Ryan Giggs reckons most Premier League players deserve the vast wages they earn in the modern era.
United star reckons biggest names deserve big wages
Ryan Giggs reckons most Premier League players deserve the vast wages they earn in the modern era.
The last few years have seen the salaries of the English game's biggest stars balloon to over £100,000 a week, a far cry from when Giggs started out at Manchester United nearly two decades ago.
Many have argued that the huge amount footballers now earn has alienated fans and they feel it difficult to identify with the players.
Yet given the amount of money coming into the game through television rights and sponsorship, Giggs feels footballers are merely taking their fair share.
"There is plenty of money in the game but the majority of the players deserve it," he said.
"There are a number of players that perhaps 20 years ago would not have got paid the money that they're getting now but that is the way that football is.
Good luck
"The average player is getting a lot of money - if that is right, I don't know. But good luck to them - the money is in the game, why not earn it while they have got the chance?
"But 20 years ago that wouldn't have happened. Then it was probably only the top, top players, the elite players who would be earning good money."
Italy's Serie A was arguably the most competitive and most appealing league in European football when Giggs made his debut as a 17-year-old in March 1991.
That began to change with the introduction of the Premier League from the 1992/93 season, though, and Giggs has seen the coverage of football and the interest in the game's biggest stars transformed.
Massive
"The game has gone massive," he added.
"Footballers make the front pages and the back pages - it is big news, they are like pop stars.
"A lot of things are for the good - the fitness of players is better than it has ever been. The Premier League is now the best league in the world."
