The Super League | FA + PL: New Charter & Fines | UEFA: Settlement

[Damocles]

but even with billionaire owners they can't break through the elite now - not only is it anti competition, football speaking, it's anti competition, financially speaking.

They've carved off a large slice of the pie for themselves, forever.

It is immoral, unethical and absolutely wrong. It is a racket.

You're whole argument seems to be, we've been unofficially shafting everyone for decades, but lets make it official and permanent to shaft everyone else and somehow you've made the leap to think that's ok. If that's your world I don't want anything to do with it. You're welcome to it

No my whole argument is that as they've been shafting everybody unofficially for decades then when they begin to officially shaft people, then saying "well this is shafting people" is not a good argument against the shafting. You're fucked either way.

My whole opinion, and I've said that I'm leaning towards the SL but I see problems with it, is that we should do whatever is best for Manchester City Football Club. Because that is their job as owner and board members. I don't support the Premier League nor the Champions League, I support City and my primary opinion is always going to be that we should do what benefits City the most.

This happens with or without our participation.

 

[SWP's back]

The soul of the club changed either the time we were bought by a human rights abuser who had people shot in the streets or the other human rights abuser who he sold it to who executes gay people and still stones people to death.

This... ermmm... doesn't happen.

 

[jim tolmies perm]

Yep that's it in a nutshell
Even though Roan is normally a ****

 

[Esteban de la Sexface]

This... ermmm... doesn't happen.

yeah, i kind of swerved that and put it down to Damocles being emotional

 

[SWP's back]

There are 2 facts that I keep coming back to with the CL. 1 - Since 2006 there have been 59 English entrants into the Champions League and 58 have been the "big 6".

And 2 - in 29 years since the Champions League format came in, there has been 1 new winner of the European Cup - Chelsea in 2012.

European football is broken beyond repair already, and in reality the super league proposal doesn't change all that much. Its already a closed shop, just not officially.

We don't know how qualifying is supposed to work, but if 1 non "top 6" English team a year is involved, that will make it more inclusive than the Champions League has been for nearly 20 years.

Something had to change. This isn't my preferred direction, but the status quo was almost as bad and who knows where this format will end up after the bartering and brinkmanship and concessions end?

Fair points put forward with facts, so it will definitely be lost in the current forum hyperbole.

 

[Coatigan]

Anyone else think Pep will fuck off? You expect a winner like him to give a toss about a micky mouse competition where you are ever present automatically?

I hope he does. At least i'd feel I can separate this season from it, in a desperate cling onto some moral high ground.

But where the fuck would he go? Game over, very much.

 

[Robinho's Subbuteo]

Football is only about money now, at many levels.

The Aguero moment would extremely likely not have happened without massive amounts of money.

Our club was transformed by Sheikh Mansour - We've all revelled in the trophies that have followed ... but it took A LOT of money to pull that off.

As a massive investor in our club, the Sheikh also has a right to make his investment back and actually make a shed load of money too.

Football is a business now ... not a sport.

 

[Blue Mist]

What every e is forgetting is most of the clubs supposedly breaking away have their own TV subscription channel. They demanded the right to show champs league matches on them and Uefa said no.
The reason this announcement was made yesterday was to shit on the Uefa statement being made today about reform. What is likely to happen is uefa cave in and grant Rag TV and the rest 4 matches a year and the corrupt cartel will all carry on as normal.

 

[vicblueman]

They've been to a UCL final - something we've never managed.

Shit club ,shit fans ,hate them cocky cockney bastards , but also dislike the management staff & owners of MCFC at the moment to !

 

[coolcity]

Agree its something to tie us down as we get stronger. You only need to look at Barca, a billion in debt. The only way these clubs could catch up is with a cash cow and it sounds like that's exactly what this is.

 

[shemnel]

Football is only about money now, at many levels.

The Aguero moment would extremely likely not have happened without massive amounts of money.

Our club was transformed by Sheikh Mansour - We've all revelled in the trophies that have followed ... but it took A LOT of money to pull that off.

As a massive investor in our club, the Sheikh also has a right to make his investment back and actually make a shed load of money too.

Football is a business now ... not a sport.

all fair points. none of them will see me watching another City match under the new formats (should they go ahead)

 

[Damocles]

yeah, i kind of swerved that and put it down to Damocles being emotional

Yeah I got that wrong but the larger point in that arguing for the soul of the club in 2021 like we've still got Wardle or Bernstein around seems a bit late in the day

 

[inbetween]

I'm simply stunned Ric. I feel let down on a massive scale. Clearly nobody at the club gives a **** about what we think or care about.

Why should the club care? There isn't a club in a league anywhere that truly cares about its fans providing that they are coughing up the dosh.

At the end of the day the fella going to the game is worth far less. A TV sponsor will pay billions and then billions more but the fans pay the same amount every year.

For me I support two teams, I support city obviously but then I also support a non-league team where the fan experience is miles better. Non-league has been killed by the pandemic whereas for city it doesn't matter because every single fans season ticket added together doesn't even pay Kev's wages.

 

[MarsLlama]

Seen the suggestion that by leaving the ECA, we are ineligible for the Champions League? Does that mean PSG have won it then?

Don't think that would be allowed to happen. Imagine if PSG were awarded the Champions League and then announced their intention to join the Super League?

 

[sir baconface]

Although unhappy, this is modern football. Those in our own ranks who wanted Messi at all costs, who condemned dissenters for having an “ickle Citeh” mentality or who think Sterling’s worth a shiny new contract, have no right to moan. (If indeed they are.)

Football sold its soul years ago. This is realpolitik and the sad reality is City either go along with it or get left behind. I don’t particularly blame our club, and strongly doubt they are among the shakers and movers, but nor am I proud.

Meanwhile one of my local clubs, Dover Athletic, have had to furlough all players and staff in order to survive. Consequently they start next season with a fine and 12-point deduction for failing to fulfil their fixtures. Hopefully I’ll get along to a couple of their games next year.

How many of us will stop supporting City? Very few, I imagine. We’ll wring our hands and carry on regardless. Much as the club is doing.

 

[PragueBlue]

I would have preferred the status quo but that was never an option. Let's see what the next days/weeks bring.

 

[MarsLlama]

The radio silence from the club on this so far is pretty telling. They're not even trying to sell the merits of this to us as fans, because there aren't any. I pity the poor bastards who are manning the club's social media channels today who will probably cop most of the flak.

I know at least one person working in City's media department who's deeply unhappy about this, and you're right they'll be the ones who have to deal with the backlash.

 

[carlosthejackal]

It’s fucking laughable that these six English clubs deem themselves superior to the likes of Everton , Villa, Newcastle , Sunderland, Wolves, Leeds , Huddersfield etc etc all great clubs with tradition and history, every club in this country should be cherished . Supporters of these clubs should be allowed dreams and aspirations, they have as much right as we do to hope one day it might be their turn .

 

[PistonBlue]

I respect this opinion but I want you to sit in the cold light of day and think - what were the options put in front of us that we should have taken?

If we pick to not go, we're essentially relegating ourselves to the standard of team currently in the Europa League at best. We'll get some decent players in and we could have a go maybe at the league on a fluke season but we don't play in the biggest competition so we'll always be behind the top clubs. No Pep, no De Bruyne, no Haaland or Messi or Kane.

The decision was this - do you want a morality that harks for a competitive standard that hasn't existed for 30 years or do you want trophies, top players and big games?

Because there's the biggest rub in all of this - this isn't the death of competition. Competition hasn't existed in the Premier League for decades. Why purposely limit the potential of the club to chase not just an idea of morality but a totally false one that doesn't even exist?

I feel like a lot of you are facing the battles that I have already mentally faced in 2008 when Sheikh Mansour took over. We were to become a global club, one of the biggest in the world, and we would eventually be the people who were doing the smooth talking in the hallways of UEFA. I settled with the idea that a globalised Man City was what we were and celebrated the idea that our club could become something akin to a New York Yankees or Barcelona or Chicago Bulls. An instantly recognisable symbol of excellence in their sport.

Agnelli, Perez, Glazer, etc, they're business men. They want us in it because the league will generate significantly more money with us in it. Football has always been a competition in the boardroom as much as it is on the pitch. I'm not really pissed at this. They tried to stop us and they couldn't so they invite us to the group to get some reflected glory. Was always going to happen; what's that quote about how they laugh at you first? Our boys in the boardroom are savvy operators and they'll know that these guys wouldn't piss on them if they were on fire but they need them.

My point being that you should try to think about this and let the details come out. City aren't dead nor have they changed, they're just potentially playing in a different European competition. The people there are all the same as they were yesterday. Phil Foden still has a shit fringe. Almost all the complaints I've seen about this are about what "might" happen. Cheerleaders (?!), no away fans, a bunch of literal shit like that. People are overreacting. Let's see what it looks like before we start throwing away 40 years of support - it's not even been a day yet.

Mate, for me we have just officially become everything our fanbase has always despised about self serving twats like utd and liverpool. That just doesn't sit well with me at all.
Maybe I'll get over it, maybe I wont. I don't know

 

[hilts]

How? I don't understand how us deciding to play in another competition is stealing the club from us

Because the vast majority of fans, want to compete in a domestic league and domestic cups and qualify for Europe based on their achievements. Being in a closed league based on pure luck as to your standing in the game at one particular moment in time isn’t what most want.