Money talks in football but, throughout England it does not always guarantee success.
Every season, clubs across the country invest heavily in wages, transfers and infrastructure in the hope of climbing the table.
EFL League Two is no exception to this, while some of the division’s biggest spenders achieve promotion as expected, others fall short despite operating with budgets far beyond their rivals.
Salford City fan, Luke, said: “Evidently the extra money we spend more than Notts did not matter when it came to it.”
The impact that financial supremacy has on the league is often overstated as to how the season plays out.
Smaller clubs with limited financial resources continue to outperform expectations through smart recruitment, tactical organisation and long-term planning.
Bromley are the perfect example of this, with the second lowest wage bill in the division, they finished first in the league over teams with double their wage expenditure, like MK Dons and Cambridge United.
Bromley also finished above Salford City who had a much higher wage expenditure, when they visited the Peninsula in their penultimate game of the season, their fans seemed unsurprised about their side’s success.
Bromley fan, James Tamworth, said: “The club’s infrastructure is top, all us fans know how well run we have become which is exactly why we have competed against the richest teams in the division.”
The most impressive part of Bromley’s success is breaking into the top six league positions.
Four of the top six teams were in the top six for wage expenditure, there is a trend develops that most of the biggest spenders would reside near the top of the table.
Bromley were a major anomaly in this trend as they had the biggest jump from wage budget to league position of 23 spots.
Although there are anomalies, a pattern does begin to show, all of the play off teams and automatic spots, apart from Bromley, were in the top half of wage expenditure.
Accrington Stanley fan, Toby, said: “It is really demoralising to be honest, unless a miracle happens, we are just stuck in limbo because we can not compete with the wages that teams, like Salford, can offer.”
Accrington are yet to log a top half finish since returning to league two in 2023, but what more can fans expect with the lowest wage expenditure in the league?
Toby said: “We can only dream that one day we can get major investment because it feels impossible to truly compete without it, which is sad because it never really felt that a few years ago.”
Accrington have still outperformed their wage expenditure; teams such as Barrow and Bristol Rovers have struggled despite having relatively large wage budgets.
Bristol would have the second highest wage bill in the division yet finished 14th, having been relegated the season prior, their large wage expenditure will have been down to members of their League One squad remaining.
If they had lost more members to fit the wage structure of other struggling sides, could they have gone down instead?
Questions like this are important and often display a bleak outlook for the future of English football.
With teams being able to buy their way into promotion spots, other than the odd anomalies, it leaves teams who have not received investment from wealthy businessman to continue to struggle as they are leap frogged by teams with massive investment.
Teams such as Harrogate and Barrow, who were both relegated this season, have been stuck in the division since 2020.
During this time, they have seen teams, such as Wrexham, shoot through the league and competing at the top half of the Championship, just because a rich owner chose them as their vanity project.
That is why the success of Bromley is one that should be championed by clubs across the lower leagues as their ability to compete with a much smaller budget provides a glimmer of hope for less financially powerful sides.