Football

[RailGooner]

I just think ESL and restructured CL as ideas are short-sighted folly. As others have mentioned, these ideas are structured on the revenues from global TV deals, deals that are largely fuelled by Far East betting habits. Those betting habits are facilitated by corruption and inaction in football governance IMHO. If football ever gets it's house in order and deals with corruption and dodgy financial practices, that'll lessen the Far East betting interest. Combine that with the inevitability of something else taking the interest of gamblers (particularly the criminal syndicates) and the ESL model becomes financially unsustainable.

Sadly, I do think it will happen though. The question of "will fans regularly travel to distant stadia?" has kept the handbrake on the idea for decades. But C-19 has shown that football can still offer a viable product to TV even without the fans present.

[port perran]

Having watched football regularly for nearly 60 years and seen my team play at least 1500 times, I can only say that this has been coming and is, in many ways saddening and deeply worrying
As others have said it is fuelled by money and by the Asian and, to a growing extent, the US markets.
In my eyes, the formation of the Premier League was a huge mistake and let me state here that I do not watch the Premier League (even though we have Sky Sports).
It seems to me that, apart from two exceptional years when Blackburn Rovers and Leicester City won it, that the top few (rich clubs) will generally be there or there about making it Very difficult for less wealthy clubs to succeed and that makes it boring.
It creates an ambition of just getting enough points to survive.
I hate the media circus that surrounds the PL and the celebrity status of often very mediocre players that it generates.
This New Venture is the next step in destroying the game that so many of us love.
I can only hope that the powers that be are strong enough to say to the six English Clubs "You leave with our blessing but you will NEVER EVER be allowed back into ANY of the domestic competitions.
Our game will be better without them.

[Calnefoxile]

According to the BBC:

Bayern Munich have just distanced themselves from the ESL:

15:43

Bayern Munich 'say no' to the ESL

Bayern Munich, who are the current holders of the Uefa Champions League, have released the following statement in the last hour:

FC Bayern Munich takes a closed position on the Super League. President Herbert Hainer says: "Our members and fans reject a Super League. It is our wish as FC Bayern and our goal that the European clubs live this wonderful and emotional Champions League competition and develop it together with UEFA. FC Bayern says no to the Super League. "

The chairman of the board Karl-Heinz Rummenigge confirms: "On behalf of the board I can expressly state that FC Bayern does not take part in the Super League. FC Bayern stands in solidarity with the Bundesliga. It was and is always a great pleasure for us to be able to play as the German representative in the Champions League. We all still fondly remember our Champions League victory in Lisbon in 2020, such a happy moment is never forgotten. For FC Bayern, the Champions League is the best club competition in the world."

Oh and as far as TV rights are concerned, Sky & Amazon Prime have just confirmed that they've not been involved in any discussions around the ESL. (In other words they're a tad annoyed their not going to make any money out of this)

Cheers

Neal.

[Lawrence]

Bayern, Dortmund and PSG as far as I know @Calnefoxile and no doubt others, given PSG are one of the richest teams in the world, it seems they at least have some decency.
The banner above says it all, but it is a different game these days, on and off the pitch, fans can burn scarves, return season tickets, boycott the club but there will be plenty to take their place.
I thought an away game at Inverness was a pain to get to, now fans from Manchester could be flying to Spain and Italy for away matches, now that is silly and expensive.
I think they are trying to emulate american football where 3 day trips for away games are not uncommon.
As an aside, I note Rangers and Celtic have not been mentioned, no doubt their collective noses will  be right out of joint 

[Calnefoxile]

As an aside, I note Rangers and Celtic have not been mentioned, no doubt their collective noses will  be right out of joint 

Lawrence,

It has been noted that Celtic & Rangers were not even considered for inclusion, even though in attaining European Competition terms they've been more successful than most of the English Clubs mentioned, however they've not actually won anything for such a long time and, I suspect, for that reason they've not been included.

Cheers

Neal.

[RailGooner]

Good to see Bayern declaring against the ESL. I note that the DSL's 50+1 rule states that clubs will not be allowed to participate in the Bundesliga if commercial investors hold more than a 49 per cent stake. That means a club's members - the fans - retain the majority ownership stake. A commendable ownership model. One we'll never see - when I last looked ~2017, a single Arsenal share was valued at £17,750!

Good also to see high profile figures, in and out of football, commenting against this today: Bojo, Prince William, Jamie Carragher.

[Lawrence]

As an aside, I note Rangers and Celtic have not been mentioned, no doubt their collective noses will  be right out of joint 

Lawrence,

It has been noted that Celtic & Rangers were not even considered for inclusion, even though in attaining European Competition terms they've been more successful than most of the English Clubs mentioned, however they've not actually won anything for such a long time and, I suspect, for that reason they've not been included.

Cheers

Neal.

I know Neal, absolutely hilarious, they are so up themselves though, and they have ruined football here in Scotland, something akin to what the ESL will do in England, Spain and Italy

[LASteve]

Just to add my 2¢ to the Super League debate, although there are still a lot of moving parts I find it quite ironic how hypocritical a lot of the talking heads are being.

Sky Sports have declared that they "passionately articulate the the views of football fans on the importance of preserving and sustaining the entire football pyramid", conveniently overlooking the fact that they probably started the whole mess in the first place by bidding a then eye-watering amount of money for the rights to the "breakaway" Premier League back in 1993.

The likes of Gary Neville spouting his "the game's gone" rhetoric, conveniently clutching a Sky microphone and bleating from behind the Sky paywall.

UEFA themselves announced yesterday changes to the Champion's League which includes the idea of allowing teams into the competition based a "coefficient" of performance over the past five years. This at the behest of the Juventus chairman Andrea Agnelli who wanted to be sure that Juve were never excluded from the tournament. The changes also included a huge restructuring of the early rounds the so-called "Swiss System" and expecting all clubs to play eight more games in order to "qualify" for the final elimination rounds; the change all but guarantees that none of the main attractions would not make it through to the round of 16 (unlike Manchester United this year who fell at the group stage).

It has been overlooked in all the hot air and mud-slinging that no-one is currently suggesting that the clubs are going to withdraw from their domestic leagues, they simply want to play in a "Champions League" format that suits them better. The number of times UEFA have messed around with the European tournaments to milk as much out of them as they can is impossible to count, and it's sheer hypocrisy for them to be criticising the Super League cabal for essentially doing the same thing.

The threat of players not being selected by their national teams also rings empty - do you really think that a top player would turn down the opporunity to play for one of those clubs because it meant that he wouldn't be able to play in the Nation's Cup, or have to listen to Gareth Southgate trying to explain why he's playing a back four and two defensive midfielders against the likes of Gibraltar?

And don't even get me started on the eternal hypocrite Boris Johnson suddenly getting interested in a populist bandwagon he can try and jump on.

It'll all fall apart for now, but the idea won't go away, it'll just be handled an awful lot better then next time it gets announced.

OK, maybe that was 4¢

[honestjudge]

You make some good points there @LASteve . Except I feel your being unkind to my idol Boris.... name me a politician that doesn't jump on a popular  bandwagon when one rolls up!

[RailGooner]

It's all a bit Kerry Packer.

[Trainfish]

Man City have now withdrawn, Bayern also withdrawn, Chelsea about to follow allegedly. Surely they all agreed to join in the first place didn't they? I still believe it will happen one day but not just yet. Hopefully. If clubs do join the ESL then kick them out of the domestic leagues. They may think again then.

[LASteve]

Barcelona. Bayern were never part of the proposal, nor any Bundesliga team. A major part of the reason there is that the Bundesliga has a restriction on a private party taking more than a 49% ownership, the remainder (the 50+1 Rule) of voting rights must remain with the club itself - i.e. the entity itself and the fans - specifically designed to prevent the type of executive action that Liverpool, Manchester United and the rest have imposed on their clubs. It's almost impossible in Germany.

The exception is RB Leipzig who have attempted to circumvent the regulations by various means, but are widely disliked (I'll go so far as to say universally hated) by German soccer fans because of it.

[honestjudge]

So all the  premiership teams have now withdrawn from the ESL project.

Surely we will see this ill fated idea collapse now , a victory for the Fan's??

Or was it one lot of money men against another?

[LASteve]

I'm baffled by the entire 48 hours while this story unfolded. The announcement was half-assed at best and the timing was curious. If you're planning a global product launch (let's face it, that's what this was) you've got an orchestrated launch event, PR up the wazoo and smoke. And strobes. And more smoke and fireworks. And journalists on boondoggles. And pizza. You don't get Daniel Levy on a Zoom call. These are extremely weathly business people who don't do half-baked.

It smacks of "let's run this up the flagpole and see if anyone salutes", especially with the UEFA announcement of the Champions League changes due the next day. Also so I'm sure there was a conversation around fan boycotts - but the last 14 months have proven that while in 2019 it would have been unthinkable to regularly play matches in empty stadia the COVID restrictions have tested, and disproved that theory. Who needs fans when you can pipe in crowd noise?

What I am surprised about is that the exit strategy when it was apparent that no-one was saluting said flag. It's been so fragmented - no "all for one" but a slow collapse. I wouldn't want to be the last man standing in that race.

At least Edward Woodward appears to have decided even his ego can't stand up to the oppobrium of the Manchester United fanbase and the football fanbase as a whole. He won't be missed on the sporting side of things, but I'm sure the potential noodle sponsors of the team are rueing his impending departure. Maybe he, Jose Mourinho and JP Morgan can start their own super league in Dubai, they're both looking for a new challenge and JP Morgan have the money. Eight teams, all coached by the Special One and the league provided with players by Ed and funded by JPM. You know Sky would fall over themselves to buy the rights.

[emjaybee]

Bearing in mind my earlier caveat as regards my football knowledge, I wonder if the Spanish and the Italians had decided their countries wouldn't be that bothered and they could use Spanish legalese to shove it through. The American owners of LFC, AFC & MUFC thought that they had enough financial clout to weather the storm and that fans are more like US fans. But UK fans are far more parochial than US fans, hence the near civil war. The other three UK clubs thought "well, if they (AFC, LFC, MUFC) are prepared to take the major heat and stick their necks out we'll join in."

Just the musings of an 'outsider'.