European 'Super' League

[jobotic]

Who's next up if City and Chelsea back out? I'm hoping the Super League does go ahead but with Burnley, West Brom and Osasuna in it.

[Inspector Norse]

I can't survive on blue tick takes

https://twitter.com/MarcusRashford/status/1384494671129301002

As far as players making statements go, a key player for one of the clubs most heavily involved in this as well as the national team (and who was just made an MBE) is a pretty powerful voice.

[Chollis]

EXCLUSIVE: Liverpool skipper Jordan Henderson has called an emergency meeting of the Premier League captains to discuss a response to ESL. More
@MailSport
shortly.

(athletico mince sketch right there)

[Wayman C. McCreery]

Not enough minute by minute bombshell updates and middle aged men wobbling their lips for me today. Let's have a resignation or a riot or something. I can't survive on blue tick takes and Spurs gags.

Yeah, boring as fuck today. The Premier League have just released a statement that says precisely nothing. I want titles stripped/Roy Hodgson to write an essay for the Palace website by close of play, please.

[Norton Canes]

EXCLUSIVE: Liverpool skipper Jordan Henderson has called an emergency meeting of the Premier League captains to discuss a response to ESL. More @MailSport shortly

HENDIMOOORE!!!

[chveik]

Not enough minute by minute bombshell updates and middle aged men wobbling their lips for me today. Let's have a resignation or a riot or something. I can't survive on blue tick takes and Spurs gags.

yep what's the point of a mafia war if there's no blood drawn

[Ferris]

Feel like a lot of this is going to depend on the players, particularly the top players. Is there going to be a mass exodus from these teams or are they going to decide the money is still good and they don't much care about international games?

Some players may decide they want to leave but their contract situation makes it a bit more complicated.

Surely though if significant numbers of the best players decide they don't want to play for ESL teams, then the whole thing starts to fall apart? Global fans will lose interest if the teams involved decline because nobody wants to play for them, and any player who does play for them has their name dragged through the mud.

No I don't think so - the fan excited to watch this hasn't a scooby what really top level football looks like. They'd be happy to watch macclesfield town batter rushden & diamonds if they were all wearing Chelsea/Atletico jerseys. It's like if you sat down and watched AA baseball and were told this was the pinnacle of the game; would you know enough to disagree?

I'd guess a good percentage of players at these clubs would say "oh yes please, actually give me more money to stay because I'm ineligible for internationals now" and if 50% of them leave, they'll be spread out among the other clubs. It'd be great to have top players at Burnley or Atalanta.

[chveik]

Atalanta already has top players

[Ferris]

Atalanta already has top players

Ok, Sassuolo and West Brom then. Point still stands.

[Thursday]

Amazon Prime make a statement.

https://twitter.com/primevideosport/status/1384507214530973696



Vaguely critical of it, but also it doesn't actually rule out the idea of them showing it.

[Ferris]

What are these new champions league rules? Assume (correctly) that I know nothing of the 'old' rules also.

The top 2/3/4 teams in European leagues are entered. This tends to be the same "big teams" because they have the most money to spend on players, and get lots of money for being in this competition that no one else qualifies for which means they have more to spend on players... etc. It's a feedback loop of wealth.

Annoyingly, the rules as written mean that if you get loads of money, but don't put it back into the club (ie spend it on exec bonuses and ivory backscratchers or paying down debt) there's a chance you won't do well in the league and will finish in the qualifying spots. Some lesser poorer "plucky underdog" club might do well in the league and get to enter this competition. They'll get your money! That's your money!! Those bastards. Worse, if they spend that money on players wisely, they might do well again next year and enter the feedback loop and maybe permanently diminish your financial advantage. It's an outrage!

These new rules basically allocate additional qualification places for historic success or some shit aka if you spend money on ivory backscratchers and paying down your debt and do badly in the league, doesn't matter you can come into the big money competition anyway! It explicitly guarantees a financial advantage for the big clubs who had it all but guaranteed already.

The existing competition is worth something like $200m for each club that enters (and more/less depending on how well you do so if you enter and do shit, you'll get less) - this new super league is supposed to be ~$450m for every club regardless of how you do. Field a team of 11x cardboard cutouts of Alan sugar and lose every game, money is still money.

So basically, how much is that extra $$$ worth to clubs? Enough to permanently burn bridges with fans/domestic leagues/players/fifa? Maybe. If it is, then I can't see why anyone is sad to see the back of a supposed sporting enterprise that is so thoroughly broken and corrupted.

Caveat: some of those figures might be out of date because I can't be arsed to keep up with this stuff.

[Chollis]

been crying in my room all day listening to the champions league theme feel like pure shit

[Ferris]

Hang on - are the teams proposing this replaces their place in a domestic league? Or is an extra champions league type money-spinning competition that they want to set up?

If it's the former then my opinion is the same - fuck em, goodbye. If it's the latter and they're just using it to further entrench their financial advantage but will stay in the domestic leagues to strangle all competition then it's an outrage.

[Wayman C. McCreery]

Hang on - are the teams proposing this replaces their place in a domestic league? Or is an extra champions league type money-spinning competition that they want to set up?

Essentially the latter. But it's incompatible with the current domestic leagues (which are affiliated to Uefa), so it'll lead to them being booted out and the former happening.

[thugler]

Hang on - are the teams proposing this replaces their place in a domestic league? Or is an extra champions league type money-spinning competition that they want to set up?

If it's the former then my opinion is the same - fuck em, goodbye. If it's the latter and they're just using it to further entrench their financial advantage but will stay in the domestic leagues to strangle all competition then it's an outrage.

It's not explicitly proposed. But this is just a step towards ditching the domestic leagues entirely.

[Ferris]

Got it - ok, carry on. I look forward to the husks of these teams leaving the league please and thanks.

Goes without saying I genuinely feel terrible for the fans of these clubs who have been absolutely mugged off by the clowns running them. Pure greed.

[Wayman C. McCreery]

I hope the Super League sue The Super League for nicking their name, using the resources afforded to them through their top sponsors:

[The Culture Bunker]

It's not explicitly proposed. But this is just a step towards ditching the domestic leagues entirely.

That's my take on it. If it initially does well, then surely it'll result in expansion and it'd be interesting to see if clubs like Everton still feel the same once they get asked if they're interested in a very large sum of money.

[Thursday]

Yeah I feel like it's the intention to get kicked out of their domestic leagues but saying they plan to carry on with them is sort of just deniability so they can claim it's aggressive UEFA and FA's fault for being so unreasonable.

[Poobum]

I have to say, for me, this is very much the European Pooper League.

[ersatz99]

I'd imagine without any relegation the second half of the season will have a lot of dead rubbers. Pundits will be stupified by the tedium and people will tune out.

[bgmnts]

Are the players allowed to renege on their contract in this situation? Or are they fucked?

For any footballers that actually would care enough to not play for that team and join a different team on a lower wage anyway.

[Beagle 2]

Just watched Pep squirm his way through a presss conference. You imagine that in this day and age as much is choreographed as possible, but something like this and there's obviously no prepared lines, nothing to even really go on the record and disagree with in terms of what their employers expect them to say. Shambles.

I was thinking that City not bothering to put out a statement about joining the league and then tweeting "The boss speaks out" today was perhaps a way of softening things up for their announcement that they would be the first to break ranks, but actually I just think that credits them with too much intelligence and forethought. There's just no plan.

[Kankurette]

Any social media feed about is this flooded with 'global fans' saying 'just cos your clob wasn't invite'.

Parasites.

And this is why I avoid football Twitter. I can't be doing with a bunch of kopites saying 'you're just bitter cos the Ev didn't get invited lololol 1995'.

[Kankurette]

To be fair though, if Everton weren't a shit club, you'd have to assume billionaire Farhad Moshiri would have been okay with it.

He might be. The rest of our board aren't.

[BlodwynPig]

Ok, Sassuolo and West Brom then. Point still stands.

Sass already have top players

[bgmnts]

He might be. The rest of our board aren't.

Does the majority stakeholder have the final say in this? Maybe he/they think this'll make clubs like Everton the top dogs in the new league however that forms.

[Kankurette]

Fuck knows. I've not been paying attention.

I do not want Everton to be a part of this. And giving Everton a metric fuck ton of money is not a good idea if the powers that be don't use it properly and just waste it on crap players.

[checkoutgirl]

I'd guess a good percentage of players at these clubs would say "oh yes please, actually give me more money to stay

I don't understand football economics but if you did this super league and gave all the teams 10 trillion dollars each every year wouldn't the top players and agents cotton on and start demanding a billion dollars a week and they're all back where they started. United make fuck knows how much from a big stadium, sponsorships and TV money etc but someone at the top of their operation is compelled to do this for more money.

United and Spurs owe a billion between them even with their stadiums and fan base. If they get a guaranteed 300 mil from this league they'll blow it on a Ronaldo wage immediately and be back where they were. You might say United don't really owe that it's the owners leeching but what about Spurs? And Barcelona owe nearly a billion and a half, and how in the name of the wee man do Brighton owe 200 or 300 million?

They could do a super duper league on the moon with just Barcelona playing United every week for a century and they'll still blow all the money on some bullshit unsustainable football economy dooda.

[Chollis]

Live stream of Chelsea fans out protesting

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvnieFO2sho&ab_channel=SubjectAccess