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Players and fans are just as to blame. The players are all hypocrites. How do they think their stupid wages are funded, Real Madrid and Barca are going to the wall because of players and the likes of City can only pay because of the oil baron.
Its all greed, greed, greed. If anything the City and PSG takeovers where worse for football than the ESL. They started the massive transfer and wage inflation that led to this point. Nothing was done, Gary Neville and Sky Sports all fine and dandy because it didn’t directly threaten them.
The only reason West Ham or Everton didn’t do the ESL is because they were not invited. The ownership and financial structure of football is the real problem, the ESL was a symptom of this problem.
Watch Sky Sports, soon as it turns on ownership, wages and above all how the media play their part they will suddenly say everything is fine.
I really like the idea of fan ownership, but I my concerns are:
If it were enforced in this country, you'd get 'lobby groups' like that angry twat from goonerTV.
Even with a million fans chipping in, that'd be £750 each for a controlling stake.
How would the billionaires react? What spiteful shit could a resentful billionaire dream up in all their new spare time? (something like the ESL, I'm guessing)
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Now that this has been binned off (all be it with the CL revamp meaning 'certain clubs' get a spot regardless of performance), do you think the clubs deserve punishment?
If so, what?
I know there's clamour from the wider footballing world for the English clubs to suffer fines, transfer embargos, points penalties, etc.
I don't think the 'elite' clubs will get anything but a slap on the wrist.
If so, what?
I know there's clamour from the wider footballing world for the English clubs to suffer fines, transfer embargos, points penalties, etc.
I don't think the 'elite' clubs will get anything but a slap on the wrist.
Yep. I wonder what would happen if we suddenly said that instead of 200k a week they were going to earn that a year? It's still over 6 times the average wage. It's a fortune.
You know what? They'd still take it. Because a) they'd have to and b) they really weren't going to become doctors anyway. Imagine all that extra cash not being spent on idiot celebrities... what a world. Next we can work on defence budgets and cronyism, but start small...
[Edit:] Actually, fuck that, it's not small. This is important. It needs to change.
Exactly right. Those celebrating are too wrapped up in the comedown following the emotional, hyperbolic frenzy of the last 72 hours whipped up by Sky and BT to protect their golden egg laying hen to realise though.
We now have exactly the same thing but with none of the deep, deep financial problems of the modern game solved. UEFA still running it, existing intermediaries will remain, no real plan to move away from the status quo which is not sustainable and would have been partly addressed by the ESL (or at least the door left open towards doing so).
And the same clubs will be involved anyway. Every year. Except for, and this is where I put my selfish Spurs hat on, us and maybe Woolwich. When this happens again, we will not be in the conversation. I think this is why there was some sorrow and frustration in Levy's message - he knows this was a once in a generation (maybe ever) opportunity for Tottenham to secure their future as a big club as part of a movement that's ******* inevitable anyway. It won't come again and, in time, I think people will regret this. As I said earlier, the big clubs never actually intended to leave their domestic leagues - that was a threat by the EPL, SKY/BT emotion-exploiting the fans by misrepresenting it was the end-game, and blackmail by UEFA on the international bans which were too easily bought by naive fans who should have been way more skeptical given all these stakeholders have a vested interest in the status quo.
Football came so close to fixing itself. Now we have kicked the can down the road and guess what, next time we won't be invited. Everton, Villa, Leicester and Wolves (maybe Leeds?) are going to make a real push now in the next decade so they're the ones in the conversation next time.
Leicester wouldn’t be where they are without Thai investment.
West Ham got a stadium for virtually nothing (the matter was REDACTED)
Leicester drove a horse and cart through FFP rules with illegal doping by their Thai owners to get out of the championship ...
West Ham got a billion pound stadium for 12m a year ...
There's plenty of shit to go around ... at least we legitimately paid our own way to our magnificent 7th place.
I am absolutely one of the frogs!
If I wasn't I would have given up on Football years ago
Clubs have always unbalanced the league with heavy financial backing. Sunderland were the 'Bank of England club', Liverpool did it way back when, Blackburn did it, Newcastle tried (and failed), Leeds tried it. Chelsea, Man City? they're just the latest in a long line.
You're right that the financial structure of the leagues is rotten, but it has been for decades. It's not a new thing.
All professional clubs should have a fans voice in the running of the club. The German 50+1 rule is the way to go.
I agree but wage and transfer cap has to be part of that. The reason the Italian and Spanish clubs were so desperate for this ESL was keeping up with the oil clubs was literally bankrupting them. While money has always been sort of football it’s gone to a completely other level that is breaking the whole model.
The super rich should never have been allowed to buy clubs. It’s fucked the game.
I get the appeal of a salary/wage cap, but because football is the global game, I can't see that working. If the Premier League have a salary cap but France doesn't, the agents will encourage the best players to fuck off there. Won't bonuses and clauses be used to circumvent that? A £1m bonus for avoiding relegation, a £1m bonus after they score their first goal or keep their first clean sheet?
Dunno how a transfer cap would work? A club can only spend so much every season?
That is the irony in all this. Barca, Real and Juventus needed the premier league clubs support to compete with those same clubs. Barca and Real are on the verge of collapse. The premier league clubs were helping them become more competitive and to stay financially viable. There was this strange idea propagated on here by those who "definitely didn't support it" that UEFA is stealing money from the clubs. That maybe true to an extent in terms of revenue share (not for us), but in truth these clubs had spent absurd amounts of money on transfers and wages. They had been totally reckless and they needed the premier league to bail them out.
You know why there were 6 premier league teams? Because we have by far the best brand in Europe and we are starting to get ahead. A lot of that has to do with the revenue share. It is not perfect but even the lovely German league is pretty pointless most of the time.
I get why Levy joined, he is desperate for us to leech off the super clubs but City and Chelsea had no reason apart from FOMO.
Would easily work if the big clubs or UEFA pushed it. Even government could start the ball rolling. The ESL was even talking about some caps so it’s on the radar.
Wouldn’t work if it was just the Prem as players would go to Spain or Italy.
Yeah, for two spots even if they fail in CL qualification or get into Europa, they qualify.
The problem is with legislation - EU labour laws don't allow for the restriction of salary - agents and players could sue the clubs. Of course laws can be changed but that would mean every football association in every country in Europe (in the EU or not) agreeing to laws that would limit football salaries, and then the EU and every other non-EU government passing new labour laws to bring those proposals into effect ... it's possible but can you ever see that happening in the real world?
In 50 years the EU still hasn't managed to standardise VAT ... what chance players's wages.
Does not stop there being a salary cap in Rugby.
Well that's good news
Tracey Crouch has been appointed to to lead the review into football governance. She's Spurs through and through and a true fan not a corporate stooge.
Tracey Crouch has been appointed to to lead the review into football governance. She's Spurs through and through and a true fan not a corporate stooge.