Here we go again and it looks like our blue friends across the bridge have become entangled in the "must have" foreign ownership to survive debacle. Am I so wrong in berating this awful trend in the national sport when you only have to look at recent history to see that most of these interlopers in our game are frauds and ne'er do wells at best. I know the financial aspect of our sport has gone down the toilet in the last 10 years or so but just look at who has perpetrated this situation, and you have to look no further than the new breed of ownership at the top level of the game to see that their uncontrolled spending has created a "no win" situation for the lower teams who feel they must keep up with the Jones's. The world's financial downfall is the sole blame of the greedy investors who have taken the common man for a ride down the path to nowhere and unfortunately this credo is permeating football and apparently sees no end. What will happen to the game of football when these so called saviours of the game decide that they have had enough or are found out to be less than savoury? The influx of foreign ownership has changed the playing field possibly for ever and when I hear these new owners of Cardiff City telling us they need to market the game in the Far East I must confess I cringe. Have they conveniently forgotten that the game is played over here and that's where they need to focus their attention rather than in the country of their birth? In case you haven't noticed this new order is something that I have extreme difficulty accepting, and although there is no possibilty of returning to the days when sanity ruled the roost surely there is a middle ground that would save the integrity of the game without breaking the bank. Yours truly Victor Meldrew Mike
Mike, you are entirely correct. Football teams are not "Worldwide Brands" to be thrown around the financial markets. They are not companies like, dare I mention Coca-Cola, who have to sell their products all over the world to satisfy the shareholders. Football teams represent the towns and cities in which they play. Thus whoever is paying the bills for the club's profligate spending, be it the local butcher or a foreign money grabbing investor, the football club belongs to the town/city and the public who pay their entrance money. Otherwise football may as well franchise the teams and we then end up with a club's franchise being bought and moved to another location. This happens quite frequently in USA sports; American Football, Baseball and Basketball. Mainly because they do not have promotion or relegation. So if this scenario were introduced in Britain, we could get SL buying Glasgow Rangers and moving them to Ashton Gate yet still playing in the SPL. Or just suppose Wolves had stayed up, Birmingham had gone up this season, that gives 4 Premier teams in a very small radius in the West Midlands, so SL instead bought the franchise for Aston Villa and moved them to the Gate. How totally ridiculous is this! Perhaps if Sky Sports and its various associates throughout Europe had the TV contract cancelled and also the Champions League returned to it's original format as a knock-out cup for Champions only, the silly money being paid to players may cease and we might stand a chance of returning some way toward sanity. And to the times when at least a dozen teams in each tier stood a reasonable chance of finishing first in their league. Like those days when a good start by an average team could lead to promotion or even the top league title.
Thanks for your comments cideredabroad. The days have long since disappeared when about anyone could become the champions of the upper echelon of our leagues and any team rising to that level also stood a chance as well. The decline of the English national squad also follows the same downslope of competivity that has been witnessed in our leagues, and when you see Premier League teams relying on foreign players to fill their boots the rot has set in. Look around at the most competitive national squads and you will see that they will not allow the same intrusion of overseas players that has become the norm in the English top tier. How on earth are we supposed to field a competitve national squad when our league policies allow us to build up the strength of other national squads that would probably not be able to compete at the same level if it were not for the Premiership saturation of non-british players. Read the BBC Football gossip column and my point will be more obvious, particularly when the rumours are primarily about Premiership teams bidding to bring in players from all over the world and the mention of a home grown player is the rare exception. Wake up everybody you are allowing our national sport to be flushed down the toilet and insulting the people who have supported this game for eons.
Buying Rangers and moving them to the gate that would one uping buying a well know ex premier league team moving them to a new place and then rebranding them as MK Dons. We have seen recently with Cardiff that the owner wants to change their team colours, badge and nickname so he can make the club more money by selling them as a brand in Malaysia, somewhere Liverpool have cornered the market so red Liverbird vs Red dragons. As City fans would we accept change to a blue kit if it meant we became a mid table prem league team as i think i would prob accept it eventually. The club already got rid of our robins badge a few years ago. English Football is now an international game where rich men buy clubs like buying a dog. Some look after them and other owners get rid of them if they get bored.
I have no problem with foreign owners if they do it right , the man city bunch may be spending alot but they'll slow down and reap the rewards of building a solid foundation and if they get bored they shall sell it to another family member , Chelsea may go through many managers but they keep winning things . pompey had bad ownership for many a year over spending was their downfall and now in major trouble. oh and the venkys are just chicken **** had no idea what they were doing and i see them giving up . quite a few teams that gone into admin had british owners so it's any owner can be good or bad not just foreign also teams do changes every year some we notice some we dont i dont mind em taking the robin off the badge as many teams are called the robins
Reference the City's badge. Robins yes but lets not forget we are BRISTOL CITY so the similarity with the Bristol coat of arms is alright by me. I am a proud Bristolian.
What "owners" need to remember, be they foreign or British, is that they may OWN the club, but the club BELONGS to the fans - they are just the custodians
