Sporting stagflation

Two stories that have caught the eye over the last 24 hours:

Firstly, Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson's statement that he will not be signing any more players this summer because he feels the market is overheating, with transfer fees and salaries being artificially and dangerously inflated (by clubs such as Real Madrid and Manchester City)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2009/jul/13/manchester-united-city-madrid-alex-ferguson

Secondly, a view from Italy that suggests at least four professional clubs (some with a history of playing in Serie A) are unlikely to make it to the start of the new football season http://www.sportbusiness.com/news/169913/economic-crisis-takes-toll-italian-football

With this interesting combination of hyper-inflation and economic stagnation throughout the majority of the sport, does it now mean that football has a problem with stagflation? Can the economic conceptualisation of stagflation be readily applied to sport, specifically football? Or is this something (slightly or significantly) different requiring a different conceptualisation? If what we are seeing is actually a form of sporting stagflation, how do we address the problems and challenges it is posing? The presumes it is a problem, is it? Assuming it is, what should happen: government intervention? Governing body intervention? Intervention by clubs, allied to collective action? Or do we simply let the market do its job (assuming, of course, that the market in football is a free and balanced one)? And what can sport/football learn from economists, national economic planners et al. in the ways they are dealing with or have dealt in the past with stagflation? Are we witnessing stagflation at the moment in the wider macro-economy? In which case, is there any need to worry about sport/football if stagflation is already taking place around it (i.e. it's not a sporting problem, it is a problem it has been exposed to by prevailing macro-economic conditions)?