He is speaking the truth though. Arsenal would rather play Rangers or Celtic over Swansea and Southampton, go ask them on their board. There is no money in Scottish football but drop the Old Firm teams into the Premier League and they would be challenging near the top.[/QUOTE] Maybe they would at first purely because they havent played you much before. Eventually you become the same as everyone else and then I'm pretty sure any Arsenal fan (the 4/5 I have just spoken to anyway!) would rather not travel all the way to you guys when they could just pop down the road and play a team in their own country. And come on be realistic Celtic would probably be a mid table premier league team and Rangers would be nowhere right now. Even at the top of their game you would be nowhere near the top. Get real
Do you see how it's misguided to put the blame on English football though? The root of the problem is that too many Scots are glory-hunting instead of supporting their local teams, and it's left you with a ridiculous lack of competition. The great thing about the EPL is that every team has a ton of support, and the same can be said for most Championship teams. Instead of wishing to compete with the big European teams more often, you should be wishing for the other Scottish teams to be better so they could compete with you.
Maybe they would at first purely because they havent played you much before. Eventually you become the same as everyone else and then I'm pretty sure any Arsenal fan (the 4/5 I have just spoken to anyway!) would rather not travel all the way to you guys when they could just pop down the road and play a team in their own country. And come on be realistic Celtic would probably be a mid table premier league team and Rangers would be nowhere right now. Even at the top of their game you would be nowhere near the top. Get real[/QUOTE] Both teams would be top 7 I'm sure of it. Correct at the minute Rangers wouldn't feature anywhere near it but what I am talking about is the huge amounts of money available in the PL that can transform clubs. Both Old Firm teams already have good academies and have experience playing top teams in Europe (not so much Rangers now) and quite often getting decent results.
Fulham, nearly relegated in the same season as getting to the final of the Europa League. Leeds, mid table when getting to a champions league semi-final. Spurs, outside the top 5 when getting to the later stages of the champions league (QF?) Stoke, bottom half when getting to the later stages of the europa league. All within the last 20 years. This is precisely why I would argue that you would be a bottom half to relegation zone premier league team. I am struggling to remember Rangers getting to the later stages of these european competitions on a regular basis. Either way in your current sate its a non conversation
Both teams would be top 7 I'm sure of it. Correct at the minute Rangers wouldn't feature anywhere near it but what I am talking about is the huge amounts of money available in the PL that can transform clubs. Both Old Firm teams already have good academies and have experience playing top teams in Europe (not so much Rangers now) and quite often getting decent results.[/QUOTE] Celtic would be mid table. There are too many established teams that have got exactly what your teams do but better. Man City, Man Utd, Chelsea, Arsenal, Spurs, Everton, Newcastle, Liverpool. Rangers could possibly make it up to the prem but that would be all. Either way its a null and void argument because its not going to happen!
Whether they could or not, I don't think Celtic and Rangers being inducted to the Premier League is realistic. A small possibility is some kind of European competition involving the top teams like the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal, Sweden, Norway, whether that is alongside or in addition to domestic leagues. But I don't imagine there is much appetite for that in those countries, and Rangers would have to get back to their former position before conversations even started. European/World Super League, cannot see it at all.
So none then. I'll repeat, if either Old Firm team were in the PL no doubt they would have an entirely different team than they do now. A hell of a lot more money would be available. Rangers and Celtic have qualified from the group stages of the CL and got to the final of the UEFA in the last 10 years whilst still fiercly competing against each other for the title and picking up other domestic cups. If they can do this and still get good results against the best teams in Europe then yes I do believe they would be up towards the top of the league.
Do you really think any top side is really going to want to play in this super league? Even if it did happen, then what would be the point in the Champions league? They would be exactly the same thing just played in a different format.
Such as? That has been talked about before. The top teams in Portugal, Holland, Belgium, Scotland, Denmark etc. playing in a league.
That's the whole point. I super league would kill off the CHampions League. I'm not saying it's gonna happen or that I want it, but I do think it's is a possibility.
That's kind of what I said - part of the blame goes to the SFA for scuppering the old BSB deal (where we got nearly as much as the English teams) to protect attendances for Div3 midweek games (they refused to allow big English games to be shown in Scotland if ANY Scottish game was on) - most famously an FA cup game between two Prem sides wasn't shown to stop the attendance dropping in a Div 3 game (Montrose vs Brechin or something) and the attendance was 238 or something I'm not blaming the English teams for us not getting money - almost the opposite, I think at some point, the EPL bubble will burst (Rangers, Portsmouth et al are warning tales for living beyond your means) if the TV money ever evaporates. Whilst Sky subsidise the league by so much (apparently, even a Sky subscription without Sky sports means 68% of your subscription goes towards the EPL) the current rate of spending by most clubs is fine but, should it ever decrease or stop, only the sensibly run teams in England will survive (I'll include Saints in this but, in particular, I'd say Newcastle, Norwich et al will be fine - QPR pumped). People are quick in politics to bring up supposed English subsidy to Scotland but, in football terms, I subsidise your league (by getting Sky simply for my teams Champions League games) but you only subsidise my team if we get to the Champions League. If you were a foreign player and were offered double your money to play in front of 20,000 in the Championship or half that to play in front of 60,000 with the chance of getting to the Champions League, most young players will take the cash. To be honest, I think that contributes positively to our team a little bit - if people want to chase the money they can sign for Blackpool or someone. If they want to further their football career, they'll come to Paradise (despite the inevitable talk about the level of opposition). We're playing Barca in a double header soon - yet the guys in our team were probably all told at some point they'd play a better level of opposition in the Championship. The English leagues will always be bigger and more succesful than ours due to demographics (higher population more evenly spread) but it sticks in the craw somewhat when this is exaggerated by a multi-national corporation run by an Aussie Nazi
Sadly, to survive and prosper in the PL, a club has to have existing funds to function, and plenty of it. You don't get given all this money in the beginning.
And if Lech Poznan were suddenly in the PL, then they'd also have a lot more money and an entirely different team. But that's irrelevant.
TV Money, higher sponsorship deals, kit deals, merchandising etc. all this comes with joining the premier league. **** sake you get more money finishing last in the PL than winning the Champions League.
Ok so all im trying to say really is that these teams have done exactly what Rangers had done previously and not all of them were "towards the top of the league" and certainly not "top 7" (Spurs excluded). Theres absolutely no evidence to suggest that if Rangers or Celtic came into our league then they would have any chance of making it. Certainly not to break into the top 8. I agree that this super league type thing sounds a bit odd and pointless. As I said previously, sounds very much like he's just coming out with any old rubbish to get the fans onside. Cant see it happening either. Maybe an expansion of the champions league qualification instead e.g. turning it to group stages for lesser co-efficient countries? I don't know but cant see it at the moment.
Bolton, Birmingham, Cardiff, Blackpool, Blackburn, Leicester, Leeds, for starters, would give the group stage a good go. They'd be unlikely to get to the knockout stages unless they got a kind draw, but I could say the same about Celtic and Rangers.
I'm not making that comparison at all, but I am saying that they have a 42,000 capacity stadium and regularly play in Europe, and would have the means to invest heavily in a new team if they were suddenly competing in the PL. But the fact is they're not in the PL and their team is not as good as a PL team at this moment in time. Just like Celtic and Rangers.
