Was thinking this myself, but apparently Al-Khelaifa and Ceferin are very good mates and it could be as simple as that. Either way it's nothing to do with sporting integrity, family or community.
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There is absolutely no way the Super League announcement would have been made without a major broadcaster on-board. Ad we're not talking Sky, Fox Sport etc - we're talking a global subscription player like Netflix or Amazon, or a heavily financed new entry who wants to use this content to drive their platform. There is a slight possibility the latter could be a bespoke platform just to sell the SuperLeague and run by it, but I suspect that would be seen as less beneficial than just hawking the rights to an existing or aspiring global platform. Sky's entire success was built on football. It's what drove adoption of its services throughout the 1990s (with the old adage of it being sold to blokes, who then justified it to their wife on the basis of the movies package for the both of them and Disney for the kids). Football remains Sky's crown jewels - even in a more competitive rights environment these days. If they lose the rights to the apex of club football in Europe - which they would, because they don't have a presence in every market - then the whole rationale for having it starts to crumble a bit. It's already very expensive as it is (€30-40 for a fairly basic package)
So there is zero principle involved here for Sky. This is them fighting for their very survival.
What do people think of the potential of a player-based response? Some stories going round of a few big names - Henderson at Liverpool, Maguire at Man Utd, etc - expressing negative opinions and trying to rally support. Would enough players be willing to take a stand, and have the balls to back it up by walking? I suppose I'm basically asking if there would be any possibility of a players strike occurring. Is that wishful thinking?
Yeah, the Tories have always been interested in letting business make lots of cash and pretty much nothing else.
Another question on this is - what makes Liverpool FC Liverpool FC? Is Anfield necessary? Is it a bunch of players in red kits and a liver bird crest? (Did the Harlem Globetrotters have a home venue?)
I don't think the Harlem Globetrotters are a reasonable comparison. They were always more of a circus act than anything resembling competition. They typically aren't even playing local opposition, they bring their own opponents (the Washington Generals with them). Their games are more like WWE or the likes where the results are basically scripted/choreographed.
Not to say that something like that isn't an eventual possibility down the road but its not what is being proposed here.
But theres nothing to say these teams couldn't become permanent traveling teams playing a series of games in different parts of the world. Though several of them have spent a lot of money on their facilities in recent years so I can't see that being their plan in the short to medium term.
Yeah, take out the fake nature of it alright (which admittedly is a lot of what they are). Maybe a better way of putting it is whether Liverpool could relocate to Beijing (say)?
I'd be surprised if something like that didn't happen eventually, once the league is established. I don't know if it would be Liverppol, but even a European league of about 20 teams with 3 in London?Or 3 in Liverpool/Manchester? the NFL is far more widespread with a max of two teams per city.
Liverpool and Man Utd are brands just like Doc Martens, the football brands don't need a home stadium just like Doc Marten doesn't have and in fact never had a factory, they are made in S.E Asia now and despite the shoes being garbage they are are going public with a $5 bio dollah American offering.
N.B Legacy DM fans can buy shoes sold under the Solovair brand made by NPS who used to make DMs when they were manufactured in the UK, a much, much better shoe than DM have made since the 80s.
I don't think that's a fair analogy though as club's home grounds have a certain resonance. Big nights at Anfield/Old Trafford/Camp Nou, etc. It's a locus for the team. There's merchandise money to be made off it too I'd say.
US sports have shown that relocation can work, although it ****es a lot of people off (although increasingly those people - the "legacy" fans, to use the earlier quote, are irrelevant), and it comes at the cost of a name change which I don't think would work here.
It may happen at some stage in the future - hence wondering if a Dublin Dons could be Ireland's football team at a lower level - but (and this is answering my own question I guess) I'm not sure if football's ready for it yet.
(I think this is still all a giant game of chicken btw, but the topic is going to keep coming up, so may as well chat away about it in the meantime!)
Yeah I really think there is too much money at stake for there not to be a resolution of some sort. It might involve the associations and even UEFA capitulating, but the national leagues involved absolutely can not expel the teams involved. The EPL is a non-runner without those six teams.
I'd also be surprised if one of these clubs were ever relocated. I think long term you'll probably get a few home games touring around like the NFL, but the 'brands' are all to tied to specific place for them to actually permanently move.
It would be great if UEFA actually managed to clip these guys wings rather than do a deal which means that by guaranteeing access based on history (as currently floated but for only two teams) they effectively just create a ESL with the only difference being its run by UEFA instead.
Only way that happens is if Governments step up,
Chance for Boris to nail down the Working class vote in the UK maybe??
On one hand, the big boys are not happy with the money. On the other hand, UEFA is/was a deeply corrupt organisation. In theory, I support any kind of rebelion against UEFA as long as it's properly done. But the current idea of the Super League is not OK.
If the big boys go on with it, we'll have UEFA retaliate. And I do have two tickets for the EURO, will not be happy to see Portugal without CR. But let's say this happens. We will surely have a lot of legal actions for years between clubs, UEFA, FIFA, players and so on. A total mess.
The Times is reporting that one of the six English teams is having emergency discussions at executive level about backing out after the fan backlash. Clickbait or signs of hope?
You'd imagine it's probably Liverpool.
BBC reporting that Chelsea are pulling out. This idea might be sunk.
Edit - Confirmed that City are gone too.
Edit #2 - All happening fast, reports that all 12 clubs are considering disbanding the whole idea. Some turn around from this morning!
UEFA should now ram it up their arses by throwing out changes to cl
Ed Woodward resigns. Was apparently going to leave at the end of the season anyway, but I assume this means Man Utd are also abandoning the project.
After all the drama this is going to end up as a victory for the barstoolers as they will continue to think they are indispensable to the English sides.
All six English sides are withdrawing. It's over, for now.
Plenty of angry people calling for punitive action to the clubs in question, but I imagine that's a non-starter. Weirdly in a few weeks the CPL and EL might be won by teams that were involved!
Guardian live feed suggesting that the City and Chelsea oligarch owners having interests in their clubs other than profit might not be coincidental to their crumbling; the rest are naked profiteers. Same feed, btw, reveals that Theresa May's former press officer was doing the PR for the dirty dozen. Or, doing it as badly as could be imagined. And coincidentally, Sajid Javid and Chuka Umunna were recently appointed to the bank that was funding the league - so I suspect that Bojo's appetite for taking on the clubs might be tempered a little, given the level of ex-Westminster and especially Tory involvement (even if Javid and Umunna seem to have been peripheral) and now that there seems to be no need for political action. Why antagonise the money markets needlessly just for plebs' votes, after all? I hope I'm wrong.
I'm originally from Old Trafford. There's no way to express the shame and anger that the club literally a few streets from where I was born, in George Best's last season in the red, could treat this game of ours so despicably. But I don't for one minute think this is the end.
Reading the six statements, and I think Arsenal are the only ones to flat-out apologise, if that means anything to anyone. Remarkable 48 or so hours. Very pertinent thread here from one of the Soccernomics authors, on the nature of incompetence in football boardrooms: https://twitter.com/KuperSimon/statu...87075115233284
As funny as it is I'm a bit disappointed that this ended so quickly. Was hoping for a long drawn out battle so that barstoolers would get a good look at what they are supporting. This will all be forgotten in a week and sofas across the country will be full for the weekend but not tuned into WLOI unfortunately.
The dark part of me wanted it to last till the first game, with the English teams relegates, and the tournament becoming a massive flop.
Besides, everyone knows there is too much money at the top of world football (and even maybe in our league). The wealth gap between the super clubs and the rest is what is making football stale at the top level. The Coup to keep more money is really sickening/ pointless / dull / monotonous.
Raging it didn't happen, in an admittedly unscientific survey carried out by me today, 100% of respondents confirmed that they will stay affiliated to their respective franchise despite their franchise been involved.
Of course they will. If fans of teams like Man United were really that bothered about the way their clubs were being run, or how fans were being treated, they'd have done something about it already (and I don't mean just wearing a green and yellow scarf for a while). But they clearly just don't care enough. They deserve everything they get.
A small proportion of United fans did. FC United were getting in the region of 2,000 at games, whilst Old Trafford continued to sell out all its 76,000 seats.
And the gobsh'tes who support United in Ireland weren't the ones switching allegiance to an alternative fan-owned club.
Liverpool developed a couple of fan-owned alternatives = FC Liverpool and City of Liverpool FC. They each get a few hundred at games, whilst Anfield continues to sell out its 53,000 seats.
Again - if the fans were really that bothered about how their clubs were being run or how they were being treated, they'd have done something about it by now. There are ready-made alternatives for fans of Man U and Liverpool to do so - yet few take that option. They're not interested, despite all their whinging.
To many its about the brand and not grass roots football.
Exactly. They'll make loads of excuses, but the bottom line is they don't want to watch games against Runcorn or Prescott Cables - even if it means being treated better and building something sustainable and attractive in the process. They're just not interested. Though you can be sure if FC United made it to the Football League they'd suddenly take an interest and tell everyone they used to go back in the day before they were big.
If you're still supporting Man U after the Glazers bought the cliub and saddled it with the debt from doing so etc etc, then you are just an empty commercial vessel. Doubly so if you're doing it in Ireland whilst turning your nose up at domestic football. You deserve everything bad that happens to 'your' club and to you as one of its consumers.
Can anyone enlighten me on the actual debt these initial 12 ESL clubs have amassed given their desire to solve that problem with the formation of the now abandoned league.listening to 95fm here in Limerick this morning our obviously ill informed soccer correspondent reckoned on 70 billion.i would assume its around 3/3 billion?
Ah, here. Read Madrid have around 0.9 billion in debt. Man Utd have half that. No way the twelve of them add up to any more than a few billion.
Real Madrid are reportedly €900m in debt, have long been spending more than they bring in, have Covid losses still to account for, and need to find €570m to rebuild the Bernabeu (and we all know how reliable building estimates are!):
https://en.as.com/en/2020/12/21/foot...69_507998.html
Barcelona meanwhile, are reported to be €1.2bn in debt, are also overspending/Covid etc, and need to find €600m to revamp the Camp Nou (though they're said to have been forced to scale that back):
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/bc/b...ent-experience
While Atletico, whose balance sheet looks healthier and already have their own new stadium built, are €999m in debt:
https://www.sportspromedia.com/news/...venues-la-liga
So they're not so worried - I mean, it's not as if they owe a billion...
Anyhow, that's the 3 biggest clubs in Spain, who hoover up a far bigger percentage of overall football revenue than other top league, and who between them owe €3bn+, with another €1bn+ to be found.
Over in Italy, Inter's Chinese owners are desperately scrambling to raise €200m of emergency funding just to keep the lights on until the end of the season:
https://www.ft.com/content/7fdc9a56-...5-bf827a0e7b1d
Juve, despite winning Serie A every year since Adam was a lad, have lost money for the last 3 years, most recently €234m for a part-Covid season. This is despite selling players at a profit and always qualifying for the CL, a huge source of revenue for them (€449m for the last 5 years). Currently in 4th place, CL qualification for next season is not guaranteed. Their debt is just under €400m, with their total liabilities just over €900m, in short, they are hugely dependent on revenue from the CL and player sales:
https://www.juvefc.com/analysis-of-j...r-conclusions/
While AC Milan did appear to be heavily in debt, though it looks as if their US owners may have wiped that? (Unsure).
Anyhow, with the big Spanish clubs all being in deep doodoo, and the Italian football finance model increasingly falling far behind England and Germany etc, it is obvious why their Big Six are/were desperate for this Superleague to save them.
What football needs is mechanisms to protect clubs from themselves and others in terms of ongoing wages arms races. FFP and wage caps based on club's real ability to generate revenue are vital- not just at the top level but here as well. And where there are investors there should be rules to ensure they invest in the fabric of a club as well as the first team.
Which is why I put ex-Westminster before Tory - really didn't have time to list Umunna's affiliations! Journeyman pro if ever there was one... But thanks for clarifying in case anyone was confused.