Peter Corrigan: Crozier takes on self-preservation society

While all levels of football are operating under severe financial strain, and rumours abound that a major Premiership club is close to calling in the administrators, the Football Association are approaching the time when they will be ready to place a steadying hand on the tiller. It will not be a moment too soon.

The most desperate need of English football is for the game to be gathered up and pointed in a direction that serves the common good and not the selfish interests of particular groups.

When it comes to the interests of clubs versus the interest of the national teams, I am firmly on the side of the clubs. When it comes to the clubs versus the interest of football as a whole, it is vital that the game comes out on top.

Only the FA can attempt that mighty task. Theoretically, as the official guardians of the game, they possess the power and strength to exercise firm control. In reality, the parentage has been much less than strict as clubs have proceeded on a merry, madcap path towards ruination.

All this, we pray, will change when the FA announce their plans to revolutionise the way the game is run. The announcement is expected soon and, as my colleague James Lawton of our sister paper, The Independent, recently revealed, it will contain measures to control players' wages, transfer dealing and the activities of agents.

The thinking behind the new moves is supported by a large-scale survey that Adam Crozier, the FA's chief executive, commissioned shortly after his appointment two-and-a-half years ago.

Crozier has already been offering a higher and more authoritative profile. Last week he issued a timely warning to England skipper David Beckham about his forthcoming autobiography. In the nicest possible way, Crozier suggested that Beckham should not go in for any Roy Keane-type revelations. The FA will decide this week what action to take over Keane's admission that his notorious tackle on Alf-Inge Haaland was made with malice aforethought.

Crozier has also taken the controversial decision to lift the three-year England ban on the Leeds United defender Jonathan Woodgate, who is expected to join the England squad tomorrow three months before the ban was due to end.

Meanwhile, Crozier is pestering Fifa to give Nationwide League clubs exemption from the transfer deadline that slammed shut yesterday all over Europe for the rest of the year. The FA want a two-year moratorium for smaller clubs on the grounds that they often need to sell players quickly to keep alive.

These are encouraging signs. We need a proactive figure from the governing body to convince us that they are still alive and prepared to kick.

Not that Crozier gets everything his own way. The FA's desire to introduce a mid-season break has been abruptly dismissed 20-0 by the Premiership clubs. But he has vowed to raise the matter again and is convinced he can persuade them.

It is significant that most of the big changes in football have come from outside; either from Fifa and Uefa, as in the case of the new transfer deadlines, or from the courts, as in the Bosman ruling.

It's about time we started our own reforms, and Crozier believes he has all the ammunition he requires in the Mori survey, which has yet to be published but contains a damning verdict on the way the game's finances have been allowed to drift on a dangerous tangent.

Involving thousands of interviews at all levels of the game, the survey is the most thorough ever mounted in football and leaves no doubt that financial reform is imperative if the game is to flourish.

Among the recommendations is the introduction of an American-style clearing house to monitor all transfer deals and also to supervise the role of the agents, who are accused of driving up wages and flouting the terms and spirit of club contracts. Discussions have begun between the various leagues and the Professional Footballers' Association on the need to cap salaries and general budgets.

Crozier is determined to sort out the mess before its effects get worse. The former joint chief executive of advertising giants Saatchi and Saatchi has warned that changes are impossible to avoid. "We have to find a way that works for everybody. Life is changing for everyone these days and football cannot hope to be an exception. It is no use saying we want everything to stay the same. It can't," he says. The big clubs, who have done so much to force the financial pace, will have something to say about that. They are already hinting about Europe being their future arena. That can't be allowed.

The essence of football's growth has been the solidity of the structure and the abiding hopes of the little clubs that one day they will grow and prosper. That's the sort of democratic thought that doesn't penetrate the thinking of the top clubs, whose every move is aimed at the preservation of their position. That's understandable.

But clubs can't operate in isolation. Even the Harlem Globetrotters had to have someone to play against. Competition is the key. Honest rivalry, free in-your-face competition... and nowhere is that available but in a structure that allows the meek to meet the mighty and the poor to have a pop at the rich.

This should be the domain for the FA to reimpose. It won't be easy, but it's heartening to hear that they are about to try.

The 50-1 favourite

It is not often that Tony McCoy finds himself on a 50-1 outsider, but that's how William Hill rate him in the race to become the BBC's Sports Personality of the Year when the winner is announced in December.

It seems more of an insult than an assessment, but bookmakers are practical people and they know that the old ladies who vote for the BBC's annual award are swayed by other factors than mere sporting brilliance.

As a matter of fact, McCoy's price came tumbling down from 100-1 during the week. All he had to do to merit that improvement was to ride his 1,700th National Hunt winner.

Thus did he pass the previous record, which was held by Richard Dunwoody. It is a further measure of his achievement that he reached the record in eight years, which is precisely half the time that it took Dunwoody.

In April, McCoy passed Sir Gordon Richards's record of 269 winners in a British season and went on to set a new best of 289.

There is nothing left for him to win in a cumulative sense. He bestrides his sport like no other. If he drove Formula One cars with the winner's urge and instinct he brings to riding horses he would have won the top award a few times by now.

The qualities of a National Hunt jockey go largely unappreciated. Theirs is a day-in-day-out, all-weather occupation, and its dangers were underlined on the day McCoy broke the record, when his rival Richard Johnson suffered a broken leg that will put him out for three months.

But it is still difficult to understand why his chances of national recognition are rated so low. The clear favourite is the track heroine Paula Radcliffe, who left her rivals out of sight in the 10,000 metres at the European Championships in Munich last month.

She is quoted at 4-1 on. This makes her the biggest certainty of all time despite there being over three months to go. Lennox Lewis, the world heavyweight boxing champion, is an understandable 3-1 but David Beckham, who hasn't got a medal to polish this year, is 16-1, while Tim Henman, who has nothing but brave moments to remember this summer, is at 33-1.

If the million horseracing punters said to inhabit these islands were to go out and have a couple of quid on McCoy at those odds and then blitz the Beeb with their votes, who knows what would happen? At least they would frighten the living daylights out of William Hill.