Last week the new chair of the Independent Football Regulator addressed clubs at the National Football Museum in Manchester. Three-time FSA Writer of the Year Henry Winter (subscribe to his Substack here) was in attendance and has covered the event exclusively for the FSA…

“Change is coming.” That is the promise from David Kogan, the first chair of the Independent Football Regulator. Change is coming to tests on owners, starting with Dejphon Chansiri at Sheffield Wednesday, and checks on club finances. Change is coming in relationships between fans and clubs, relationships within the divided Premier League and in the stand-off between the Premier League and the EFL over distribution of TV money.

Change is coming and the catalyst is a 68-year-old former county sprinter, who has already worked with many within the game during a long, successful career as a media rights adviser. Kogan wants to rebuild the game with more integrity, unity and sustainability.

On Wednesday, Kogan began his time in charge by addressing all 20 Premier League clubs, all 72 EFL and all 24 National League in a conference at the National Football Museum in Manchester. He received broad support in his desire to make the game more sustainable, plus backing in a text from Richard Masters, the chief executive of the Premier League which, Kogan says, has “lobbied and lobbied and lobbied” against the appointment of an IFR. But, as Kogan adds, they have “lost the battle”. It’s now about all working together, Masters, Kogan and Rick Parry in the EFL, and changing the game for the better.

After all the clubs had gone home, and the Museum was locking up for the night, Kogan sat down in the deserted canteen and opened up. The obvious place to start was owners. There are good ones, and ones that simply cannot be trusted and threaten the existence of clubs. Kogan emphasised that his first focus “was to get the ‘Owners, Directors and Senior Executives’ tests done, because clearly there are issues facing clubs. Morecambe, Sheffield Wednesday, were the two in August.” Morecambe appear in better hands now but Wednesday’s existence under Chansiri is grim.

“Sheffield Wednesday is not just any club,” Kogan says. “People outside of football don’t really understand this. Sheffield Wednesday are one of the oldest clubs in the country. Sheffield Wednesday were also a founder club of the Premier League, which people forget. Sheffield Wednesday is not simply a club that is in difficulty. Sheffield Wednesday is a fundamental part of the fabric of football in this country. Clearly, anybody who’s interested in football, certainly the chair of the IFR, has a direct interest in ensuring that Sheffield Wednesday is given as much protection as possible.

“The moment that legislation goes through (Parliament), we get our powers, we have the right then to investigate any club about which we have concerns. We have concerns in this particular case (Wednesday). I am spending a substantial amount of time, as are my colleagues, talking to supporters groups, talking to the EFL, talking to the politicians who are involved in this. We have the authority and power, ultimately to take direct action about the ownership of the club.” They can call Chansiri to account in a way the EFL cannot.

Left to right the IFR team: Andy Abraham (head of supervision), David Riley (general counsel), Martyn Henderson (chief operating officer), Laura Nell (head of policy) and Richard Monks (chief executive) alongside chair David Kogan © IFR

Debt and financial security

I asked Kogan whether football could see “another Glazer-style PIK (payment in kind loan) takeover” in the future? “Whenever we move into the discussion about new owners coming into clubs, we have the absolute right – and we have greater powers than both the EFL and the Premier League – to investigate the background and history of those owners, and to look at the way in which they have acted in terms of other things they’ve done.” There is a huge caveat, a get-out for the Glazers. “Just to be really clear, our job is not to fail owners who are going to use debt. Debt is absolutely explicit in vast numbers of clubs in the English game.”

Stadium constructions at Tottenham Hotspur and Everton, and a leveraged buyout like the Glazers in 2005, have led to billions of debt. “We’re not there to declare that clubs can’t have debt,” Kogan continued. “We’re not there to declare clubs have to be profitable. What we have to be certain about is the long-term financial viability and security of those clubs, which is a different issue. Are they giving long-term commitment? What’s the three-year business plan? What’s the nature of where they see monies coming in? And what’s their risk assessment of their own businesses? But that doesn’t mean they can’t use debt.”

So what about state ownership of clubs? “If you read the legislation we are not in any way capable of judging (potential owners). Our remit is financial regulation and stability and solidity of the monies that are there. That got changed when the legislation was changed under this Government to take away the foreign trade element of the legislation.” The IFR does not now have to consider Government foreign policy when looking at overseas owners. “My job is quite clear on this. We have got to assess people in terms of their fiscal viability and their long-term commitment to the club.”

So what of ticketing, and certain clubs’ assault on concessions? “One of the things in this job I’m learning is everybody believes that we have a remit in every conceivable area of football – meat pies, ticket prices, beer, whatever. We don’t.” What Kogan can do is demand clubs work more closely with their supporters. This week, the IFR will release details of fan engagement requirements for clubs. “They put enormous onus on clubs to work with fans in a very, very formal way of fans’ involvement in any number of issues within the club.”

Does he believe clubs actually will do? “They have to,” Kogan responds, “It’s part of the statutory process.” What happens if they don’t? “Well, it’s part of our assessment of whether they get a licence, an annual account they have to go through to tell us what they’re doing. Today we took them through all of this, and no clubs demurred with any of it, but we can’t directly get involved in ticket prices. (But) clubs now have a duty to consult fans on issues such as that.”

Encouragingly for those who want unity in the game, Kogan’s career has been all about the art of doing business with people. In 1999, he pitched to the then Premier League chief executive, Richard Scudamore, for work selling media rights. “Know Your Enemy” was the title of Kogan’s presentation. “I was trying to persuade Richard, who I didn’t know at all, that we could go and do business with people other than Sky in order to push Sky to pay us more money. And that strategy did, in fact, work.” (NTL and ITV also became involved in bidding, and the Premier League rights for 2001-04 cycle rose from £670m to £1.1bn).

“Know Your Enemy”

Kogan’s “Know Your Enemy” approach paid off. So was it the same now for him as Regulator? “Well, I don’t regard anybody in football as my enemy. In fact, after today, quite the contrary. Some of the texts I’ve had this afternoon after the conference reaffirmed this. Everybody now believes we can do business together, and that’s the important thing. I have a long personal history in the world of football. I regard Richard Masters as someone I’ve known for 30 years, Rick Parry, all of them, as people I know, people I work with.

“I had a cup of tea with Karren Brady a couple of weeks ago. Karren and I don’t necessarily agree about a Regulator, but Karren’s been extremely supportive of me being in this role, both in public in the House of Lords and in private. Richard Masters sent me a text, all of half an hour ago, saying, what a success today was. Why? Because the battle to stop us being created is over.

“What we’re now engaged in is how we’re all going to work together and how we’re going to use our powers and do what we need to do. We can do that in collaboration with both the Premier League and the EFL and ultimately, they have to do it in collaboration with one another. The dynamic has changed when you have the Regulator getting involved.”

Masters needs help because of the divisions between clubs in the Premier League. Kogan reflects that clubs “fought like cats and dogs about everything” in the early years of the Premier League. “But they believed in the Premier League as a concept, they’d created it, and that made Richard Scudamore’s job – brilliant man as Richard is – more easy because he knew he could depend on that level of support.

“Today, Richard Masters has a much more difficult job because clubs are much more oriented towards their own individual self-interest. There aren’t the blocks that vote together. The issues have become more complicated. Every one of the 20 clubs I’ve talked to in private talk about that as a problem, even though they themselves are actually the problem.

“It’s become much more difficult and much more fractious in getting majority votes on things that the Premier League executive feel they need to get is a political process that’s become much more tricky. Now, can we be helpful? I hope so.”

Uniting the game

The game needs uniting, and the pyramid strengthened. “The clubs at the top of the Premier League have a completely different world to the clubs in the National League. So can they be brought together? I believe they can. I think people have got slightly exhausted with the non-stop battles.”

The battles have been myriad but most damagingly with the much delayed “new deal” distribution agreement over Premier League TV monies. “The last time it was done was 2019,” Kogan continues. “The Premier League and EFL failed to do one in 2023. They failed to do one this year. And that’s led to the Regulator being created. So it’s not exactly worked as a strategy to keep fighting.” He believes, “we can find an accord there. I’m an optimist, really”.

He’s needed to be, given the constant scrutiny of the IFR by those opposed to regulation in football. His Labour connections have been noted. Kogan donated “very small sums” to Sir Keir Starmer and Lisa Nandy and was involved in the website Labour List (he’s now stood down from it). “When I was originally approached in May 2024, the first conversation I had was, ‘do you know that I am chairman of Labour List? I have written two books on the Labour Party, I am a Labour donor, and if I walk like a duck and quack like a duck, the probability is I’m a Labour party duck, right?’ For a year, I’ve been telling them. And this was still under a Conservative Government!

“Ironically, my life would be a lot easier if that Election hadn’t been called, and I’d have gone through the process while a Conservative Government was in place because I certainly had enough referees and enough back-story in football that I was a tenable candidate. So it doesn’t annoy me. The Select Committee said I was a more than capable candidate because of my history in football.”

He believes there is nothing that affects him in the current inquiry by Sir William Shawcross, the commissioner for public appointments. “That report wasn’t about me. It was about the process that led to my appointment, which obviously I didn’t have anything to do with. Whatever Sir William decides to do with his report, I’m not annoyed about it at all. I’ve had to get on with the job.”

Who does Kogan support?

Kogan grew up in North London, attended Haverstock Comprehensive, alma mater of Joe Cole and, briefly, John Barnes. He excelled at athletics. “County level. I was a decent 100m, 200m runner but then did what we all did was resort to alcohol and fun.”

Inevitably in such a tribal sport, fans are fascinated to know who Kogan supports. “I have 116 clubs who I have a fan relationship with now,” he replies. “Now I am steadfastly and boringly neutral, which comes as a big surprise to everybody who knows me.” He’s passionate about Spurs.

“Infuriatingly, at the Select Committee, I was asked who I supported and I said it was Tottenham and, of course, the following week, Tottenham were trotting off to Bilbao (for the Europa League final) and of course, I couldn’t be seen to be going there, because it would look as though I’d got a freebie ticket. So, actually, I managed to completely mess up my one ability to see Tottenham win a European trophy. I did see them win one in 84 (the Uefa Cup). Close friends of mine who are Arsenal fans just look at their trophy cabinet. We’ve had quite long periods in the trophy desert for the last 100 years. It’s been slightly depressing.”

Yet also uplifting. Kogan reflects on the players he has seen. “Glenn Hoddle was clearly a massive class player. Ossie Ardiles was a class player. Jimmy Greaves I only saw a play a couple of times. I’ve just been reading Arthur Hopcroft’s ‘The Football Man’ and there’s this wonderful series of chapters on George Best and the art of dribbling. I’m the generation that remembers Eddie Gray, Charlie Cooke and Steve Heighway. Spurs never really had a flowing, fast player like that.”

Spurs did have a player who became a favourite of Kogan’s. “If I was anything, I was a fast, left-footed, not very good footballer. So as somebody who was a battling midfield player myself, my favourite is Alan Mullery. Fantastic player, that driving ambition and aggression that Mullery had was a wonderful thing.”

Kogan then said, “You cannot be a Spurs fan and not be romantic about football.” It’s why his favourite moments include breath-taking finals. “I look back on the 1970 World Cup as a magical experience. I was 13. That Brazil team! I was at the Champions League final at Wembley (in 2011) where that extraordinary Barcelona beat Manchester United. It was like watching football taken to three-dimensional chess level, an astonishing game against a great Manchester United team.

“My memory of that Brazilian team in 1970, and my vision of the Barcelona team is…when you see teams that are just ethereal that’s what football’s about. And that’s why we’ve got a bounden duty to try and protect it.” So Kogan will need more than the three days a week he’s employed for. “Yeah, yeah, it’s like seven days a week! It’s going to continue being tough, but it’s worth the work.”

Our thanks to Henry for this feature – subscribe to Henry’s Substack here and join the FSA here.