Football (Soccer) Thread

[Tamas]

For sure the position of the super-leaguers are not entirely without merit. But, it's all moot at this point.

[FunkMonk]

For sure the position of the super-leaguers are not entirely without merit. But, it's all moot at this point.

Yeah, a super league will eventually happen. With the input of everyone with a stake in European club football, it could be successful and well-received. Someday.

This episode was an arrogant powerplay by outsiders so far up their own asses that they managed to destroy their own project within 2 days. It's quite remarkable.

[Sheilbh]

No I totally agree with that. My point was some of the clubs aren't businesses in the normal sense - so they've got other motivations which aren't always aligned with business sense.

The top 4 in England also play in the Champions League so they get their share of the, I think, $3.5 billion revenues in that competition - then there's a smaller pot for teams 5-7 in other European competitions. But there's more games. One of the reasons for this Super League is that a number of those top clubs haven't been regularly getting into the Champions League so they're not getting that money.

The American sports are the best at maximising revenue and there's a huge amount European can learn from them and there's no doubt that a Super League makes business sense for those clubs. I don't think anyone's saying otherwise.

The flipside of the increased revenue is they want more financial controls because there's been huge inflation in transfers in the last few years - even 6-7 years ago record transfer fees were around £80-100 million. Then PSG (Qatar) spent over £200 million on Neymar. If that's now the top-end of fees then normal business clubs like Madrid, Barca etc can't compete. So the Super League also included I think a 55% of revenue salary cap and limits on transfer spending. It's perfect business sense, again - minimise risk, maximise revenue and place controls on cost for you and your competitors (who are, occasionally, nation states).

[alfred russel]

Then PSG (Qatar) spent over £200 million on Neymar. If that's now the top-end of fees then normal business clubs like Madrid, Barca etc can't compete. So the Super League also included I think a 55% of revenue salary cap and limits on transfer spending. It's perfect business sense, again - minimise risk, maximise revenue and place controls on cost for you and your competitors (who are, occasionally, nation states).

But then when you compare to the US, baseball players have large salaries in a sport that isn't even the most popular in the country and individual contributions to victory are really limited. A few sample contracts:

Mike Trout: $426.5 million over 12 years
Gerrit Cole: $324 million over 9 years
Max Scherzer: $210 million over 7 years
Stephen Strasburg: $245 million over 7 years
Nolan Arenado: $260 million over 8 years
Manny Machado: $300 million over 10 years

https://www.mlb.com/news/highest-paid-baseball-players-in-2020

None of those guys play for teams owned by Qatar. The point being: £200 million for Neymar isn't that much considering the popularity of soccer in Europe.

[Tamas]

The flipside of the increased revenue is they want more financial controls because there's been huge inflation in transfers in the last few years - even 6-7 years ago record transfer fees were around £80-100 million. Then PSG (Qatar) spent over £200 million on Neymar. If that's now the top-end of fees then normal business clubs like Madrid, Barca etc can't compete. So the Super League also included I think a 55% of revenue salary cap and limits on transfer spending. It's perfect business sense, again - minimise risk, maximise revenue and place controls on cost for you and your competitors (who are, occasionally, nation states).

Butbutbut... the spirit of sport omg!

[celedhring]

has salary caps ever been a possibility in football in Europe?

La Liga has salary caps, but not in the sense american sports do. The cap is based on your revenue, so richer clubs can pay higher wages. It's a mechanism to avoid clubs overspending.

I think a maximum salary is illegal in Europe - used to exist in England back in the day. Jimmy Hill campaigned to get rid of it.

You can pay individual players whatever you want, as long as you don't exceed the team cap.

[celedhring]

Then PSG (Qatar) spent over £200 million on Neymar. If that's now the top-end of fees then normal business clubs like Madrid, Barca etc can't compete. So the Super League also included I think a 55% of revenue salary cap and limits on transfer spending. It's perfect business sense, again - minimise risk, maximise revenue and place controls on cost for you and your competitors (who are, occasionally, nation states).

But then when you compare to the US, baseball players have large salaries in a sport that isn't even the most popular in the country and individual contributions to victory are really limited. A few sample contracts:

Mike Trout: $426.5 million over 12 years
Gerrit Cole: $324 million over 9 years
Max Scherzer: $210 million over 7 years
Stephen Strasburg: $245 million over 7 years
Nolan Arenado: $260 million over 8 years
Manny Machado: $300 million over 10 years

https://www.mlb.com/news/highest-paid-baseball-players-in-2020

None of those guys play for teams owned by Qatar. The point being: £200 million for Neymar isn't that much considering the popularity of soccer in Europe.

Yeah, never quite understood the baseball pay structure. I'm not an expert but AFAIK individual players have much less influence on the outcome of matches compared to the other major team sports, yet you still get all the massively paid big stars and ESPN cutting to Bonds every time he's at bat*. I guess every sport is going to have star players, it's human nature.

*before the roids.

[Josquius]

The problem with doing a super league right that I can't wrap my head around is how to do promotion and relegation.

Swedish team in bottom 3 means Swedish champions get promoted? Sucks to be an awesome English team.

Annual playoff on the lowest finisher from each nation? So... You could win the super league and be relegated in one?

Eliminate how strictly national leagues work so it can operate much like the lower divisions of regular football? Good luck with that one... A top European super league is one thing but you'd need a bunch of buffers here and just be passing the problem down the chain.

[FunkMonk]

Now that this is done, I eagerly await the summer when these same Sky pundits are criticizing Arsenal for not spending enough money and therefore show a lack of ambition compared to Manchester City or Manchester United spending hundreds of millions in a single transfer window.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah - absolutely and you're looking at baseball but the sport European football team owners and league administrators and players are most interested in is the basketball. They are all obsessed with the NBA - that's the model they aspire to and think they can learn from. And again the US sports are the best at this stuff.

£200 million isn't how much they paid Neymar (I think he's on £35 million a year) that's how much they paid to sign him. Right now everyone wants Erling Haaland - he has apparently has a release clause that triggers in summer 2022 for £115 million, but the oligarch/nation state clubs are sniffing around now but obviously to sign him you'd need to pay a lot more than £115 million. Again that's just not viable for a lot of the elite clubs in the current market.

One reason I suspect US athletes earn more is because they have a union and from my understanding details are published - in Europe the union is useless and all player contracts and transfers are super-confidential (not least because you get weird clauses like paying someone's dad or paying for private plane travel every month for family from Brazil or whatever). 90% of transfer fees and wages are just based on reports - they are almost always "undisclosed" publicly.

Having said that and just doing a quick search for the average squad player - so not superstars - do pretty well in Premier League (less so in other European leagues). The average wage is apparently about $4 million which is the same as baseball - but only half of basketball.

[Threviel]

Regional super leagues perhaps? Feeding into a European super duper league with 4 pan-European levels perhaps? One Scandinavia league, one German, one Balkan and so on feeding into the lowest rung. Shouldn't be very much different than how it's divided nowadays in lower leagues within one nation. Would also have most nations having at least one or two teams in the top 4 divisions.

[Barrister]

The problem with doing a super league right that I can't wrap my head around is how to do promotion and relegation.

Swedish team in bottom 3 means Swedish champions get promoted? Sucks to be an awesome English team.

Annual playoff on the lowest finisher from each nation? So... You could win the super league and be relegated in one?

Eliminate how strictly national leagues work so it can operate much like the lower divisions of regular football? Good luck with that one... A top European super league is one thing but you'd need a bunch of buffers here and just be passing the problem down the chain.

You... don't.  You just play in the Super League.  If you suck in the Super League you suck in the Super League.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah I think especially with say Benelux or Scandinavia where the leagues themselves aren't super competitive it'd make a lot of sense to have a regional super league. Also if it was possible I think a Yugoslav league would make a lot of sense.

Similarly I think an African super league makes a lot of sense and in each case would likely increase the revenue and allow those clubs to keep players for a little while longer.

[Tamas]

Also if it was possible I think a Yugoslav league would make a lot of sense.

That certainly would make it to the news regularly. 

[Tamas]

Watching Chelsea-Brighton I kinda' wish I could watch Chelsea play one of the other 11 every week instead of this thing.