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

Would you be happy if City joined this European Super League?

  • Yes

    Votes: 109 5.3%

  • No

    Votes: 1,954 94.7%
  • Total voters
    2,063
Stockton Heath Blue said:
I'm not suggesting Sheikh Mansour is any better
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He is though.
The difference between our owner and that wanker is ours isn’t a money grabbing twat, he’s done so much good, not just for the club but for Manchester.
This was the first real major mistake he’d made since the takeover and that’s why we’re not trying to drive him out of the club.
Everyone makes mistakes, some can be unforgivable.
But for me up until a few days ago the club was perfectly run and fans were always respected.
Unlike Henry, Glazers and Kroenke etc.. who only care about money.
 
terraloon said:
I don’t know if you have been watching the hype those saviours of football-aka Sky Sports, are saying about how the clubs have broken the PL rule book but yet again the coverage is not just biased they are deliberately mis quoting the applicable PL rule.

Each year the rule book is reprinted and is only relevant to that season. So the 20/21 season is about season 20/21. I know that’s obvious but bear with me.

Here’s the rule that Sky are suggesting the 6 have broken

L.9.
Except with the prior written approval of the Board, during the Season a Club shall not enter or play its senior men’s first team in any competition other than:
L.9.1. the UEFA Champions League;
L.9.2. the UEFA Europa League;
L.9.3. the F.A. Cup;
L.9.4. the F.A. Community Shield;
L.9.5. the Football League Cup; or
L.9.6. competitions sanctioned by the County Association of which it is a member.

Unless I misread it , and that’s possible, how have any of the clubs entered the 20/21 version of the ESL?
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Spot-on. SKY have been running this fake story for 48 hours. The rule is clear. They can't retrospectively deduct points. We are still in the PL and never joined the ESL. Even if we had it would only apply to next season not 20/21.
 
danielwood5 said:
Great words there and really well put, I agree with them all.

It's been a weird couple of days and the emotions have been all over the place for me personally.

I think mostly I just felt drained by it all, especially at the thought of what this would have done to football in this country and what would have been taken away from everyone else.

I did find it hard to be particularly outraged though, over the last twelve years there's been so much ridiculous political infighting and goings on that it's hard to care about football beyond what happens on the pitch. It's more a case of just taking each game as it's own as a separate entity separate from everything else going on off the pitch. If we win, lose or draw as long as the result was fair and square then I'm happy.

In a world where part of being a modern football supporter means having to also have a solid grasp of Middle Eastern socio-political events, American venture capitalism, media manipulation, the complexities of multi billion companies financial affairs, Far East betting syndicates, how bots spread football related misinformation on social media, the frame rate of television cameras and how that relates to the relative velocity of two athletes, not to mention how to tell if someone is a journalist, a blogger, an online troll or a paid media mouthpiece of a football club/country and which ones from these groups wank off dogs eventually it just all becomes a bit tiring.

I don't think anyone would have thought as we were watching Stuart Pearce think a footballing masterstroke was putting David James up front as a striker that just a short time in the future this is where we would be; a load of people up in arms about a scheme to protect the wealth of a few clubs that would eventually destroy football while just a week earlier people were complaining that the current plan in place to protect the wealth of a few clubs that would eventually destroy football didnt go far enough and was too weak.

What a load of old bollocks this entire shit show has become.
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There are many things wrong with the game that you highlight. This venture woukd have just made it much worse. Clubs, UEFA and FIFA need to be forced to make the game fairer, not destroy it by creating a distinct separate path for the richest owners to make more money in the short term that ultimately leads to reducing the game to a dividend scheme.

I hope this sorry episode mobilises people everywhere who love the game to say, you can't use our game as a trinket or a way to enriched yourself. It will be interesting to see what will happen. UEFA can't try to be the good guys here, as we know they aren't. It's the people's game but they seem to think they are the only people who matter. They would be advised to remember that their job us to improve football at every level and not just for those who have power. That power has been shown to be dependent upon supporters accepting it. If they undermine what it's all about to us then they and their plans have been routed.

The next week's will be interesting and uneasy for a lot of people running the game, and not just the six in England who totally misjudged their own supporters, but the governing bodies. Let's see if their incompetence can be rectified. No laughing at the back.
 
Coatigan said:
Did they really need to beat Uefa's vote on CL reforms? I'm not sure. That is claimed but I dont think it is relevant.

Agree though, they had to rush it through, but possibly not for that.
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The desperate state of their finances and the scale of the losses due to covid?
 
yankblue said:
Cool story.

The same AC Milan that is absolutely broke and hasn't finished above 5th in a weak Serie A for 10 years? Whos last Champions League title was 15 years ago? Who hasn't even been able to qualify for the champions league from a weaker league in a decade now?

Or the Inter Milan side who is again, broke, and hasn't won a declining Serie A in 10 years, finishing outside the Champs league spots more often then not?

When's the last time either of those 2 clubs were serious draws or major powers? At the moment they are has beens.

Oh but they have the history so I suppose they should be given a free pass then yeah?

Fucking Spurs have more of a right to call themselves a top 12 European club than those two at the moment.
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LOL im with you 100%, AC Milan hasn't been relevant in a decade (inter not much better)... Porto AND Benefica have just as good a shout.Not even going to mention the Dutch sides that used to dominate. While we're at it, why don't we include Forrest and Hamburg??? Spurs in there is a joke.
 
SWP's back said:
A no-brainer as in no thinking person believes fit a nanosecond that it would ever happen?

The SL nearly happened because the “big” clubs want more guaranteed “big” games. Going back to the European Cup is the antithesis of that and would only ensure a breakaway did happen.
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No-brainer as it would make the product instantly better.

Agree that it won't happen. Something has to happen though. The amoubt of games is killing the product. If I'm going to commend the SL gang for one thing its that they have put light on this. We dont need nor want tournaments like the CL, EL, Euros and the Worls Cup with a million teams and games starting every other minute. It waters out the product, it takes away from the magic of it and feels less prestigeous and less exclusive. Today we have fans of teams like Burnley giddy and proud finally qualifying for Europe only for their club and management to try and get them out before the group stages so they can focus on not getting relegated in the Prem. It's nothing in it for them because the EL has been made into a complete secound-rate tournament. A team like Portugal can win the Euros by playing absolute shite football and not winning a game before the semi-finals because there are so many teams in it the format hardly works so you can sneak in by finishing 3rd in your group.

If I was at UEFA I would walk in tomorrow to pitch 3 new tournaments. The premium one, the CL would be the NFL format, 12, 14 or 16 teams depending on how many "lower quality" champions you want for the sake of the product. Lets say 12 to make it easy. Then next year before christmas we would have 2 leagues of 6, 10 games home and away for each team. The two groups consisting of Man City, Inter, Madrid/Barca/Atleti, PSG/Lille, Bayern, Ajax, Sporting, Besiktas and then 4 teams from different smaller european leagues qualifying through knockouts. More than enough good match-ups there Then after Christmas the two groups meet each other based on their positions in their table. You have now guaranteed smaller clubs 10 games in Europe, and you have given them a fair pathway to a great european journey, while being able to maintain the tournaments integrity with still having the majority being some absolute powerhouses thats in there because they have proven they are the best in their country.

The secound tournament is similiar to EL today, but maybe with slighly less teams because currently the EL is bloated as hell. If you put the 2-4/5 in England, Spain, Germany, France and the likes into a tournament like this it suddenly becomes very high-quality and nowhere near the tournament you try to avoid like it is today.

What this will do is help spread the revenue over more countries, and it will in time help spread the best players over more clubs. Today all the top clubs can pretty much guarantee CL-qualification(and with that, money). So they can stockpile the talent. But if you make the premium competition more exslusive you avoid that. You cant guarantee winning the league in England. Sure atm there is mostly one winner in the other big leagues, but give Leverkusen or Dortmund, or Marseille or whatever a couple of years in the new EL and this new football landscape this creates and suddenly they have built a team that can compete with the likes of Bayern and PSG over time. It also offers different opportunities for the likes of us. If we dont win the league one year (which happens way too often :P) we miss the opportunity to play in the CL but we get to play and try to win a high-quality EL that we dont get to compete in every year. Rather than how it is now, we have to have a disaster of a season and finish far down the table to even qualify for it. Maybe give the EL winners a spot in the CL like it is now as well

The third comp is to not exclude the midtable teams. Meaning if your midtable in the big leagues you have something to aim for even if a top 6/4 placement is out of reach. It also gives an opportunity to get more smaller teams into europe to experience meeting some relatively decent teams. This would obviously be less prestigeous than the other two, but offers a fun experience and seperates the level of teams based on their league position rather than bloat the other tournaments which is the problem now. In a tournament like this, hypothetically teams like Arsenal, Villa, Leeds or Pool would play in it next year so will still offer some big names any given year

I would pitch it but it definitely would get downvoted lol. But personally I love the idea
 
Postman Pep said:
The desperate state of their finances and the scale of the losses due to covid?
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Pretty much nail on the head there with the timing of it I think...

I wouldn't at all be surprised if we see at least one of these ESL driving forces come close to (or actually do) go the wall before next season starts - Barca would be my bet.
 
MarsLlama said:
It would make the Europa League great and the Champions League completely irrelevant until the quarter-finals at the earliest. Who wants to watch City in a group with Club Brugge, Rangers and APOEL and then a round of 16 tie vs the incredible Red Star Belgrade?

Your suggestion would kill the Champions League dead.
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Change the format, explained it in another post.

But I do see the point of the "secound tournament" being the better tournament simply because of the amount of quality teams. But we also have to find a way to spread the revenue out and make more countries competetive
 
mannion18 said:
Something like this has been threatened for a long time & whether or not city were the inside guys to take this down I am unsure.
What it has highlighted again is that these clubs do not see this a game for the fans but only to maximize profits at every opportunity.
The Champions league has not been a competition worthy of its title since its creation.
The fact none champions can win the competition whilst losing numerous games along the way should have been the end of the competition.
But having numerous media outlets who are struggling for income (mainly due to the dross they print) actively promoting the teams they believe will produce the clicks to keep the money rolling has given all these teams the self entitlement they have. As they believe the utter garbage written about them.
The champions league needs a total overhaul and not the one that is currently on the table.
City need to take this opportunity to stand up and say that this is the time for change to promote competition and reward current achievements not past.
Scrap and seedings or coefficients and reward winners of the leagues an automatic place regardless of the country they compete in.
Perform draws for groups from one big bowl whereby it all comes down to the luck of the draw and not allowing the bigger clubs an easier ride out of the groups.
Fans want excitement, fans want to believe that no matter who they support and how much history or income their club has they have just as much of a chance to progress.
Historic achievements should not give you a free pass.
This would be a start, working out salary caps and set transfer budgets should be looked at too all in an effort to get back to what the game is about, tactics coaching and a pure desire to win. If the playing field evened a little there maybe more surprises along the way.
We have been lucky to have been invested in so heavily but I am pretty sure that the majority of us at this point do not want us just to get to the position where we win because we can out spend the rest. We want to continue to win as we have been doing by purchased strategically whilst employing one of the best tacticians,motivators,revolutionists and perfectionist the game has ever seen.
I’d like to think I am not seeing this through blue tinted spectacles but I truely believe we have earned every trophy we have ever won through hard work, determination, skill and professionalism from top to bottom, and not purely on the amount of money we have spent. Yes it has helped, but Mark Hughes, Van Gaal,the not so special one and even Whiskey nose in the early days has shown it’s not all about the money you spend yes it helps but that does not guarantee success.
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Agree with all of this except (City need to take this opportunity to stand up). I don't think we are in any position to push for change at the moment. I think along with the greedy 11 our influence is diminished and we should probably keep our heads down for a while and concentrate on winning football matches.
 
Esteban de la Sexface said:
you don't think they've done anything wrong?
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I don't know, just my way of dealing with the way I felt about the whole thing, I think my opinion that it was a sting maybe is a way to cope with being so utterly let down, I must admit I was in disbelief and if found out then yes punished as hard as possible
 
kaz7 said:
Where are we ? We look stupid after everyone else has apologised, maybe we are not sorry


One bad move after another
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Have Chelsea?

I have a theory that we are currently wrongly seen as the saviour of English footy at the moment while the other clubs apologise. Perhaps some PR firm have said “an apology only draws attention to your error while at the moment you and Chelsea are primarily seen as the teams that brought the ESL down....be remembered for that as you can’t get anymore out of this”

Just a mad theory.
 
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kaz7 said:
Where are we ? We look stupid after everyone else has apologised, maybe we are not sorry


One bad move after another
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There’s ‘dog sorry’ and cat sorry. ‘Sorry I got caught’

I suspect we are hearing a lot of the latter sort from various clubs so far.
 
give it to gordon said:
Bloody hell even my local tory mp is getting involved lol

European Soccer `Super League`
English football fans have prevailed the self-styled “Big Six” Clubs have withdrawn their support and the `European Football (super) League has crumbled. At least for the time being. Now we have to make sure that it does not rear its ugly head again.
Let us be clear: the proposal to create this European league was not, as the embryonic League`s Chairman, Real Madrid President Florentino Perez, sought to claim, “to save football”. It was about big, foreign, money. It might have been good, in the short financial term, for the handful of participants but it would have been bad for the British and the European game and it would have been particularly bad for the smaller clubs who have always looked forward to emerging as the `giant killers` that have injected so much excitement into the game.
It is not as though the `Big Six` English clubs are even at the top of the charts but by building a protective financial wall around themselves they sought to insulate against a loss of form and potential relegation .That might fit neatly into the game plans of Russian oligarchs and American business investors seeking to guard their assets but could there be anything much more boring than seeing the same cluster of `elite` clubs fielding their over-priced muscle to play each other every week? A Saturday afternoon watching paint dry might be rather more exciting.
It is now clear that the Managers and the players of the clubs lined up to join the `European Football League` were kept in the dark about the secretive discussions taking place as were, so far as we can ascertain, UEFA, FIFA and our own domestic governing bodies. And as were, of course, the people who matter most – the loyal fans who on good days and bad days, come rain or shine and whether on the way up or on the way down, have stood by their clubs at every level and are the bedrock of what the football community and family is supposed to be about. They were taken for granted as Senor Perez and his buddies tried to take them for a ride.
For the great and the good of The FA and UEFA and FIFA, not all of whom have in the past always been squeaky clean, the creation of an `EFL came as a monumental shock because of the potential for the loss of their own power to control the game. And Money. While much sabre-rattling took place not only in Whitehall but in the corridors of footy-power and we were told that “We will talk to them” and “if they do not listen then we will take sanctions against them” the nature of those sanctions was desperately vague. These are private businesses and if they want to play with each other and if the star players believe that their bread is buttered on that side and are willing to literally play the game then how are you going to stop them?
Looking to the future we are up against big bucks and a little lateral thinking is required.
Football matches require grounds and those grounds and the fans visiting them again, when Covid permits, have to be serviced. There is crowd control and traffic control and policing and fire and health and safety requirements that have to be met. And if, suddenly, not only those attending the matches but all of us were to decline to patronise the burger chain or the drinks supplier or anyone else that gives these Behemoths succour then that might begin to send a clear message that while we welcome innovation and investment in sport and that while we are not opposed to reasonable profit we do not like naked greed and that the fans that support all football clubs have to be treated with respect. If they are taken for granted we could go a step further and boycott all of the brands that are advertised around the grounds or on the teams` strip and if we did not buy all of that expensive sportswear merchandise either then we would begin to hit the EFL club owners in the only place where it really hurts them – in the wallet. The threat may have gone away for the moment but it could return and we have to be prepared – and the club`s owners have to know that we are prepared - to all play our part in any future battle for the soul of football.
In the meantime, there are all of the many fan-orientated and honourable teams to get behind and there is also Parliament`s secret weapon, Dame (as she must surely become) Tracey Crouch. She has rightly been asked to continue her inquiry into the future of the game in Britain and if I were the owner of a “Big Six” football club I would not put too much of my carefully squirreled away fortune on the chances of coming out of a skirmish with our Tracey unscathed. We shall all await her findings with very great interest indeed!
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Which MP is it? We've got a brand spanking new tory as our MP but I'm not even sure he's real as he never seems to vote in the commons, speak out or actually do anything!
 
RandomJ said:
Has anyone from the club even apologised yet?
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What is it you want the club to apologise for? All this "dear fans we are sorry we upset you and wont do it again" bullshit does nobody any good. I would much prefer to hear an explanation of what was actually going on, as it is all we got was a generic statement from the twelve clubs late on sunday saying they were going to start a super league on weekday nights, thats it, thats all they said.
 
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