I've just read an interesting article on the bbc about how financial fair play will make it very difficult for lower league teams to ever challenge the current top teams in Europe. http://http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/24333604 Could this hold Saints back? I could understand if football was a non profit organisation. Sadly it's not and football is a business, FFP just seems a way of protecting the top from teams like us challenging them financial.
There had to be a good reason why Cortese voted against it. Not a bad thing in itself, but it favours status quo.
I agree something needs to be done but they could of found a better way. Like for example an addition levy against every player and salary, with the money used on grass roots football. The money spent on player transfers and wages the you more you pay, could be a good way of handicapping team who spend heavily.
If anything it'll begin to hold clubs with enormous operating debt back. ManU, for one. But, of course, that won't be allowed. In modern football, I have found that when vested interests are disturbed, newly introduced laws are found to have clauses at the bottom of the text. I suspect these are written in, at late notice, with invisible ink which only become visible when football itself begins to lose money. The day that someone from FIFA/UEFA/FA starts talking about clubs like Accrington Stanley or Crewe Alexandra getting a fair crack of the whip, I'll begin to think football has taken a turn for the better. Football authorities should exist primarily to make the competition greater. Not to slide success off to a select bunch of clubs just because they have a big fan following and can generate a lot of dosh for all who can benefit.
I would love to hear Nicola's reasons for voting against it. The only reason I can think of is that he thought either it would prevent the Leihberrs investing a lot more money (unlikely) or he could envisage us wanting to borrow a lot to get us to the next stage of his plan.
At the end of the day that's is exactly what we all crave is increased competition. It's a shame that most of tv money goes to premiership clubs. Why not share it out with the lower league teams which would help them stay competitive, better facilities and training for youngsters. They could still make it based on league performance.
I don't think NC would have a problem with it if every club had no choice but to sacrifice a percentage of tv money. If he was only interested in money we wouldn't be spending so much on our academy and we would bring in foreign recruits.
If you created a football league today it would probably more resemble the US sports in terms of structure & salary caps etc The trouble with football and the way it's organically grown around the world is that unlike the NFL or NBA their is no strong all encompassing federation. FIFA seems to have little control over the club game. UEFA are unlikely to introduce a salary cap for fear of losing players out to potential breakaway leagues in Asia or the Americas. None of the major FAs are going to potentially restrict their clubs in the champions league, so were left with the current structure. I'm not a fan of FFP as I do believe it will make it a lot more difficult for clubs to progress above their current standing, but it's true that clubs need to be protected. We just need to come up with a way which makes any financial caps more universal.
That's all very well but the Premier League was formed so the big clubs could keep all the TV money. There's no chance they'll agree to share it with lower league clubs again any time soon.
Could be worse. In Spain each club negotiates TV rights independently, which means Barcelona and Real Madrid get almost all the money and the rest of la Liga have to fight for the scraps.
At one time teams shared gate money on the basis that it takes two teams to make a match. Then it was decided that the home teams kept the money....bet it wasn't the little clubs that wanted that. Now it is only cup games that give small clubs a payday.
I've mentioned it before, but the best way for the lower leagues to get increased exposure and TV money would be to play a tonne of games on days other than Saturdays and feature more night games, perhaps even partnering with a broadcaster on a separate Football League channel. That would mean, for instance, having a slate of League One games on Friday nights, Championship games on Saturday nights, League Two games on Sunday nights, and similar rotation during midweek. Good for fans? Perhaps not, and that's really the major stumbling block. But if the FL is to get its hands on a significant share of the pie, it's likely going to have to be reliant on generating that income itself, because the PL is never going to be too desirous of handing over large chucks of its TV money.
I agree with the fixture change, but I would shift the premier league games to Sunday to come more into line with the rest of Europe. With two televised games and Europa league half the fixtures can be end up being played on a Sunday as it is. This will leave the traditional Saturday 3pm slot for the football league and won't be a big burden to travelling fans like too many evening games would. With more ridged fixture lists, we could see an improvement in season ticket sales.
Hmm, I can't see SKY giving up a day of televised Premier League football just so that 72 league clubs can benefit from any extra revenue.
True and it's not just Sky with BT or whoever having a live game. A Saturday night & Monday night live game would still exist as the exclusives. Perhaps they should look at showing one game live in England whilst the others are playing too which is similar to the NFL.
Don't kid yourself. He's a businessman first and foremost, he's focusing on spending money on the academy because he can see the potential return on investment is huge. If he thought by scrapping it and investing in a tic tac mine would be cheaper and guarantee sustained success he'd be cutting the little nuggets of mint out the wall right now and Staplewood would be gone.
