It hasn't. If they're trying to make it level though, then they should do a proper job of it and the FFP simply won't do it, in my opinion.
Looking at the attendances for some teams (baring in mind this is "the most exciting league in the world", in the worlds most popular sport) they are pitiful. teams like Wigan, Blackburn, middlesborough & Pompey (when in the prem). Look at the attendances they get in America for jnr sports. It's crazy. Anyway, it can be put down to a number of things, one of which is all seater stadiums. Teams used to get 80k going regularly (even Chelsea!) and it was for everyman, now it's for plastics, one match fans and taurists because it's so expensive. Teams should take Sir Alans advise offered pre-sky era and put in place regulation to prevent 90% of the money going into players' pockets. We should have enough to maintain the league on an international level, but if the money was spent on youth and infrastructure clubs would save money of they actualy brought through their own talent. How many teams atm play is rubbish stadiums and have rubbish training grounds but have spent £££££££'s on players wages with nothing to show for it. However you look at it, Bricks and mortar is a much better investment than the next whoever, which is why i'm glad we have been spending wisely of late.
It probably never has. However, the ridiculous, excessive spending by the mega wealthy owners of clubs like City and Chelsea, has just made the field more uneven. These clubs are not run as any kind of business. If they were, they'd be bust already.
Count me among the skeptics that this will lead to anything other than Man City and maybe Chelsea playing a game of three card monte with their money. Once there's enough money in the system for it to be a problem, there's enough money to pay off anyone who wants to change things. It's like health care in the US. The HMOs probably need less than .01 % of their profits to pay off all the politicians. I see Spurs liking the present system as good news. Management must think things are going well enough they don't want any changes.
What I find confusing is whenever these discussions regarding FFP take place it becomes unclear as to what the objectives are, take the current one regarding the EPL, led by Man U, is it to prevent the likes of the Leeds and Portsmouth situations happening or is it because they won f*** all last year and they fear losing their stranglehold. I started watching football in the late fifties and remember the great teams around then, Spurs being one of the best, but alas we will never go back to those days of the 60's, 70's and 80's when all teams could and did have equal ambition. FFP is flawed, far from being fair it is cementing the "elite" position in European football and if you are not part of it within the next couple of years, forget it the door will be bolted. It created a situation where clubs like City, PSG and others have had to spend vast amounts of cash in a very short space of time in order to join the "elite" and make no mistake these clubs will meet the criteria required, which I know in City's case will p*** a lot of people off on this and other forums. I'm amazed at the number of fans outside the "elite" group crying out for the FFP to come along and stop the likes of City, the reality is, forget any dreams you may have had of being up there one day. Is FFP good for football? you decide.
Any FFP regulations for the Premiership do not have to be an exact copy of UEFA regs. However, it is still my strong contention that something must be done to curb the ridiculous off balance sheet spending of clubs like City & Chelsea. If nothing is done they will just keep spending, running their " business" at a continued huge loss, until they buy all the success they seek. Whilst it's true that there has never been a level playing field in top class football. Nothing we have ever seen before even comes close to the levels of money at the disposal of a club like City - which is, in all but name, owned by an incredibly wealthy Arab oil state. If you sit down to play a game of poker, if you have any common sense at all, you will only play under the rule called "table stake" which means that everybody starts with an equivalent agreed sum of money. If this is not in place and everybody sits down with say £1000 and two others sit down with £20,000 they can simply buy all the pots, as the other players cannot afford to stay in the game, no matter how good their hand. That is just an analogy of what is happening in Premiership football, and it has to be stopped, IMO.
The aim is surely to enable clubs to compete on the basis of their support and income. That is the way football has grown over the years into the worldwide game is it today. In recent times it has been distorted by huge inputs of money from mainly Sky and individuals like Abramovich and your oil sheikhs. At least the Sky money is distributed among all clubs in the division. The Chelsea and Man City type funding is the most damaging as it does not depend on income or support and is neither sustainable or fair. If clubs without these benefactors try to compete they risk going the way of Portsmouth or Leeds. The income/support model has produced elites, it always will and clubs like Arsenal, Man U, Liverpool, Everton, and Spurs have been top teams for a very long time but during that time many other clubs have had their time at the top. Ipswich, Villa, Blackburn, Leeds, Notts. Forest, Burnley, Wolves. Chelsea, Man C., and more. It therefore offers the chance for teams to reach the top. The success of Chelsea and Man C. is quite different and has simply been purchased and this is what needs to be controlled.
United are in no position to challenge City and Chelsea financially for the next few years and that would mean the end of the United dynasty and so this move is timely indeed. Plus United just got a deal worth 40m to have the dhl logo on their training kit which just coincides with Fergie unbanning the BBC so dhl logo can get exposure hence the 40m. So you can see the ground is again being prepared for United by both adding dodgy sponsorship to increase revenue and at the same time restricting the spending power of Chelsea and City, it stinks. FFP needs to have a wage cap and transfer cap, same for all with a draft introduced. This would be fair but it ain't gonna happen, it would topple the top clubs in europe eventually and in the end even with FFP, owners will still buy cars and houses for the relatives of young players they want to sign.
Yep, but it wouldn't necessarily save us cash would it Spurm? If the foreign stars go elsewhere in serach of uncapped cash, the PL might start haemorraghing money. Toon might struggle to fill their ground without cutting prices etc. A salary cap might be good for us, it might not. Ditto FFP rules. If we're against it, I assume there's a reason. I'm no big fan of Mr Levy, but finances are something he tends to understand well.
that club will start to lose money, but so far Spurs fans are showing no signs of boycotting prem games, so why would Levy reduce prices. Bizarrely, people seem to be prepared to pay top dollar then moan like billyo when they get there, an odd consumer choice, but football is riddled with irrationality.
Fair comments, the new stadium, assuming it's here fairly soon, will be a test for our pricing structures. Will ENIC sill be in charge whe it's fully up and running? who knows what will happen by then, triple dip recession, economic boom, capitalism is hard to call so are the fortunes of football clubs.
Maybe, but a bit more spending might have got us that 3rd place. We can't compete with City and Chelsea on a regular basis I agree, but there was a chance for CL football last season, and we blew it.
But have we been spending wisely of late? we aren't in the CL, our fans are booing their own team, to echo Sgt Wilson ' do you think that's wise, sir?'
Even if we did decide to start spraying money around, ( I think the men in white coats for come for Levy, if that ever happened!) we have next to nothing in the way of financial resources compared to,even Chelsea. City are in a league of one, globally, in terms of financial firepower.
I'm a poker player myself and table stakes would be perfect, can't see others like utd having it though!
I notice how you leave City out of your Top Clubs but include yourselves, I think you will find our records are not dissimilar when it comes to winning things, Your turnover may have been bigger than ours for a while but that is mainly based upon the difference in charges at the gate. The point I was making was that when FFP comes into play all the clubs you mention with the exception of City, Chelsea, Utd and maybe Arsenal can forget any future in the ECL. Football as we all know is big business now and if you think we are just a rich guys plaything you are deluding yourself, but who is going to invest now in the likes of Spurs, Everton etc when these restrictions prevent them from joining the top table. I don't really like it but it is fact.
I think you'll find that before City hit the jackpot our record for winning things was very dissimilar, your last trophy was in 76, we won 6 trophies after that win. Also you spent some time in the 3rrd division, and quite a bit in the second, we only spent one season in the 2nd during that time. There's a lot of delusion amongst City fans, not all of them, that you were somehow on a par with us before you got given a stadium and then a stack of cash. You weren't on our level for some thirty years, crystallised in our famous 3-2 win in 81, which sent the clubs on different paths. Had it not been for the freebies you'd still be below our level IMHO. Historically before your recent success, you have had just over half our amount of trophies 17 to 9 in our favour http://www.krysstal.com/trophies.html
Quite right and that is why City were not included in my top teams. They have had their moments (Mercer & Allison) but through history they are not as big as the clubs I mentioned or indeed as big as Villa.
