Reflections on the "oil money" matter

[TFC]

In the spirit of @aguero93:20's answer, fuck the haters. I feel no need to justify anything.

 

[citizenyank76]

I always find it hilarious when fans discuss the ethics of investment and corporate responsibility in football. You have every right to bleed for your club and sing chant from the tops of the trees.... but that doesn't give them some sort of fiduciary responsibility when flashing the cash. What did you buying that pint and a pie, suddenly make you a stockholder?! There is no large amounts of guilt free money invested into football. It don't exist. Those Turkish clubs who have arms dealers fund their transfers just don't have good bankers! The world was shocked when the Ranger's success was mostly funded by gigantic tax dodge. but if anything, I'll bet other clubs have gotten away with murder (they just didn't get caught.) Maybe there was a time when your club president was a banker who could fund purchases with carefully timed sales and investments, but that's gone. And it is like that in Europe, US and China, wherever. Bob Dylan put it best, "money doesn't talk. It shouts."

 

[RandomJ]

The Spuds fans have been clinging onto this since we gave them a good spanking yesterday. They even have a thread on their forums asking what they would do it they got taken over and all of them deluding themselves saying they would walk away from the game. It's such bollocks. Every fan of every club in the world would give their left bollock to have our resources, our owners, our manager and our style of football. It's pure jealously that we leapfrogged them while they tread water.

 

[oldius]

I heard no complaints, from any of the traditional 4, that they had an unfair advantage financially and should have restrictions imposed on their growth. In any business, you have to rise to the level of the competition or your business suffers.

 

[gordondaviesmoustache]

In spite of Liverpool's dominance in the late 70's, thirteen different clubs won the First Division between 1960 and 1981, including the likes of Burnley, Ipswich, Forest and Derby.

There was a reason for this; the TV and gate money was split along fairly equitable lines. In terms of gate receipts, it was a system that had been in place since the 19th century and ensured that money was redistributed throughout the game in a manner that tried to create a level playing field, as much as possible.

Some clubs were uncomfortable with this. Some clubs thought it was unfair that 'smaller' clubs were benefitting from their larger supporter-base and so they took steps to address it. Five clubs in particular took it upon themselves to reshape the way that finances in football were distributed: united, Liverpool, Everton, Spurs and Arsenal. It started with Football League gate receipts in the early 80's, thereafter allowing home clubs to keep all of the receipts from ticket sales in league games (the old rules remaining in the FA Cup). This clearly benefitted the larger clubs with bigger capacities. The way that TV money was distributed was next, in terms of the terrestrial deal - more money would be kept by those at the top, at the expense of those at the bottom. However this didn't go far enough for some clubs and so a few years later a breakaway league was formed, The Premier League, with the top division keeping all their TV money to themselves. Throughout all those events, certain clubs threatened to go off on their own if their demands weren't met. Principally, the same five that made the moves around gate receipts, although tbf, other clubs, City included, were either compliant or acquiescent with the direction of travel. There was lots of money to be made, after all.

All these moves were designed by the 'top' clubs to concentrate more and more money at the top of the English game. It is concomitant of this approach, that those at the bottom would receive less, at least in relative terms. These clubs sought to enrich themselves by changing the rules to favour themselves, and it is undeniable that for them, it worked and enabled them to 'earn' their money 'the right way' for a sustained period.

More and more money flooded into the upper echelons of the English game, as a serendipitous cocktail of global media and technological advances conflated to create a perfect storm for those who were prescient enough to engineer their own good fortune at the right time. And it worked wonderfully for a number of years. The rich got even richer, on and off the pitch, whilst the rest of the game barely managed to keep its head above water. However, as the Premier League brand and the reflected glory that accompanies it continued to grow, people outside the party started to want a piece of the action. People like Roman Abramovich and Sheikh Mansour. Why wouldn't they? I know I would if I had that sort of dough.

What we are seeing is quite simply the natural outcome of the decisions that were made in the early 80's. Create a sufficiently large honeypot and it will draw attention. Concentrate enough money in a particular area, then predators will circle and want a piece of it. It isn't particularly complicated or unexpected.

Perhaps if supporters of the foregoing 'Big 5' made the effort to research the subject, they would realise that it was their clubs' naked greed and own form of financial doping that created the landscape for the Sugar Daddies they decry to want to (and be able to) enter the fray. If they'd left well alone, and kept spreading the wealth around, the English game would still be wholesome and trophies would be spread out more evenly, which is something I'm sure they'd all greatly welcome - except they wouldn't, of course.

If you change the rules to suit yourself, don't expect that advantage to last forever.

And be careful what you wish for.

 

[Gorton_Tubster]

Oil money, loan money, Russian money, American entrepreneur money, doesn't matter. You play good honest hard working football and the neutral fans forget it and appreciate the magic.

Hard core haters will never let go.

 

[EL APACHE TEVEZ]

Don't give a flying fuck what anyone says about are spending what's it got to do with them anyway.

 

[I'm With Stupid]

At least we brought in money from outside of football, rather than dominating by stealing money from other clubs. Everything that the big, established clubs have done in the last 30 years has been designed to let them get a bigger slice of the pie at the expense of all other clubs. From when they first refused to share gate receipts with the visiting team, to breaking away from the football league, to threatening to form a European league if they weren't allowed to compete in a massively expanded Champions League with none of the profits going to wider football. And in Spain it's even worse with the big clubs basically breaking away from the competition they're in. The Mansours and Abramoviches of the world are just a symptom of the fact that it's basically impossible nowadays for a team to establish themselves at the top of world football based on football ability alone.

 

[MillionMilesAway]

3The City thread, one of many City threads on there, is full of United idiots who still think Sheikh Mansour is funding the club and buying players out of his own money.

Sometimes it appears that it must come from a single source who dictates what this week's mantra is! The funding thing is all over the place on the BBC HYS.

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Do any of you accountant types have any idea how much has been invested in our club since the takeover and how much the total worth of the club is now.

As the Sheikh buys shares for every £1 he puts in, according to the accounts he's put in £1.3bn since the takeover but about £300m will have been for the CFA & SS3.

The most accurate valuation of City alone is around £2bn so he's made a tidy little return.