It's history repeating itself. Before the PL came along, the usual suspects regularly threatened the Football League with a breakaway. The ending of the gate money sharing agreement was an early result, which caused the financial playing field to tilt noticeably in favour of those clubs like the rags, Liverpool, Everton & Arsenal, who all had big crowds and got to keep all their match-day revenues. Look at who won the title after 1981 when that was introduced if you want proof of that. The FA resented the Football League's hold over the professional game so, when the PL was proposed, they heavily encouraged it thinking it would break the dominance of the EFL and put them back in a strong position. They underestimated the power of money though and the FA is no more relevant that it ever was, probably less so.They wouldn't be in this situation if the hadn't sucked the devil's cock in the first place.
At the time the Champions League was created, UEFA should have taken full command of it & told the 'big' clubs that they abide by their rules or fuck off on their own.
See how much interest they would have got playing each other, every week, rather than playing in their domestic leagues & the 'real' european Cup. Some would have broken ranks immediately.
Abu Dhabi and Qatar certainly won't be doing anything together in the immediate future.Considering our owner has Florentino Perez on speed dial and has business dealings with him, I highly doubt Madrid are behind trying to leg us over.
Barca and Bayern, hardly a stretch, is it?
Anyhow, consider any fall out, Abu Dhabi and Qatar would simply finance their own version of an elite comp, with money far beyond the realms of others.
I think our approach will depend on what happens next. I would imagine conversations between the club and Uefa will pretty quickly establish if there is to be any 'follow up' action. If there is, that will largely dictate what is said in public. If there isnt, i would imagine that things will go quiet pretty quickly.Now that the story has been run, how do City respond.
1) We might be anxious to move the agenda on to something else. i.e. stay quiet,
2) We might want to issue a public statement and set the record straight from our perspective, but that would prolong a debate that is possibly damaging
3) We could brief our argument to the press and drip-feed our own opinion / 'revelations'.
Now that the story has been run, how do City respond.
1) We might be anxious to move the agenda on to something else. i.e. stay quiet,
2) We might want to issue a public statement and set the record straight from our perspective, but that would prolong a debate that is possibly damaging
3) We could brief our argument to the press and drip-feed our own opinion / 'revelations'.
Whoever flagged Mubadala links to Softbank has found the smoking gun, brilliant detective work.
Now you have established motive.
And guess who is playing both sides and sits on both the Uefa and Fifa executive boards?
That's right, our old friend David Gill. Who also sits on the board at United.
You don't know that. Der SPiegel could have got their information elsewhere. That it suits Bayern etc is obvious, but coincidence does not equal cause. People always make this mistake.