General Football Thread

That’s why I said “much more”.

 

The links were for Zog, and anyone else interested of course.

 

Ethan Nwaneri, 15 years of age, is on for Arsenal v Brentford

He becomes the Premier League's youngest EVER player.

The schoolboy replaces Fabio Vieira.

 

Then what was the “more than six years ago” comment supposed to be directed at?…

 

Extraordinary

 

The first sentence of my original reply to Zog.

 

The “too short a term” bit?

That makes no sense. Six years is a medium term investment.

 

I think a bigger factor is perhaps the cost of investing in English football, rather than North American Sports. The latter has got considerably more expensive over the last decade, making Premier League teams a more attractive investment.

Latest expansion fees/estimates:
NHL - Seattle Kraken paid $650m
MLB - Estimated expansion fee is $2.2bn
MLS - Charlotte paid $325m.
NBA - Last expansion cost $300m in 2004, any future expansion expected to cost over $1bn.

And an expansion team needs a stadium, training complex, initial player signings, etc. It gets even more expensive very quickly.

The Bournemouth takeover bid is thought to be around £150m, for which you're getting a Premier League club with existing infrastructure which will do for now, and massive TV revenue from around the world. Not to mention the freedom in how you go about things like player recruitment compared to North American sports means there's opportunity for quick advancement or to gain an edge.

I think it's going to be interesting to see whether an influx of North American owners results in changes to the Premier League to prioritise profitability. A wage cap, for example, could be applied to the Premier League whilst still allowing the league to outspend everyone else in Europe. Relegation could get harder, All Star games, overseas fixtures, etc might all find more popularity.

 

Yeah it’s only a matter of time IMO. Relegation helps none of the Premier League powers that be, so they will be very happy to make it a closed shop.

 

According to this Wikipedia entry (updated to just a few days ago), there are 21 clubs in the EPL and EFL owned outright or in part by US investors. The list does not currently include NCFC, presumably because Attanasio's involvement is yet to be formally approved by the authorities. There are at least two non-league clubs (Wrexham, and Dagenham & Redbridge) to be added to any overall total.
Numbers by league:
EPL 9
Championship 4 (5 if you include us)
L1 6
L2 2
Non-league 2
So, currently, and now including NCFC, 24% of clubs in the top four English leagues are US owned, wholly or in part.

 

Does that include Leeds?

 

Thanks - interesting analysis. I think the percentage would be more accurate if it was rebalanced to reflect the partial ownership, but tricky - because if you’re looking at US exposure to the English football business it would be better to weight it against all other investment. My guess is it would come out somewhere are 15-20% given the number of partial ownerships - so still slightly below the US percentage of global GDP, but I bet well above in terms of foreign investment in the league.

 

Yes. These are the nine EPL clubs they list:
Arsenal, Aston Villa, Chelsea, Crystal Palace, Fulham, Leeds, Liverpool, Man City, Man Utd.
Re. Man City, US involvement is through a private equity company, Silver Lake (10% stake).

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/football/59581396

But then, we all know he was rubbish .............

 

I never thought he was rubbish, he just wasn't a lone striker. Some of our better attacking performances that season (which is damning with faint praise) were with a Hooper/Elmander tandem. In isolation it was relatively savvy recruitment to sign an experienced striker on loan, but if he was ever able to play as a lone striker, he couldn't by that point in his career.

The perennial problem for teams at the bottom end of the Premier League is that it's very hard for a team to play a 2 striker system and not end up being overrun in midfield and that causing no end of issues. Has anyone other than Dyche's Burnley done it with any degree of success in the last decade?

 

I was really excited when we signed Hooper, I never thought he got the game time he deserved

 

More or less what I've always thought about Becchio.
Perfectly good record at Leeds, but naughty step for us??

 

Yes that really was a wierd one, he was bang in form when we signed him if I remember correctly and then only got a couple of sporadic appearances after signing

 

Becchio was bad timing and wrong fit - he was always dangerous when crosses came in, but a bit of a donkey otherwise, and we were set up to play more to Grant Holt’s style which - despite his reputation for being a “big” centre forward, was not really his skill set.

Elmander I always rated and thought he was a fantastic signing. He was the right choice to follow on from Holt. Unfortunately, he joined as the Hughton era was collapsing, with us becoming far too structured in style and the fans turning against manager and team. I’m confident that if he’d been with us in Lambert’s season he’d have been terrific.

A bit like Mbokani - in another season he would have been sensational.

It’s all about the luck and timing.

 

Becchio was fitness issues, I think? Not sure how he went from a high scoring Leeds player to unfit at Norwich, but I'm sure I remember him being deemed too out of shape to start, then falling down the pecking order.