European Super League.

[Ranaldo Bairn]

9 hours ago, DMCs said:

Bricking it from Eibar Bottle merchant

That quote makes me angry, but also immensely and deeply sad.

[marty_j]

Until a few days ago this guy was entertaining parody
 

Indeed

[G51]

10 minutes ago, Pato said:

Until a few days ago this guy was entertaining parody

 

Tbf, it's been longer than a few days since USA Soccer Guy was last funny

[coprolite]

Unless the 12 clubs have some sort of egalitarian measures between themselves, like the draft systems in the States, this sounds like it could get stale fairly quickly. 

Thing about glory hunting plastic wanks is that they like to see their team mostly win. They're not going to have south coast seaside resorts and northern mining towns to look good against. How many will stick with Arsenal (for example) after their second winless season in a row?

 

[Michael W]

1 minute ago, coprolite said:

Unless the 12 clubs have some sort of egalitarian measures between themselves, like the draft systems in the States, this sounds like it could get stale fairly quickly. 

Thing about glory hunting plastic wanks is that they like to see their team mostly win. They're not going to have south coast seaside resorts and northern mining towns to look good against. How many will stick with Arsenal (for example) after their second winless season in a row?

 

The "fan of the future" will simply turn their attention to one of the other 11 teams based on some 10 second TikToks the club account pumps out. 

[GordonS]

10 hours ago, Jambomo said:

I don’t get it tbh, Neville is clearly not attacking Liverpool as a club, nor were Leeds with the T-shirt’s, more the owners taking this decision.

I think he might have been hearing Neville's comments second hand and misinterpreting them. But Leeds went too far by putting the t-shirts in the Liverpool dressing room and it was wrong for their players to be abused over this. They're just caught up in this too, obviously don't like it either and Klopp is trying to protect them.

I'm sure Klopp would have agreed with Neville calling the Liverpool owners spineless cowards for leaving the players and manager to field questions about it.

10 hours ago, Left Back said:

It really isn’t.  The idea that football is big business is a myth.  Very few football clubs take in as much revenue a year as a single large supermarket.  Not the group.  One single store.  
 

It is important to the communities voters.

Genuinely interested in this. How much revenue does a supermarket take? 

Not disagreeing with your point btw, most football clubs only have a handful of FT employees but a fair number of part time. It doesn't add up to much around the country and obviously most of the revenue of a football club goes to the players.

[RandomGuy.]

3 minutes ago, coprolite said:

Unless the 12 clubs have some sort of egalitarian measures between themselves, like the draft systems in the States, this sounds like it could get stale fairly quickly. 

Thing about glory hunting plastic wanks is that they like to see their team mostly win. They're not going to have south coast seaside resorts and northern mining towns to look good against. How many will stick with Arsenal (for example) after their second winless season in a row?

 

The plan is to remain in the English leagues, though.

To me it seems like they want to kill the Champions League. So even if the 6 English clubs have a poor season like Liverpool/Arsenal, then they're still guaranteed say £300m from the "ESL", while someone like West Ham/Leicester will only get the prize money from their league position, and a reduced CL fee.

[Gaz]

I get that FIFA are rotten to the core, but aren't they (nominally at least) vehemently opposed to any kind of political involvement in sport?

If WM are really planning on using legislation to stop this from happening, what's to stop FIFA withdrawing England's membership altogether?

[GordonS]

2 minutes ago, Michael W said:

The "fan of the future" will simply turn their attention to one of the other 11 teams based on some 10 second TikToks the club account pumps out. 

My guess is they would do two things that US sport has done. 15 clubs isn't enough, they'll look to grow it to about 32 by adding a couple of franchises a year. And they'll reduce competition between the clubs by capping overall wage bills and pushing out transfer fees, so that the bottom clubs aren't there year after year and will be more competitive. The lesson from the US is that when they operate as a cartel and have a bit less internal competition, all the owners make more money.

[djchapsticks]

Just now, RandomGuy. said:

The plan is to remain in the English leagues, though.

To me it seems like they want to kill the Champions League. So even if the 6 English clubs have a poor season like Liverpool/Arsenal, then they're still guaranteed say £300m from the "ESL", while someone like West Ham/Leicester will only get the prize money from their league position, and a reduced CL fee.

This is one of the most controversial points for me.

The 6 English sides will all have an additional foot-up of at least £200m to spend per season on every other club in the league and there's nothing the others can do about it whatsoever. So barring a colossal f**k-up, in addition to their guaranteed revenue, they will also hoover up all the cash from the top 6 league positions every single season without fail. It basically nullifies any threat of a team like Leicester, Wolves or West Ham ever so much as entertaining the notion of breaking them up again.

[Gaz]

6 minutes ago, coprolite said:

Unless the 12 clubs have some sort of egalitarian measures between themselves, like the draft systems in the States, this sounds like it could get stale fairly quickly. 

Thing about glory hunting plastic wanks is that they like to see their team mostly win. They're not going to have south coast seaside resorts and northern mining towns to look good against. How many will stick with Arsenal (for example) after their second winless season in a row?

Isn't the whole point of this to replace the CL? So (in theory) they'd still be in the PL competing against utter haddies. Unless I've missed the point completely, in which case, as you were.

[Jacksgranda]

11 hours ago, Left Back said:

Carragher at least acknowledging the hypocrisy of Sky

 

11 hours ago, Jambomo said:

Carragher at least addressing the Sky hypocrisy here. 

 

11 hours ago, Ro Sham Bo said:

Carragher at least accepting the Sky hypocrisy. 

Anybody mentioned Carragher and the Sky hypocrisy?

[cyderspaceman]

50 minutes ago, Gaz said:

Man Utd especially could jettison every single one of their existing ST holders and still sell out Old Trafford many times over every week. I'd imagine the same could be said for most of the big clubs.

I see your point but in reality all these replacement 'fans' would have to come from a wider and wider cachment area. You wouldn't get tens of thousands travellng long distances  on a regular basis for bread and  butter jam football. (IMO)

Anyway, it would all be down to TV and internet fans paying the cash.  And due to Covid, people have had a taste of watching the game without a crowd being present.   They could even use CGI to create a virtul crowd,  with recorded 'oohs' and 'aahs' from previous games as they do now.

 

 

 

[wastecoatwilly]

8 hours ago, Antony said:

So because I'm a Celtic fan I'm not allowed to hope that in future, finances are more evenly distributed and not hoovered up by the 2 Glasgow clubs while the rest fight for scraps? 

Unfortunately Celtic the PLC would not want that and would jump at the chance of a UK league. 

[topcat(The most tip top)]

This is one of the most controversial points for me.
The 6 English sides will all have an additional foot-up of at least £200m to spend per season on every other club in the league and there's nothing the others can do about it whatsoever. So barring a colossal f**k-up, in addition to their guaranteed revenue, they will also hoover up all the cash from the top 6 league positions every single season without fail. It basically nullifies any threat of a team like Leicester, Wolves or West Ham ever so much as entertaining the notion of breaking them up again.

Basically copying the Scottish model

[Sherrif John Bunnell]

We are already witnessing the dire consequences of The Super League.

 

[djchapsticks]

Just now, topcat(The most tip top) said:

Basically copying the Scottish model

But on steroids.

The only equivalent I can think of was a few years back when there was talk that the OF wanted to go off and negotiate their own TV contacts.

[Gaz]

Just now, Sherrif John Bunnell said:

We are already witnessing the dire consequences of The Super League.

 

I am now firmly in favour of the ESL

[SecretCEO]

For me, this ESL proposal is a bit half-arsed. 

I would have more time for it if they'd gone for a World League, with the best from Brazil, Argybargy, etc filling up the remaining places. Much more like a galacticos franchise-type deal, with the very best players, and genuinely exciting to watch for the global masses.

And then completely severing ties with domestic leagues, letting the rest of us carry on with our regular football. They could maybe continue to grace the main domestic cups, though, to give everyone else some target practice.

I'm still waiting for Celtic to be invited to the ESL, mind you, as I would have thought their appeal to the global Irish diaspora would make them an obvious draw for such a money-driven venture. I wonder what our Neil from Doncaster would make of that.

Assuming that no more English, Spanish, and Italian clubs have shown an interest, I think Ajax, Porto, and Celtic would be the ESL's next ports of call.

[Jambomo]

4 minutes ago, Jacksgranda said:

 

 

Anybody mentioned Carragher and the Sky hypocrisy?

I think we managed to post simultaneously. Great minds an all that