Interview: Face to face with the man sating the Football League’s “real appetite” for better financial regulation

The director of the EFL’s Club Financial Reporting Unit tells Off The Pitch about his daily work monitoring and investigating the finances of its 72 clubs.
John Potterill-Tilney heads a team of three charged with ensuring clubs meet the EFL’s new financial reporting criteria.
Why it matters: Prior to Rick Parry’s 2019 appointment as chairman several EFL clubs were engulfed in existential financial crises. Better regulation and compliance functions since then have stopped this tide.
The perspective: Potterill-Tilney says a quasi-independent financial reporting unit “shows a real appetite for the EFL to get this side of things right” and plans for it preceded similar recommendations made in the UK Government’s fan led review.

When the Football League chairman Rick Parry sat down for an exclusive interview with Off The Pitch in August 2021, he offered a tantalising glimpse into how he runs the oldest league body in the world.

Less than two years into the job, the EFL was still in recovery from the financial crisis brought by the pandemic, and the aftermath of a succession of governance crises, that included the collapse of Bury and Bolton Wanderers brought to the brink. At the same time it was facin

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