Clever lobbying in the beautiful game

The Premier League has rejected a proposal from Phil Gartside, Chairman of Bolton Wanderers FC, to create a two-tier Premier league and to invite the two dominant Scottish teams, Celtic and Rangers to join. Gartside, like many middle and lower ranking Premier clubs, is concerned about the huge financial gulf between the big four Premier clubs and the rest of the division.

Reading between the lines, it would appear that the Premier league may give serious consideration to some of Gartside's other proposals. This may help feed more television money to the smaller premiership clubs, and so level the playing field a bit within the Premier league. I may well be doing Gartside a disservice, but the press focused on the two high-profile proposals, and Gartside's agenda may have been actually on the less high profile. If I am correct, he has played a blinder, and created a story that might or might not be a long-term goal, but may lead to changes that improve Bolton's financial situation in the short to medium term.

If I am correct, this is a version of the door-in-the-foot (FITD) persuasion technique where you make a large request that is almost certainly going to be denied, and then come back with a smaller request. Cialdini & Ascani 1976 found that students asked to give blood every 2 months for 3 years most declined, but when asked to volunteer the next day, 49% agreed as opposed to 32% of the control group.