EPL 2020/2021
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Football sold its souls years ago and the big clubs have finally sold out down the river their real fans and the communities they were sent up to represent.
An announcement in the middle of the night European time to avoid the ire of supporters, journalists and politicians from the UK and Europe, but to please Asian money markets says it all.
In the spirit of the announcement, they should base the 12 Judas teams of the new Super League in tax havens and authoritarian regimes. How about Dubai Spurs, Dinamo Chelski, Jeddah Sky Blues, Real Shanghai, Cayman Islands Red Devils, Virgin Island Reds, Bermuda Old Lady and Tehran Gunners?
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The teams in this league are so "Super" they could only mange 5 wins between them over the weekend. Despite their only being one game between two of them.
Juve lost to Atalanta
Arsenal could only sneak a draw with Fulham in the 7th minute of extra time
Inter drew with Napoli
Real with Getafe
Liverpool yet to playFucking Super - don't make me laugh
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@dogmeat said in EPL 2020/2021:
The teams in this league are so "Super" they could only mange 5 wins between them over the weekend. Despite their only being one game between two of them.
Juve lost to Atalanta
Arsenal could only sneak a draw with Fulham in the 7th minute of extra time
Inter drew with Napoli
Real with Getafe
Liverpool yet to playFucking Super - don't make me laugh
Arsenal being there is pretty funny.
Spurs too, who couldn't win a loaded chook raffle.I'm interested to see how this plays out actually. I am pretty sure the big clubs just expect this to take over from European competition, but how do they honestly expect their FAs to act? Or are these guys right, and they are too big and too important to the broadcast deal that they will be able to do what they want?
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its an interesting situation. these clubs are huge...but they're ultimately huge because of their fan base (they getter better sponsorships because more people watch them etc)...but their fan bases aren't locked in stone for ever...if enough of their fans see this as detrimental to the game some of that support will dwindle
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The ESL is such a bad idea that it can surely only be brinksmanship over revised champions league conditions they want to push through (also terrible).
Therefore UEFA will probably cave and concede the conditions these 'super' clubs want to stay inside the tent.
Even though this is entirely bluff from at least half these teams.
Speaking from an anglophile pov, I just see no desire from fans for a week in week out euroleague. It would be a disaster that will lose a lot of private equity money.
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From a non-anglophile pov.
From a Juventus pov, I can sort of see it. Serie A is now no more interesting than the Scottish or Portuguese league. Really just 2 teams in it.
I dont see what has changed in Spain. 2 giants dominate and contend for UEFA trophies.
It's a bit weird and sad that England with its 'big 6' us the most interesting and unpredictable league.
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Is this intended to replace the CL or run concurrently with it? As if they don’t already play enough games as it is.
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@rancid-schnitzel said in EPL 2020/2021:
Is this intended to replace the CL or run concurrently with it? As if they don’t already play enough games as it is.
i had understood it as replacing the CL, that they were saying its normally won by one of these teams anyway...so let them run it and negotiate their own deals etc
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@rapido said in EPL 2020/2021:
From a non-anglophile pov.
From a Juventus pov, I can sort of see it. Serie A is now no more interesting than the Scottish or Portuguese league. Really just 2 teams in it.
I dont see what has changed in Spain. 2 giants dominate and contend for UEFA trophies.
It's a bit weird and sad that England with its 'big 6' us the most interesting and unpredictable league.
Except this season of course when Juventus are struggling to finish in the top 4.
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- 20 teams will participate, including 15 founding clubs. Five further teams can qualify annually based on achievements in the prior season
- A group phase will start in August, featuring two groups of 10 teams playing home and away fixtures, with the top three in each group automatically qualifying for the quarter-finals. Teams finishing fourth and fifth will compete in a play-off over two legs for the remaining knockout spots
- The quarter-finals and semi-final will take place over two legs before the final in May, which will be staged at a neutral venue
- Midweek fixtures with the ESL claiming clubs continue to compete in their respective national leagues
So the 15 founding clubs have a life-long membership to the top table.
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@kiwiwomble Yes it is a midweek competition to take over the UCL and guarantee the "founder clubs" a spot every season no matter how crap they are in the previous season.
On Bayern/Dortmund - the German teams all have a minimum of 51% fan ownership (as far as I know) so cannot easily decide to jump ship.
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@gt12 said in EPL 2020/2021:
I don't know if any outside money is involved in this, but it smells like the sort of cautionary tale that could come about for NZ rugby from allowing outside money into the tent.
No cautions will be heeded.
Tbh you'd think super rugby would already be a cautionary tale the other way.
Eventually, surprisingly quickly, once the new equilibrium is found. Clubs used to being second best in their leagues ,competing annually, will find they are perennial cellar dwellers . E g. Queensland, Auckland and Natal etc.with crowds half what they used to get.
It's cute of Tottenham or Atletico to think they can compete better against the virtual entire population and economy of Bavaria better than Dortmund or even Berlin can.
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@kiwipie said in EPL 2020/2021:
@kiwiwomble Yes it is a midweek competition to take over the UCL and guarantee the "founder clubs" a spot every season no matter how crap they are in the previous season.
On Bayern/Dortmund - the German teams all have a minimum of 51% fan ownership (as far as I know) so cannot easily decide to jump ship.
yeah, that's how i saw the German club situation explained, in principle they're "in"...but need to take it to a vote of their fans/owners and that takes time to arrange
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@bovidae said in EPL 2020/2021:
- 20 teams will participate, including 15 founding clubs. Five further teams can qualify annually based on achievements in the prior season
- A group phase will start in August, featuring two groups of 10 teams playing home and away fixtures, with the top three in each group automatically qualifying for the quarter-finals. Teams finishing fourth and fifth will compete in a play-off over two legs for the remaining knockout spots
- The quarter-finals and semi-final will take place over two legs before the final in May, which will be staged at a neutral venue
- Midweek fixtures with the ESL claiming clubs continue to compete in their respective national leagues
So the 15 founding clubs have a life-long membership to the top table.
So a minimum number of games is 18 for the 10 worst teams. Maximum is 25 if you're 4th/5th and make the final.
Given the UCL is only 13 games if you win it (and don't have to pre-qualify) that's a game every midweek for all but the winter months when presumably they will halt as they do now? With 38 EPL games, that doesn't leave much of a gap in your calendar for anything else.
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@kiwiwomble said in EPL 2020/2021:
@kiwipie said in EPL 2020/2021:
@kiwiwomble Yes it is a midweek competition to take over the UCL and guarantee the "founder clubs" a spot every season no matter how crap they are in the previous season.
On Bayern/Dortmund - the German teams all have a minimum of 51% fan ownership (as far as I know) so cannot easily decide to jump ship.
yeah, that's how i saw the German club situation explained, in principle they're "in"...but need to take it to a vote of their fans/owners and that takes time to arrange
I’m thinking perhaps RB Leipzig being the most likely to jump ship. Officially RB means RasenBallsport but actually stands for Red Bull. They’re as manufactured as you can get and are universally hated in Germany anyway (or at least were).
The big permanent members and qualifications for the small fish make this look more like Eurovision.
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This is really quite unbelievable, but in reality should have been expected as the money in the game reached the levels it has, and the inevitable struggled caused by the pandemic.
Ultimately, the biggest clubs have a business model which means they must play Champs League football to survive. Ticket sales, merchandise and broadcast rights bring in colossal amounts of money and has time has gone on, the costs of running have also increased massively (salaries, transfer fee's etc) to the point that you still need an oligarch / billionaire to prop you up. And billionaires are first and foremost, business people. What brings in the money, is all that matters. So as the pandemic as destroyed ticket sales, and then the big clubs losing their colossal fans / cauldron atmosphere's, things have evened up somewhat (as can be seen by the tables). So suddenly all the CL places are up in the air the business boys get together and BOOM. A breakaway league for the rich.
It's shocking, and it shows just how little of the tournament is about the sport now. You've got to earn your right, not buy it, to play European football.
I have no idea how this will play out. I think it will come down to how the players feel. The fans hate it. The pundits hate it. Governments hate it.
But it seems to be set in stone. Interesting times ahead.
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@majorrage Surely it is their own fault if they have a wage bill that is not covered by their income. From my understanding it is not a written bylaw to the rules of the FA that you must pay more than you can afford in the salary department and any organisation that does so on an ongoing basis will/must eventually go broke - Law No. 1 of Economics. Off the top of my head I offer up Bury and Portsmouth as fine examples of this. Oh and Rangers in Scotland also had financial problems that saw them turfed to the lowest SFA League a few years back.
