2 points 1) in Reference to the constant mention of City and "Money" 2) cost of Tickets
In regard to the constant mention of City and Money in the media. It does get a little tiring. I was listening to City v Wigan on radio Manchester and the Wigan commentator Paul Rowley said on several occasions about the cost of Wigans whole team being only a few million, versus for example the cost of Citys' 3 substitutes that were used ( over £ 77million).
Chelsea, Utd etc never seem to get this.
Did Utd not spend £ 34 million recently on Mata, £ 27 million on Fellaini in the Summer and of course have spent vast amounts on Van Persie, Rooney, Ferdinand, Veron, Berbabtov, Ferdinand, Anderson, Nani, Valencia, Young, etc over the last 10 years, but during that time did commentators\pundits\the media constantly refer to a players cost each time Utd were on TV on the radio or in the press or say Utd have bought titles ? No
Did Chelsea not spend big on Matic, Zouma, Saleh etc in January even though the recouped some from the Mata sale.The same Chelsea who in the last decade bought Shevchenko, Torres, etc and many others at a hefty price, but during that time did commentators\pundits\the media constantly refer to a players cost each time Chelsea are on TV on the radio or in the press or say Chelsea have bought titles ? No
Did Real Madrid not this summer spend over £ 85 million on Bale and before that vast amounts on Ronaldo, Kaka, Benzema, Modric to name a few ? but do commentators\pundits\the media constantly refer to a players cost each time Real are on TV on the radio or in the press or say Real have bought titles ? No
Did Barcelona not this summer spend well over £ 50 million on Neymar ? but do commentators\pundits\the media constantly refer to a players cost each time Barcelona are on TV on the radio or in the press or say Barca have bought titles ? No
Thus there is some bias present at least.
Often this bias gets reasoned in that clubs like Utd, Liverpool, Bayern, Real Madrid etc have "earned" their money, but if you think of it, the only income clubs "earn£ as such is what they take on match days (tickets, programme sales, food sales etc) and sales of club merchandise (shirts etc.), and maybe some extra activities clubs have i.e. ground use for pop concerts, corporate events etc. Overall this is now a relatively small proportion of a clubs overall income as the main income is from TV rights\deals, sponsorship deals etc and this type of income cannot be said to be "earned" surely.
What is the difference between a company (like Nike, Adidas, Puma etc.) giving money to a club via a sponsorship deal compared to an individual like Sheikh Mansour giving money to City. None of it is earned, its given to a club. Thus this idea from other supporters of other clubs of "earning money" is nonsense really.
Urd have a £ 600 miillion 10 year deal with Nike just announced.
Arsenal a £ 30 million per year deal with Puma
Bayern £ 23.6 million per year shirt deal with Deutsche Telekom and vast amounts from Audi and adidas
Real Madrid are ffectovely state funded in Spain.
Barcelona and Real get 90% off the total TV money in Spain.
How is any of that money earned ? Its basically a gift from a company.
It would be an interesting exercise if someone actually took the time and found out just from
tickets sales, other matchday sales (programmes , foodd and beverages etc.) and merchandise sales what each club actually "earns" and how that compares with City. Then we could all accept what clubs actually earn thier money to spend as they wish.
Undoubtedly Arsenal, Utd, Bayern etc, earn more than City on matchdays because of their current higher stadium capacity (City may close this gap with the stadium expansion), but also in Arsenals' case they charge a great deal more for their tickets, thus ripping off supporters (so would some clubs earn more sImply by being better at fleecing supporters ?) .
It is said tickets in Germany are cheap, but is this not mostly because they have standing areas which are cheaper ? and it would be interesting to see what the general variation in cost is at German Clubs when thinking only of seating and comparing that with a club like City. i.e. how would the lowest cost of a seat at Bayern compare with the lowest at City, and similarly the middle range cost of seats and the upper range cost of seats ? One thing the new Sky and BT deal for the Premier league could have done was give the new deal to the clubs but put a clause in saying that each club has to have say at least say 15% of its seats\tickets for each match fixed at a maximum price for the length of deal (maybe working out at £ 10 - £ 15 per game max.). This would have helped drive costs down for supporters.
In the end to have a true even playing field for all clubs (because FFP does not provide this, it simply would allow the traditionally big clubs to stay on top via such as having higher "deals" with companies) and eliminate this talk of money and buying success we would need 2 things:
1) a player salary cap set by Ueafa across Europe (and adjusted to take into account tax variations)
2) a maximum transfer fee introduced and set by Ueafa across Europe for all player transfers (or all transfer fees sorted by an independent Ueafa tribunal team with no appeals allowed)
Neither of which will ever happen of course
