From VAR to ticket prices, football needs fixing. Here are 30 ways to do it

Club owners, commercial interests, TV companies and even the man that runs FIFA seem to be pulling the sport away from the people who make it truly matter. It's time to tug back, then, as we unveil FourFourTwo 's plan to reclaim the beautiful game for the fans.

You could also take a family of four to watch my team Fulham play a Premier League game at Craven Cottage for £80. Fast forward 25 years and that bread has risen by 175 per cent to £1.40, a pint of milk is now 65p, up 76 per cent, and a pint is £5.50 - an increase of 189 per cent.

Inflation has hit everyone, but still nothing comes close to the way the cost of going to football has risen. This season, sitting in the Johnny Haynes Stand for a Fulham match would cost £332 for those same four tickets, an increase of 315 per cent.

Across the Premier League, prices have risen exponentially, squeezing a lot of fans out of the game - even though those rises are a choice for clubs, not a necessity. Typically, matchday income generates seven to 15 per cent of total club revenue, depending on stadium size and pricing.

Higher ticket prices yield only £2m or £3m in extra income for the top clubs. In an era dominated by exorbitant transfer fees and colossal wage bills, that's loose change.

Some fans also feel clubs favour one-time 'tourist' visitors over local, loyal supporters. From the club's perspective, there's a higher chance they'll spend money in the club shop, and buy food and drink in the ground.

A regular fan might stay in the pub until just before kick-off. But that outlook is short-termism.

The Covid pandemic and football being played behind closed doors resulted in us being told "football without fans is nothing", but have clubs learned that lesson? If you price out fans who've been going for years, you lose the atmosphere that the 'tourists' have travelled to experience - it's lose-lose.

Added to that, any of the bottom 10 clubs could be relegated during a bad season, then they could find themselves in a situation where long-term fans have been priced out and pissed off, but the 'tourists' don't want to go to a Championship game on a Tuesday night. One success story in the Premier League in recent years has been the £30 cap on ticket prices for away fans.