– No, for us players there was no noticeable change. Everything was pretty much the same as the previous season. In any case, we didn’t realize that we were at the start of something as big as the Premier League was going to be, says Gunnar Halle. The audience didn’t notice too much on the opening day either. It was the same teams, the same rules, mostly the same players, and the same number of matches. Nevertheless, the new league was quite the hype. PL director Rick Parry called it the most important event in 104 years, i.e. since the football league started in 1888. MEDIA INTEREST: If the players did not notice much, there were strong discussions in the media about the new league where money would rule Photo: Facsimile / Irish Independent – Premier League will stand the test of time, Parry said. He was more right than he had dared to dream. Halle was the only Norwegian on the field when the brand new Premier League started on 15 August 1992 – exactly 30 years ago. Halle played for Oldham, a club which today it is impossible to associate with the English top division. First Norwegian to score But in the early 90s they were in good company. Halle joined the club in February 1991, and was instrumental in helping them up into the then 1st division that season. From August 1992, the 1st division was separated as its own organization and was named the Premier League. And Halle and weasel Oldham were there. – But I don’t remember that we particularly reacted to it. We knew of course that the league was now called the Premier League and was something new. But for us players it was the same as before, says Halle. He played the entire opening match against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. The match was still 1-1, with both goals coming in the last six minutes of the match. The following weekend he became the first Norwegian to score in the new league. One minute after the break, he sent Oldham up 4–0 against Nottingham Forest. Oldham won 5-3, and climbed to seventh place in the table. “Gigantic” TV deal THE MEDIA MOGUL: The wealthy co-owner Rupert Murdoch and his new company Sky Sports revolutionized both the TV coverage of football and the income of the Premier League Photo: BEN STANSALL / AFP There were several reasons why the best clubs broke out of the 104-year-old Football League and founded the Premier League. They had threatened to do so several times in the past, in order to have the income themselves, without having to share with everyone else, as was the demand from the league. The end of the 80s had also been difficult for English club football. Mobs, riots in the stands and several major accidents had got them banned from Europe. When media mogul Rupert Murdoch also came on board, along with changes in British media laws, it was time for television to take over. Murdoch’s Sky Sports paid large sums for the rights, and that provided a financial basis for the new league. Sky paid 304 million pounds for the first five seasons. Small money compared to TV deals today, but a sum that took everyone’s breath away in 1992. Each club was guaranteed £700,000, plus £175,000 each time they were shown live on TV. By comparison, Newcastle United, in the old league that season, could only cash in £8,000 when they were shown live on ITV. And to illustrate the growth: 304 million pounds for five years in 1992 has grown to 4.8 billion for four years in 2022. Still with Sky Sports in the driver’s seat. League start with “mediocre teams” No wonder the newspapers were full of money discussions in the days before the start of the league. On 27 May, 19 clubs from the old 1st division plus three promotion teams from the division below were registered for the PL, and on 15 August the first nine games kicked off. But it was the same club and, for a long time, the same managers and players. No one predicted revolution overnight. – Seldom have there been so many mediocre teams and such a great lack of talent, wrote commentator Peter Ball in the Sunday Tribune on the same day that the new league started. Four Norwegians were in the stables of Premier League clubs at the start, but only Gunnar Halle got to play on the opening day. Thorstvedt on the bench ON THE BENCH: Erik Thorstvedt sat on Tottenham’s bench when the Premier League kicked off, but was allowed to play and save a penalty in the next round Photo: Morten Holm / NTB Erik Thorstvedt sat on the bench at Tottenham in the opening match. He lost the duel against Ian Walker to be the first goalkeeper from the start. But in the second match, against Coventry four days later, Walker was injured. Thorstvedt came in, got half an hour, and saved a penalty. He also copied that performance in the following match. In total, he got 27 league matches in the first season, two of them as substitutes. But Thorstvedt also thinks that playing in the Premier League in the first period was not a significantly new experience, compared to the previous season. – There was a lot of press and media management around the Premier League beforehand, so we were impressed that there was nothing new to worry about. It was the same game, the same rules, and our contracts were the same, says Thorstvedt. – Success with the Premier League came gradually. Every now and then we noticed a slight difference, says Thorstvedt. Chelsea’s Erland Johnsen was injured in the first part of the season, and did not get on the pitch until January. He was to get 13 games in the first PL season Arsenal’s Pål Lydersen was far from a place in the team. He didn’t get on the field until October, and got eight games. Gunnar Halle played the first two seasons in the Premier League. That resulted in 64 games and six league goals. He is considered one of the most important reasons why Oldham survived the first season in the PL. The right to talk to players and referees TRUTH: – The Premier League will stand the test of time, said director Rick Parry at the start. He had no idea what right he was going to get Photo: Phil Noble / Reuters Sky Sports’ agreement resulted in more matches on TV than before. But neither Halle nor Thorstvedt noticed that much. – Despite everything, there were quite a few TV matches before as well, so I don’t perceive it as a significant change, says Halle. – Even though TV had bought expensive dishes, there wasn’t much football compared to what it has become later. It was probably an increase from before, but maybe only a match or two from each round. There was no match on Saturday at half past two or half past seven, and the round of 16 matches were closed, as far as I can remember, says Thorstvedt. He thinks right. In the first season, Sky was allowed to show a total of 60 league matches, and only on Sundays and Mondays. The other matches were still to go at the traditional time, Saturday at 3pm (4pm in Norway). Perhaps the biggest TV innovation that PL brought with it from the start was the right to talk to players and referees. – Therefore, people must be prepared that the program after the end of the match will not start as set up in the program schedule. If we have to wait until the system man is out of the shower to talk to the most interesting, then it will be like this, said Sky Sports’ Vic Wakeling. In the infancy of satellite TV, not everyone could afford to take in the Sky campaigns either. A necessary satellite dish cost £200, a lot of money for an average British family in 1992. Score the goal that secured a new contract FIRST: Gunnar Halle was the first Norwegian to both play and score in the Premier League. He thinks it is sad that his old club Oldham has now moved all the way down to level 5 Photo: PETER CZIBORRA / Reuters That season, Gunnar Halle played 41 out of 42 games in the league, and scored five of his six PL goals. Among other things, the fourth and final goal in the 4-3 win over Southampton in the last game, when Oldham saved the place on goal difference. Halle is still the Oldham player who has played the most international matches. He played 25 of his 64 international matches as an Oldham player. – With the development PL has had these 30 years, is there room today for small clubs like Oldham in the league? – It is probably difficult with the money demands that are in the league now, but not impossible. If a smaller club manages to raise enough resources, both money and in other ways, there are plenty of chances. There are several clubs in the Championship who bet well. But for Oldham, the road back is very long. The last few years have been difficult, and this spring the club from the outskirts of Greater Manchester fell out of the league and down into the National League, level five. – It’s a bit sad, says Halle, who in all the years since he played there has followed the club and had contact with many of the people in the club. – There has been a lot of mess. But now they have new owners. Maybe it will turn around? hopes Gunnar Halle. The man in black got a green jersey BLACK GOES GREEN: The referees were supposed to wear green jerseys when PL took over, instead of the traditional black suit Photo: STR / Reuters Almost as a curiosity, the referees were supposed to wear green jerseys in the Premier League. In the past, the judge was always the “man in black”. – It was enough to give a little extra attention to the fact that it was a new league, says Halle. The system of fixed jersey numbers and names on the back should also mark the PL as an innovation. But it did not arrive until the following year. Then Halle got permanent jersey number 7. Another new arrangement – outside the track – the first PL season was a “hooligan hotline” to the police, where stands could be reported. English football had a problem with troublemakers in recent memory, and the PL was determined to have zero tolerance there. The fear of bankruptcy in the lower divisions also dominated the predictions when the big money machines would get all the income alone. Former Arsenal and Manchester United profile Frank Stapleton was manager of Bradford City. He shared the fear of a lack of money for the small clubs, but did not paint the situation entirely bleak. – The rich get richer and the poor poorer. But in the long run, I also think that some of the money will trickle down into the system as well, he said. – Because if we (the smaller clubs) do a good job of developing good talent, we can sell them to the big clubs for both three and four times what we can today. – Can get transfer sums up to 5 million He had another prediction and: – With the money TV injects into the biggest clubs, within a couple of years we can get player transfers for maybe up to 5 million pounds. He was right. Exactly two years later, in July 1994, Norwich’s Chris Sutton was bought by Blackburn for 5 million. And then the shopping carousel went faster and faster, until Manchester City bought Jack Grealish from Aston Villa for 100 million last year. Other figures also tell about the development of the money machine Premier League. In 1992–93, the highest paid player was Liverpool’s John Barnes with an income of £10,000 a week. In 2020–21, Gareth Bale received 560,000 at Tottenham. The turnover in PL in 1992/93 was NOK 170 million. In 2020/21, it was 5.4 billion. Nine matches on the opening day Nine of the 11 matches in the opening round were played on Saturday 15 August. Sheffield United’s Brian Deane made history with the very first goal in the new league – he actually scored both in the 2-1 victory over the first PL champions, Manchester United. 27 goals were scored in the nine matches. Most sensational was Arsenal’s 2-4 loss at home to Norwich, after leading 2-0 at half-time. The attendance figures were also somewhat startling, which did not exactly indicate curiosity about the new league. None of the nine matches drew 30,000 to the stands. Sheffield United’s match against Manchester United, which barely passed 28,000, was the one with the largest audience. Nottingham – Liverpool (1-0) was played on Sunday, and Manchester City – Queens Park Rangers (1-1) was played on Monday, and were the first two live games from the Premier League.
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