When I grow up, I'd like to be on the bench. Not as a judge, though that's quite a good job: no one argues with you and it's quite well paid these days. Last week, I had dinner with a QC who's working part-time as a circuit judge. "Must be losing money," I said, "compared with working full-time in your chambers." "Not at all," he replied. Judges can now get £120,000 a year. So he quite fancies it. Too late for me, I suppose. Forgotten all the Latin I ever knew and I hate anything on my head.

I mean on the subs bench, needless to say. It's a very crowded place these days, for several reasons. First, each team is allowed to bring on three subs during a match. Then the top clubs have so much money, and so many vital competitions to play in, that they have two complete squads filled with top-class players, all capable of playing in the first team. They therefore have five subs, ready and stripped, sitting on the bench hoping to fill the three places, usually with another five behind, in their suits, looking awfully clean, glowing, affluent, but decidedly pissed off.

In ye olden days, initially with no subs allowed, and then just one, your first-team squad was quite slim. Even a top team would travel with only 13 players, leaving the rest of the club's professionals at home, playing in the stiffs. That was their role in life, lesser citizens, on piddling pay, doomed to the reserves, but at least they got a game each week. Now we have the situation at Man Utd, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool where there are up to ten top-class players, at the height of their powers, physically honed to perfection, international stars, household names in football houses, earning £50,000 a week - and doing bugger all.

All they can do is sit there, week after week, thinking of their bank balance. There's little moral or financial pressure on them. No one makes them feel guilty about earning all that money while doing nothing. Often they've been bought for negative reasons (for example, to stop another club buying them), or for eventualities that no one expects will ever happen (such as all 17 of the club's first-choice strikers going poorly or Awol), or just as a warning, to make those playing play better.

So wouldn't you fancy it?All that money, yet no work, no responsibilities. The manager doesn't shout at you afterwards. You don't get criticised in the papers. You can go out on the town and not be hissed at by fans. You don't get dropped because of a loss of form. And you don't get injured. That's the biggest plus of all. Not playing must extend your career by about five years. As the money keeps pouring in, with managers buying everything that moves on two legs and can kick straight, we'll soon develop a breed of players who will spend their whole career not playing. You'll have to be good at 19, if not stunning, have every club in the world after you, then you sit back while your agent sells you on your video, from club to club. You'll peak financially at about 27, then for five years you'll go down the leagues, for less money - but come on, what an easy life it's been. And you'll probably get a testimonial at the end. Tax-free.

Yes, I know there will be mental and emotional aggravation along the way. Subs do feel out of it, being there, but not being part of it, invisible men who never sweat, who stand at the back of the dressing room in their suits, don't get in the bath with the lads, find the top totty in the clubs looking through them. It's hard to keep your face straight and not punch the air when the team loses, tough not to look pleased when a player in your position breaks his leg.

In your mixed-up, fed-up state, you might even do the odd daft thing - I dunno, sue your manager for calling you fat and hire Cherie Blair QC to fight your case when all that's really bugging you is not playing. What's happened to Ginola, by the way? Is it true? Has it been settled? Must ask my part-time judge friend.

Robbie Fowler will get even more bitter and twisted this season if he remains a sub. And imagine being Andy Cole's partner when he comes home after a hard day on a hard bench. But they'll have to get used to it. Goalkeepers have always been in this position. The number two goalie can sit there literally for years doing nothing. Steve Harper spent five years at Newcastle waiting for his debut. Richard Wright, the top man at Ipswich, with England caps, could easily spend the next two years waiting for a game at Arsenal, if Seaman keeps taking the monkey glands. Done wonders for his hair and its sheen, so it must be working.

There's always something so touching about observing a goalie on the bench as opposed to an outfield player. Many of them sit with their gloves on - those weird, non-human, spaceman appendages - their eyes glazed, mouth set, waiting for a call to action, to go over the top from the trenches, but it never comes.

Goalkeepers are also going to find it harder in future now that clubs have so much money, such big benches. Gerard Houllier at Liverpool splashed out on the same day on not one, but two, top goalies. He must have got a discount. "OK then,wrap them up, I'll take both while I'm here, merci."

What is he going to do with them? I'll tell you. He's going to play them both together. After all, you are allowed two strikers or two central defenders. No laws against that. It will mean having only nine outfield players, but after Liverpool's 12 games so far without a clean sheet, he's worked out that two goalies between the sticks is his best way of not conceding any more goals.

Too much money in football, you see. In the end, it will turn everything into madness . . .

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