European Super League

Do you want the ESL to happen?


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    1,921
  • Poll closed .

Infra-red

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Christ that Perez interview is an absolute car crash. It comes across as the senile ramblings of a deluded lunatic. That is the man that has been chosen to be fecking President of the ESL? Really?

This fiasco continues to lurch from bad to worse. An utter embarrassment for all involved and surely now confirmed as the worst and most universally despised idea in the history of football.
 

sglowrider

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This is simply peak capitalism. It speaks of a 'free market' but its never been that. Some will always be too big to fail. A true free market would see Real and Barca cease to exist because of their financial mistakes and two other Spanish clubs take their place. However there is no free market. Just like in every facet of business. The 'free market' is a fecking lie sold to the stupid.
Its business optimisation process.

There is a shift in power from the traditional structures of traditional broadcasters; from terrestrial broadcaster like the BBC (in the past) to the previous new (satellite) SKY --- to now the likes of digital broadcasters like BT but on a bigger scale, players like Amazon, Netflix, Google who can deliver content cheaper than via the expensive satellites.

The other shift can be seen in content makers pulling back power back into their own hands away from the powers of the broadcasters.

So folks like Disney started taking control of their own content. I always have thought that ''content is king''/ top of the pyramid -- and always wondered why content makers always seemed to have relented their powers to the delivery guys. So the Big 12+ who like Disney recognised the shift, and are trying to pull back control of their own content and maximise their powers and profitability. And its not the Glazers who are that crazy. United along with Spurs and Arsenal were the original breakaway clubs from the old Division One. So things change and yet they remain the same. The usual suspects.

This is an evolutionary step. Not some radical revolution.
 

hobbers

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If this is going to be stopped don't expect any help from Spain. We know the Spanish clubs are run by simpletons and generally have the worst fan bases.
 

Blades1889

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They’ve been working on this for years they will have done their research. Talk of them getting kicked from domestic leagues is a bit pointless although fun.
 

lex talionis

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It’s easy to say I will renounce United forever if this goes through, but I will. I commit to all caftards.

What I have found is that life is too precious and short to live without principles. We stumble amd get back on our feet, but to abandon principles altogether would be tragic.
 

0le

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This should all be noted.
Agreed. It'll happen with United too as soon as we make any new signing as a result of this and some fans will forget and forgive very quickly. Hopefully the majority remain strong and firmly opposed.
 

stevoc

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FIFA's relative silence suggests to me that as a minimum they're interested in testing the water. Their big money sooner is the WC and they want more. The obvious place to look it is at the money in there club game and the European club game in particular.

The other side of that is that if FIFA let these club owners get away with this, they will be the next target. What value does FIFA add to the SL model once the initial storm has passed? Corrupt, bureaucratic and with a structure that encourages the rise of factions and bloques - they're only useful to the European franchisees as cover.
No doubt they'll be interested, they've been wanting in on club football for years, the club world cup wasn't the money spinner they'd hoped it would be.

FIFA being involved would add an air of legitimacy and the clubs get their closed shop Champions League that they control with FIFA getting a slice of it. And FIFA get rid of Uefa with the other regional confederations to follow shortly after and a 64 team World Cup every 2 years.
 

RedTiger

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Guys, I've been thinking about the other 5 clubs who'll play in this. I've got a feeling they'll offer up annual places to the previous season's CL semi-finalists and the EL winner.

Edit:
I'd actually be OK with this as long as the original 12 can also go down.
 

Giggs86

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I'm expecting Howard Webb and Mark Clattenburg to become referees in the Super League (along with that one English referee who was disgraced a while back).
Please please please don't hire any PL refs, they're all shit.
 

andyp

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What really worries me about all of this is that it feels like we are all United in despising the plans, but I have no idea of the demographic of this forum, or blue moon, or RAWK or Twitter even but I imagine it's all 'legacy fans'. What is the opinion of fans from Asia, USA, rest of the world that the proposals are clearly targeting?

If in favour then all that we will fight for will mean nothing. Manchester United will be nothing more than a brand name
 

stevoc

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This is the inevitable final result of running football clubs like a business. The Glazers, the Saudis, all of them. A closed shop makes the most sense from a financial perspective and thats what they're going to go for, probably with a salary cap at some point. It seems like UEFA's best bet is to impose extremely strict rules on banning players from hopping between the tournaments. This should give the players who do choose to play in the super league massive negotiating power as per wages and hopefully disincentivises the owners from going through with it.
From the get go apparently.
 

RedDevil@84

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Why is this keep getting branded around it's a european tournament designed to be played at home and away, no team will play in America and the naming rights won't become Manchester Red Devils Fire Rapids or whatever concoction someone makes up. It's getting ridiculous. This will not happen.
Although the exact scenario may not happen, but when a tournament has fixed teams who are competing with each other year over year, the uniqueness factor wears off pretty quickly and the organizers have to constantly keep churning out something or other to keep the show going. Else lose the TRPs and stuff and get lessened revenues.

So somewhere down the line, the game maybe taken to places where it will generate maximum money. It is a very plausible scenario.
 

JSArsenal

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Unfortunately the government and FA had the chance to listen to our fans about the shadiness of the Glazer's borrowing money to buy us and straddle us with the debt. They did nothing. From then on in the club has never belonged to the fans. The time to intervene was years ago. FFS Liverpool almost faced bankruptcy and they did nothing. Its too late to stop this now, they had the chance and they blew it.
You're right. This is all a result of corporate greed. The end result of capitalism in football.

Clubs are losing all of this money? The solution should be to stop paying such high transfer fees. Why are the fees so high? Because the PL stood by and did nothing while rich oligarchs and States bought clubs while the Spanish government bailed out the big two in Spain whenever they ran into a spot of bother.

This should have been reigned in years ago but the "Free market" and "growth" was prioritised over stability and values. Now you have media trolls holding up Chelsea and City as paragons of virtue.

We all cheer for PSG and City, two clubs that are just adverts to make the people that own them look less detestable to the outside world. The same with Chelsea. The American owners, don't give a shit about what people think of them. They're just here to make money like leeches.
 

kingwaynerooney

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| Florentino Perez: "Will our first Super League championship be considered the 14th?

No, it will be considered the 15th, because maybe the 14th is coming this year."

:lol:
 

Giggs86

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I know I'm in the minority but I'm looking forward to a CL without these teams. Less money, but hopefully more historical teams making the final rounds and a lot more variety in terms of countries. I'm excited about it, I hope UEFA doesn't do away with it.
Really? Looking forward to what, Slavia Prague vs Dinamo Zagreb in the quarters? Roma vs Shakhtar in the final? It will be CL in name only.
 

kidbob

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You're right. This is all a result of corporate greed. The end result of capitalism in football.

Clubs are losing all of this money? The solution should be to stop paying such high transfer fees. Why are the fees so high? Because the PL stood by and did nothing while rich oligarchs and States bought clubs while the Spanish government bailed out the big two in Spain whenever they ran into a spot of bother.

This should have been reigned in years ago but the "Free market" and "growth" was prioritised over stability and values. Now you have media trolls holding up Chelsea and City as paragons of virtue.

We all cheer for PSG and City, two clubs that are just adverts to make the people that own them look less detestable to the outside world. The same with Chelsea. The American owners, don't give a shit about what people think of them. They're just here to make money like leeches.
100% agree.
 

stevoc

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I wouldn't blame UEFA if they expunged every European Cup/Champions League winner from the 15 Founders.

1. Bayern 6
2. Ajax 4
3= Nottingham Forest 2
3= Benfica 2
3= Porto 2
I get the sentiment but in reality why would they care about that though?

It amounts to editing a wikipedia page.
 

Marcus

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If the club continues to participate in European competitions, then maybe not that bad. It just means the Super League teams are going to be more tired than other teams. I don't know.
 

Dante

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They’ve been working on this for years they will have done their research. Talk of them getting kicked from domestic leagues is a bit pointless although fun.
It's also moot. National leagues will never be able to compete financially, so they'll wither away and turn into feeder competitions at best.

I reckon the ESL top division will gradually get expanded until it's about 25 teams strong. That'll give us a 48 game league campaign followed by a 9 game (16 team) NFL-style playoff. So 57 games a season, with no piddling cup games to interrupt the TV coverage with their low viewing figures.

This is what it's going to be about. All blockbuster, all star teams, all the time.
 

Dante

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I get the sentiment but in reality why would they care about that though?

It amounts to editing a wikipedia page.
They'll request their replicas back from the club museums. But, yeah, I take your point.

However, it may be the only card UEFA have left to play.
 

Eddy_JukeZ

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I highly doubt this doesn't go through.

It's just too far advanced at this point.

A complete disgrace.
 

Blades1889

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It's also moot. National leagues will never be able to compete financially, so they'll wither away and turn into feeder competitions at best.

I reckon the ESL top division will gradually get expanded until it's about 25 teams strong. That'll give us a 48 game league campaign followed by a 9 game (16 team) NFL-style playoff. So 57 games a season, with no piddling cup games to interrupt the TV coverage with their low viewing figures.

This is what it's going to be about. All blockbuster, all star teams, all the time.
Are they changing the name to soccer also
 

el3mel

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Does anyone have a doubt anyway that the group stage of this competition will basically become the NBA regular season vol 2, in which clubs have no problems losing in it, the ones who are guaranteed to reach playoff in it start to rest players and lose and those who have no hope of qualifying just tank games for the draft ?

This what will happen.
 

cyberman

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Things might start getting a bit more interesting if there's any truth in this
Pretty sure they said contracts are signed. It really does seem too far gone. Hope not but theres a weird PR exercise over Chelsea and City at the minute with this reluctant participants nonsense.
 

FlawlessThaw

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When City have more morals than us. Christ.
I suppose it's easy to have morals if your owners are an Oil-rich state.

In any case, Perez literally said all contracts were signed and bonded 30 minutes ago so it would be kind of out of place.
 

Champagne Football

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The Super league has been slaughtered. I'm not for it but I'd still like to know more details etc before I can fully say that no way this is a joke that must be stopped.

At the end of the day, who is the lesser of the 2 evils, UEFA in bed with PSG and Man City with their intentions to dominate the champions league for years to come, or the super 12 clubs and their new 'vision'? Can we know for sure that UEFA are the lesser of the 2 evils right now?
 

hobbers

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Oh how I would love it if a couple of the english clubs get cold feet, and it fecks over Real and they stay on their road to bankruptcy , and kicked out of UEFA comps for a bit to boot.

I dont even care who the clubs are. I can guarentee it wont be us though. If any English clubs blink it'll be City, Chelsea or Liverpool. Sadly from our point of view. But we have the scummiest owners of the lot.
 

stevoc

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You're right. This is all a result of corporate greed. The end result of capitalism in football.

Clubs are losing all of this money? The solution should be to stop paying such high transfer fees. Why are the fees so high? Because the PL stood by and did nothing while rich oligarchs and States bought clubs while the Spanish government bailed out the big two in Spain whenever they ran into a spot of bother.

This should have been reigned in years ago but the "Free market" and "growth" was prioritised over stability and values. Now you have media trolls holding up Chelsea and City as paragons of virtue.

We all cheer for PSG and City, two clubs that are just adverts to make the people that own them look less detestable to the outside world. The same with Chelsea. The American owners, don't give a shit about what people think of them. They're just here to make money like leeches.
Top post, this has been festering inside football for years. And the authorities UEFA/FA/PL all allowed it to grow because they benefited from it.