nut flush gooner wrote:I remember the 80s well (old git yes I know), during that time manure had the money but pool had the trophies. The general consensus was that money didn't buy trophies back then. Money wise footballers used to earn what is a modest wage these days for many (I saw spurs payroll stats in the late 80s).augie wrote:I know that everything is relative but look throughout the football and you will see multiple examples of rich benefactors splashing the cash on their team and distorting the sense of fairness in the game - for me people tend to focus only on the top tier of football but wasn't there a non league team who received a big injection of cash from a wealthy backer a few years ago ? Personally, if it isn't a loan to the club, I don't see the problem - how can uefa or fifa tell a club that they cannot accept a donation from a wealthy backer ? Football may not be like your mainstream businesses but nor is it like the nfl where salary caps are enforced - football is a worldwide sport and it is impossible to enforce salary cap rules that stretch to almost every corner of the world so if the clubs are not running up debts I don't see the issue.
I really don't see where citeeh or psg have a greater responsibility to the game itself - they buy players in an accepted transfer market and they sign players as per fifa regulations so they have broken no rules there. Yes their wealth has allowed them buy the best players but for years richer clubs have been hoovering up the elite talent while they were forced to watch on so now it is their turn to be the kingpins and more luck to them. I remember back in the 80's manure were spending considerably more than the rest of the clubs in a bid to be successful again and this will be the way forever and a day. If we are honest, the only reason there has been opposition to citeeh and psg's spending is because it is producing the type of results that manure were unable to obtain back then - jealousy is driving this campaign and I would stake my life that the chavs compliance with FFP is nothing to do with respecting fair play, but is more down to the fact that citeeh could now blow them out of the water any time they want and they are no longer the big boys of the premier league
Btw, you could also argue that the reason why our ticket prices are so high is that we have to generate funds from somewhere so that we can meet the 8m per season contract of the "specialist in failure"
Basically what you are saying is, its ok to be owned by a stinking rich arab or oligarch and get first dibs for many world class players (that wouldn't touch city or chelski with a barge pole a few years back). If Dennis Bergkamp or Thierry Henry where in their mid 20s right now, do you honestly think they would end up at our club?
Having rich owners that are prepared to splash the cash, means these clubs can spend beyond their means which is wrong. It's nothing to do with jealousy its about having football clubs on a level playing field in all aspects of their operations. City quite often don't sell out their home fixtures the same applies to Chelsea. There needs to be a sense of reality that football clubs musn't spew hundreds of millions of pounds in their pursuit of glory. Otherwise it will just be a case of the clubs with the richest owners winning most/all the trophies. Manure have been the only exception over the last ten years and that was with a manager of the like that we will never see in our lifetime again (even ahead of shankly/ busby). UEFA are spot on at trying to regulate these clubs
Its the overall salary roll at the club that has an influence over season ticket prices. I think you will find wengers salary is probably a lot less than 10% of the total figure.
Am I saying that it is ok to have a mega rich owner giving their club first dibs on the top players ? Absolutely I am
I accept that would probably rules us out of signing the top tier of players (who we don't actually look to sign anyway ) but Bergkamp and Henry joined us back in the day when we were far from being a mega financially powered club anyway. You point to citeeh and the chavs not selling out home fixtures but have you ever noticed the amount of empty seats at the grove for home games ? I would suggest that the home game against the scum is now the only sure fire sell out these daysYou talk about having all football clubs on a level playing field, but you do realise that is an ideology that you will NEVER see happen ? Are you suggesting that next season burnley should have the same budget that we have ? If you are not saying that then you have to accept that a club like citeeh will flex their superior financial muscle when it suits them - if citeeh generated an extra 200m by a share issue that was bought entirely by monsoor, would you and could uefa have any grounds to complain ? Manure generated extra funds last season by issuing extra shares so would it be acceptable for citeeh to generate funds in the same way ? I suspect that had citeeh generated 200m in this manner then it would still have been met with widespread opposition
Lastly I have to admit that my views opposing FFP are based almost exclusively on the actions and words coming out of our own club - I feel in recent years that we as a club are simply using the FFP pipe dream as an excuse not to compete
We want uefa to stop the bold rich kids from spending their own money and allow us to win a league cheaply 
We want to keep moaning about how unfair it all is and in doing so, distract everybody from noticing that we are not even spending the 100m+ that we have sitting in the bank - in other words we want uefa to hand us trophies cos we are not willing to help ourselves try and win any 
Maybe, IF we spent all the resources at our disposal and were still coming up short, then I might change my tune but as things stand I am absolutely opposed to FFP and feel that the agenda is being driven by an unambitious, gutless shower of cowardly serial losers 
You could certainly argue that citeeh's trophies allied to star players like yaya and kun make them a big club for sponsors to be associated with. Conversely you could also argue that a club that hasn't won anything in 9 years and who continue to be a feeder club to the big clubs, are not worthy of significant sponsorship deals. Some will argue that we are a worldwide club unlike citeeh, but cast your mind back a decade and ask yourselves if the chavs had even a small % of the support worldwide that they now have - winning trophies brings new fans and citeeh's worldwide popularity will continue to grow as long as they win trophies.
