European Super League horseshit now a possibility?

[SPARKSY]

People championing this or even saying they don't care if it happens or not need to think very carefully about what it means. This thing will morph into a 20 team European league and it's only a matter of time before you'd see weakened league cup type teams take the field in the domestic leagues at the weekends so the bug guns could play midweek because the money this thing will generate will dwarf that of the domestic leagues.

This will kill the domestic leagues make no mistake about that,

"Home" games in Los Angeles or New York will be next. Watch this space. Coming very soon.

[rodders999]

People championing this or even saying they don't care if it happens or not need to think very carefully about what it means. This thing will morph into a 20 team European league and it's only a matter of time before you'd see weakened league cup type teams take the field in the domestic leagues at the weekends so the bug guns could play midweek because the money this thing will generate will dwarf that of the domestic leagues.

This will kill the domestic leagues make no mistake about that,

The clubs won't be playing in domestic competitions though. It's already been stated that if they compete in the Super League then they will be expelled.

Doubt they'd have the bollocks to that despite the threat, they'd be committing hari kari by expelling 5 massive clubs (and the scum ) from the league. The mega money domestic and worldwide TV deals the PL generates would evaporate without the big clubs involved so expelling them would be a death sentence.

[Andrew]

In a statement, the ESL said: "Going forward, the founding clubs look forward to holding discussions with Uefa and Fifa to work together in partnership to deliver the best outcomes for the new league and for football as a whole."

"The founding clubs believe the solutions proposed following these talks do not solve fundamental issues, including the need to provide higher-quality matches and additional financial resources for the overall football pyramid."

Yeah, right. Because the whole of the pyramid is going to share in the cash just like they did from the Premier League?

Don't make me laugh.

How have they got the nerve to even think about saying stuff like this?

[rodders999]

People championing this or even saying they don't care if it happens or not need to think very carefully about what it means. This thing will morph into a 20 team European league and it's only a matter of time before you'd see weakened league cup type teams take the field in the domestic leagues at the weekends so the bug guns could play midweek because the money this thing will generate will dwarf that of the domestic leagues.

This will kill the domestic leagues make no mistake about that,

"Home" games in Los Angeles or New York will be next. Watch this space. Coming very soon.

They tried that already with the Game 39 nonsense and in fairness the massive backlash from fans and various other groups that shit all over it put an end to the idea, here's hoping the same happens here.

[nut flush gooner]

This is the ONE chance that we will get of getting rid of Kroenke.
We haven’t been able to get rid of him by ourselves - let’s see whether he can cope by having the entire football fan base against him

I'm hoping that the hypocritical moral outrage from the likes of Spiv Neville and the PL and UEFA and the FA spreads in football and in the media to the extent that the whole idea gets shitcanned (likely) and Wiggy Beaver Features is not bright enough (likely) to realise it was only ever some brinkmanship from the rich greedy clubs to get more money from the TV deals, and he gets angered with not getting his own way, spits the dummy, packs up his wig collection, and sells us (not very likely unfortunately).

Neville was made rich by Sky Sports involvement in the PL. The whole idea of the breakaway league in 92 was to bring more money into the game. For me, this is only a more extreme version of what happened back then. The average footy fan was shafted with no free to air football. I remember Arsenal season ticket prices went from around £100 to the best part of £1k between 92 and the end of that decade.

[Clash]

Loads of negativity around the ESL. It's clear that it doesn't affect domestic league, only European competition.
If PSG and Bayern don't want to join why should we care? They clearly don't care about the damage they've done to their own domestic league.
I support this move. We will finally see some investment in the club.
Arsenal has always been a pioneering club. Why stop now. All this rhetoric about the club being "dead" to the fans. Fans own the club, Kroenke does.

Really mate?

So teams like Leicester and West Ham who are close to finishing in the CL places this season, will not get to play against the best of Europe and you say the domestic league won't be affected? Everton (a bigger club than Liverpool in the lifetime of some on here) can win the title and not get ''invited'' to take part.

And historic dross like the scum and currently our lot will be guaranteed a place even if relegated from our domestic league because we're one of the ''founder members''.

Also, the wealth of this ''big six'' (:roll) will massively increase while the rest of the English league suffers the opposite. So the gap gets bigger and the game becomes even more predictable than it already is.

This will be absolute shite, 100% guaranteed. One thing the CL did for me is ruin the aura that clubs like Juventus and Real Madrid once has because the saturated coverage of football has made me sick of seeing them. I have no interest in seeing us play only against them and not against the likes of Norwich, Wolves. etc. And do we really want to play Man United, Liverpool, Man City, etc. 4 times every season? How boring will that become? Especially if our pitiful recent record against them continues.

As for what it will do to the domestic cups? They've already been severely damaged by the greed in the game. What's it going to become now?

For Arsenal fans, this competition (if you can even call it a competition) will be utterly pointless. Our cunnt of an owner will have no interest in winning it so we'll just be a club that makes up the numbers. That will be our existence - maybe it already is as far as the PL goes. But at least we can still win cups. We will have NOTHING!

Hope the PL kicks all six out and UEFA does the same.

They wont of course. They'll cave like they always do. Sky TV will fight for the rights to cover it and then hype it up, forgetting their initial condemnation ... and the likes of Ratface Neville & co will probably change their tune too.

Absolute modern football bollocks x1m

[Clash]

This is the ONE chance that we will get of getting rid of Kroenke.
We haven’t been able to get rid of him by ourselves - let’s see whether he can cope by having the entire football fan base against him

I'm hoping that the hypocritical moral outrage from the likes of Spiv Neville and the PL and UEFA and the FA spreads in football and in the media to the extent that the whole idea gets shitcanned (likely) and Wiggy Beaver Features is not bright enough (likely) to realise it was only ever some brinkmanship from the rich greedy clubs to get more money from the TV deals, and he gets angered with not getting his own way, spits the dummy, packs up his wig collection, and sells us (not very likely unfortunately).

Neville was made rich by Sky Sports involvement in the PL. The whole idea of the breakaway league in 92 was to bring more money into the game. For me, this is only a more extreme version of what happened back then. The average footy fan was shafted with no free to air football. I remember Arsenal season ticket prices went from around £100 to the best part of £1k between 92 and the end of that decade.

Absolutely right mate. I agreed with everything Ratface said yesterday and still do ... but coming from him and Sky, it really stuck in the throat. The lack of self-awareness was unbelievable.

Sky could have covered football without the need to create the Premiership (as it was back then). What was wrong with the old 1st division?

Everytime Sky, the media and the likes of Tyler, Neville, etc. give out a stat like ''highest scorer in Premier League history'', or ''Most PL points'' etc. they are disrespecting and trampling on the history of the game. The very thing Neville was ranting about yesterday.

[Gunner Rob]

Things started to go wrong in the early 90s with the creation of the Premier League and the removal of terracing in stadiums.
The sport became sanitised and because of this the American money makers are now interested in making money out of it.

Ideally I would like to back to the old 22 club league division 1, with a reduction in European games.
Obviously won’t happen but there would be far more interest created than the rubbish proposals from both the Super League and UEFA

[SteveO 35]

People championing this or even saying they don't care if it happens or not need to think very carefully about what it means. This thing will morph into a 20 team European league and it's only a matter of time before you'd see weakened league cup type teams take the field in the domestic leagues at the weekends so the bug guns could play midweek because the money this thing will generate will dwarf that of the domestic leagues.

This will kill the domestic leagues make no mistake about that,

Exactly right. Think back to football pre-Premier League. Did we put out weakened teams for the FA Cup or the League Cup? Did we fuck - because the football league didn't carry the riches of today and those cups were among the bigger televised games, sponsorships, publicity and produced big gates. Anyone old enough to remember the league cup semi against Everton with 57,000 crammed into Highbury and people sat on the North Bank roof? I know I can

Then came the PL - millions of pounds per position in the league. I can remember they said that when Derby finished with 11 points they earned more money than all the SPL teams put together. Dropping out of the PL was supposed to originally be worth £25m, then £50m, then £100m.....now they talk about the Play Off match being worth £200m to the winners. Its that sort of money that meant everyone started playing weakened teams in the domestic cups

If the Super League was offering £10m-£20m per place, mega money per point that would dwarf the CL system, then the PL would become a modern day League Cup with academy players and fringe players playing. Clubs like ours might even do what they do in the fucking Checkatrade Trophy and enter an Arsenal 'B' / or Under 23 academy team.

This league would kill domestic football completely.

[BFG4]

I'm completely against the creation of this competition but the fake outage of the 'purity' of the game being challenged is just Laughable. In the last decade or so, Chelsea and City both have been taken over by billionaires who see them as their play thing and buy success, and Sky and the other TV companies pretend this success is earned. Those same companies look for new and inventive ways to screw you with different TV packages. Also, if you want to attend a game, bear in mind that the date and time of these games may be changed to suit these companies and If it negatively affects the club, then who cares? This new competition is wrong but it's a natural evolution of what football has become in recent times.

[Herd]

IFuck UEFA AND FIFA ,Viva the super League
Its about time the clubs regained control over football, my only regret is that the Super League doesn't go far enough.
In my opinion all clubs should ditch these two corrupt bodies altogether and form their own elected bodies to run the game !
For decades now the football has been slowly dying a death because of FIFA and UEFA's shambolic running of football..
These malignant bodies only interest is to generate revenue for themselves so that their bosses can trouser millions of our money into their back pockets
As a result of their greed they have devalued the European trophies by expanding them more and more .
Don't forget these bodies expanded their reach to Kasack fucking stan and made two English clubs fly 6 hours for a euro final during Ramadan ,just think of the contempt for supporters needed to do that .Similarly FIFA awarded the word Cup to Qatar pure bribery and corruption there.
Does anyone really watch these qualifying games anymore ,its not much fun watching semi professional goatherders from a previous soviet satellite huff and puff .
Football has not died by breaking away from these sinking ships we have the first chance for years of regaining control of the game from the evil authorities .
VIVA the SUPERLEAGUE !

[augie]

There is no doubt that the importance of fans to the clubs has reduced drastically since the formation of the premier league, but those of you who think that fans boycotting this competition wont matter are very wrong and are very short sighted. Sponsorship money only comes in when companies are trying to sell their product to the fans - if fans stop attending games where is their customer market to sell to ? At the very least companies will realise on their own that without the fans this project will fail, but in an ideal world the fans of these clubs will organise a world wide boycott of these companies products. I dont know how the fans of the european clubs feel about this competition, but it is very clear that the fans of english clubs (bar a few mongs on here ) are absolutely outraged and up in arms over it, and I could absolutely see a boycott of these companies being well supported.
Clubs may or may not care if you are I attend the games now, but make no mistake, that is only a view that they can run with in the short-term - no club, regardless of how big it is now, can afford to write off the future generation of fans, who will be largely led by their parents and other fans. My own youngest lad (16) said this morning that he is finished with the club if they leave the premier league for this, and he came to that conclusion with no prompting from me

[GoonerMuzz]

Gary Bloke
2 hrs ·
IFuck UEFA AND FIFA ,Viva the super League
Its about time the clubs regained control over football, my only regret is that the Super League doesn't go far enough.
In my opinion all clubs should ditch these two corrupt bodies altogether and form their own elected bodies to run the game !
For decades now the football has been slowly dying a death because of FIFA and UEFA's shambolic running of football..
These malignant bodies only interest is to generate revenue for themselves so that their bosses can trouser millions of our money into their back pockets
As a result of their greed they have devalued the European trophies by expanding them more and more .
Don't forget these bodies expanded their reach to Kasack fucking stan and made two English clubs fly 6 hours for a euro final during Ramadan ,just think of the contempt for supporters needed to do that .Similarly FIFA awarded the word Cup to Qatar pure bribery and corruption there.
Does anyone really watch these qualifying games anymore ,its not much fun watching semi professional goatherders from a previous soviet satellite huff and puff .
Football has not died by breaking away from these sinking ships we have the first chance for years of regaining control of the game from the evil authorities .
VIVA the SUPERLEAGUE !

Herd i agree in principle with what you say about UEFA and FIFA but do you seriously think the club's will end up running this league?

It will end up being run by the financial backers and you will eventually see changes to the way the game is played to accommodate their needs, think NFL with ad breaks every play etc, more VAR to hype up the tension and so on.

Club's should have broken away from UEFA/FIFA control years ago but this is not the manner in which to do it..... Unfortunately money talks and this is what it is all about, securing more money for the richest club's and their owners, the good of football has nothing to do with it.

[augie]

If this is an alternative to UEFA competitions, not domestic leagues then I'll support the move. As an organisation, UEFA has been proven as being bad for football. A rival organisation would be good for football.
Premier League at the weekend, European Super League midweek then fine.
If it means opting out of the domestic league then, no, I would not support that.

Far be it for me to stand up for the corrupt c.unts at uefa and fifa, but a lot of what is wrong with the game has come from wealthy clubs looking to maximise money. Forming the premier league was all about money, most of the "fit and proper" tests for new owners is about keeping the status quo and not allowing clubs like the geordies break in with new money. Expanding the champs league, firstly to 2 teams and now at four teams for big countries, is all about the bigger clubs putting a safety net to ensure that they will be in it most seasons. Expanding the uefa and world cup finals is again about reducing chances of a big country not qualifying, and of course increasing the number of countries in it will increase the value of tv rights and buys votes.

If uefa had of stood up to the big clubs years ago when they fought to increase the champs league, the chances are that this breakaway would have happened then. Uefa bowed to the big clubs back then, and they have bent over for them every day since. When some people knock my love of nfl, I point out to them the financial parity system that they use and how it is a far better and fairer system - what we have now in football is a game run by greedy owners and clubs, and supported by greedy players, and I hope it crashes and burns

Isn't that what the people setting up the ESL trying to achieve? The soccer equivalent to the NFL. No relegation. Money gets spread amongst the participating clubs and the league administrators.
Now I can understand why so many American sport franchise owners have been buying into football clubs over the last few years, so they can join this league once it has been created.
UEFA / FIFA would never have stood up to the big clubs because the people running those organisation enjoyed being flirted with by the big clubs, because they were never good enough players to play for them.
The American owners don't give a shit about the big football clubs because they have no emotional attachment to football. It's just a profitable business.
Also, UEFA has done fuck all to reinvest money into grass roots football and the women's game. It remains a chauvinistic, racist organisation. Needs to be confined to history, along with FIFA.
The ESL will match the NFL structure. So, with that I'd imagine the financial parity it offers will match that of the NFL.
Sky created the monster that is the premier league and they're fearing for their future because they'll be left with the EFL, F1 and cricket. And F1 will be moving from them to a bigger platform such as Netflix or Amazon in the near future.

You left out a fundamental part of the nfl model which will not be in play here - the salary cap. Yes those salaries are off the chart, but every team has a total salary cap that is equal to their rivals. In football we can agree to pay real madrid and ath madrid equal prize money, but real madrids commercial and merchandise income would blow ath madrid out of the water, so where is the parity in that ?

[Clummo99]

There is no doubt that the importance of fans to the clubs has reduced drastically since the formation of the premier league, but those of you who think that fans boycotting this competition wont matter are very wrong and are very short sighted. Sponsorship money only comes in when companies are trying to sell their product to the fans - if fans stop attending games where is their customer market to sell to ? At the very least companies will realise on their own that without the fans this project will fail, but in an ideal world the fans of these clubs will organise a world wide boycott of these companies products. I dont know how the fans of the european clubs feel about this competition, but it is very clear that the fans of english clubs (bar a few mongs on here ) are absolutely outraged and up in arms over it, and I could absolutely see a boycott of these companies being well supported.
Clubs may or may not care if you are I attend the games now, but make no mistake, that is only a view that they can run with in the short-term - no club, regardless of how big it is now, can afford to write off the future generation of fans, who will be largely led by their parents and other fans. My own youngest lad (16) said this morning that he is finished with the club if they leave the premier league for this, and he came to that conclusion with no prompting from me

TV fans are all that will be important mate. The people through the turnstiles won't matter a jot. They'll go down as Sundries in the credit column.

TV subscriptions, multiple ad breaks, advertising all over the screen whilst the game is going on (exactly as NBCSN and Peacock do now in the States). That's where the revenue will be earned. Not from the likes of us buying a tepid hot dog and an equally tepid pint at half time.