens of millions of pounds from sponsorship and from Sky? I can actually see it becoming like American Football where they stop every time the ball goes out for a throw in while they throw an advert on the telly.