The Premier League's case against Man City is now being heard. Should a free-marketeer care about what private football clubs do with their money? Is this just something to appease sports fans who'd prefer a more level playing-field (and a bit of justice & fairness)? The same team winning every year is pretty bloody dull. And if it goes against Man City and they get relegated, how will their quite ridiculously overpaid squad respond?
Personally my game is RU and I have very little interest in the details of this hoo-ha. But I will summarise the RU precedent for those who don't know it: Saracens, who'd also been winning quite a lot and had comprehensively busted the salary cap - systematically and quite creatively - to assemble a very hard-to-beat squad with a great many top notch players**; more than anyone else could remotely afford. They were duly fined and relegated (via an insuperable points deduction).
To me, aside from evening things up a bit and dealing out some justice, the interesting phenomenon was that almost all their prominent players stuck with the team through a dull, and actually somewhat debilitating year in the lower division: they just didn't get sufficiently competitive matches to keep them fully sharp. But they came back up after a single season via promotion in due course, and they all sharpened up quickly enough thereafter.
The loyalty was impressive. Whatever money they'd splashed around illicitly, they'd nevertheless obviously built a team ethos that wasn't merely mercenary.
Views on the questions above?
ND
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** Plus Owen Farrell
25 comments:
I liked the suggestion that the EPL (the old First Division) could expel Man City which would then presumably apply for membership of the English Football League. The EFL might then offer them membership starting in "League Two" i.e. the old Fourth Division.
Or, how about a creative solution? Let Man City apply for membership of the top division in France so that Ligue 1 isn't an annual parade leading to the inevitable crowning of Paris St Germain. Or ditto the German Bundesliga so that Bayern Munich don't almost always win it.
Or, or, or: learn the lesson of Berwick Rangers and apply for membership of the Scottish Leagues so that Celtic doesn't always win.
The best budget cap for free marketeers is for the mugs (sorry, fans) to stop giving the clubs so much money.
Yes, I know, it's an international game and so money comes in from all over the world. But UK fans stopping the cash would make a difference. They won't of course, because they are mugs.
Back when it was the old first division, the leaders then were United, and because of the wealth they had they attracted the best players. City haven't necessarily committed any wrong doing. But 115 charges rewritten to get that many is ludicrous.
@dearieme
EPL teams have been doing pre-season tours of the United States to promote the EPL and their own brands over there. So, another version of your proposal would be to send Man City into exile for a couple of years as a guest team in Major League Soccer in the US.
It might be more palatable to the club and the EPL than relegating them with a massive points deduction, and would continue the brand promotion exercise. All the media attention and big name players that City could bring would also make it attractive to MLS.
I will be astounded if MC get found guilty,or are seriously punished if they are. They'll wriggle out of it, they've got more money than the PL, they'll bamboozle the independent commission, all they'll get is a hefty fine for a few violations of the rules, and that'll be it.
Worth noting that five or six other "big" clubs have been gunning for us for years, and this is the result. Worth noting also that CAS cleared us of all allegations of financial doping (made by UEFA) a few years back. So if we are cleared in one court and found guilty in another, where does that leave football? It will of course hugely entertain the legal profession.
Apparently we buy the title every season. Odd then that we are eleventh in the net spend league over the past five years. What upsets other clubs is not only that we are the best football team in the world, what was once a laughing stock for thirty years, is now the best managed football club in the world. And not being soaked by American owners.
https://www.football365.com/news/transfers-premier-league-five-year-net-spend-man-utd-man-city
11) Manchester City: £-139.11m
Also, one reason why the Prem is so popular and itself so wealthy is because of clubs such as City and the football we play. Still, nothing to beat biting the hand that feeds you, eh?
https://www.football365.com/news/transfers-premier-league-five-year-net-spend-man-utd-man-city
Funny how the Prem never made any move to find out where Abramovich got the money to fund his buyout of Chelsea. Innit.
"Apparently we buy the title every season. Odd then that we are eleventh in the net spend league over the past five years. What upsets other clubs is not only that we are the best football team in the world, what was once a laughing stock for thirty years, is now the best managed football club in the world. And not being soaked by American owners."
Its not where MC are now that matters, its how they got there. Newcastle have owners just as wealthy as MC, as do Chelsea, but they are constrained in their expansion plans by the FFP rules now in a way that MC were not in the 2008-18 period, thanks to their hiding the true source of the money they were raising. Can you hand on heart say that the fact that Etihad airlines just happened to want to plough hundreds of millions into MC had nothing to do with the fact the owner of City is one of Royal Family of the UAE? And its completely coincidental that Roberto Mancini just happened to get a side job to his managership at City with a sports club in Abu Dhabi owned by Sheikh Mansour for a nice little £1.75m salary for a few days work a year?
Pull the other one. City's owners were pulling every scam they could think of to get money into the club, which allowed them to amass a huge number of players, often buying players just to stop anyone else having them. Players that were hardly getting on the City bench would have been first choice starters elsewhere. Look at Milner, warming the bench at City, became a integral part of Klopps Liverpool team.
This is why they are where they are today - they abused the system to get themselves to the top. And having bought their way to the top they can now work within the rules, because the club is self sustaining at that level.
All of which is what Newcastle and Chelsea can't do - they are in the position of City c.2010. And unable to do what City did, and challenge them using the same tactics City used for the last 15 years. Its not what City are doing now they need punishing for, its what they did to get where they are now.
Sorry Anon @ 9:46 was me.
On the Saracens point;
Glasgow Rangers. Following insolvency and administration, the assets were sold to a new firm, with the club leaving the SPL and joining the SFL.
In the Third Division.
Wiki gives "most key players" refusing to transfer across to the new company. Took them four years to return to the SPL, with a one year transfer ban in place during the first year in the SFL.
Now, the claim "obviously built a team ethos that wasn't merely mercenary" may or may not be true, for certain values, but I'd have to assume that the transfer market for RL players is nowhere near as deep or broad as for footballers.
In essence, Sarries' players had nowhere else to go.
Mr Cowshed, you are forgetting France? Japan?
And when various clubs have gone under in recent times (Wasps, L. Irish et al) their good players have mostly found berths elsewhere fairly quickly (hits on their wages unknown, of course)
Two countries, one of which is how far away? Breadth and depth. Rangers squad for the season just prior to the administration, contained one Yank, a Bosnian, a Lithuanian, one Senegalese, a Croatian, a Slovakian, an Algerian, and one Frog.
How many market participants across how many countries?
Hits on wages, well, yes, unknown. However, it's the SPL here, not exactly awash with the readies, and following administration, the players would effectively be free agents, no transfer fee required to secure the registration. Wages at their new clubs might actually have gone up, depending.
Quite a bit of politics in this as City's owners have invested a lot in regenerating the area, so some justified fears of balls quite literally being taken home.
I've no doubt there'll have been some ropey accounting measures, which may cost them a few points, but the interesting bits will be if they've done a few naughty things around payments.
Also interesting is what CAS said - that many of the issues UEFA punished for had expired, there's no equivalent expiration date with the EPL, so we *know* they've done a few things that breached UEFA rules, they'd just taken too long to action them, if they also breach EPL rules then they'll be punished. I didn't take much interest in the details though.
I suspect it'll end up with a points deduction, enough to stop them winning the EPL this season, but not enough to stop them qualifying for the CL if they put their foot down.
New EPL champion, City get to play victim, but still end up in next seasons CL, so no real loss and carry on as you were season after.
Although my predictions have been off last year or so, so who knows, maybe Oldham will get to host City again, this time either in Division 2 or National League.
Caesar - the Macclesfield Derby was the height of our period down amongst the dead men of the 3rd division. That year, only a win in the 2nd (3rd in reality) division playoffs - May 25 years ago, I was there with my ex and two of our kids at Wembley, when we scored two goals in time added on to go equal, and then won on pens. Had we not, we were in dire straits. So I'm pretty pleased with where we are now. And if we have indulged in any dodgy stuff, let any other club that is without sin throw the first stone.
Anon
"often buying players just to stop anyone else having them."
If you think City were the first club to do that, I guess football is a recent thing for you. That was going on 50 years ago.
Suppose ManC end up in League Two and then in the FA cup are drawn against ManU and knock them out. Headlines: "ManU knocked out by League Two side."
Roars of laughter all over the country.
Anyway, the MLS suggestion is the best so far.
@Elby - I've no doubt plenty of other clubs have a rugs that look like the Himalayas, and if/when caught, they too ought to be punished.
It's not about the sinning itself, it's about being *caught*
I've no beef with City, and I generally wish them well, but if they've been caught playing fast and loose, then they knew what they were doing and the potential consequences.
It's always the fans that get let down though, but whatever happens they can't take the memories of the good times away.
I would laugh so so much if the scumbags ManCity were relegated.
Respect is earnt not bought.
They deserve all they get
Bloody Hell! When did the Daily Mail take over the blog, Nick?
Odd that we are being charged with offences dating back to 2009, when PSR didn't start until 2012 at the earliest, a year after UEFA's FFP.
A lawyer's delight...
Daily Mail? It's when the RT lines start appearing BTL here that I start to wonder ...
RT lines? No, just observing objective reality.
I said Zelenskyy's Kursk invasion was just a PR stunt. It has no observable military objective, with the possible exception of attacking a Russian nuclear power plant. It reassigned defensive troops and armour for that purpose.
The result? The invading forces are bogged down and being destroyed and the deliberately weakened defensive lines elsewhere are collapsing.
I said "Wait a month and see", but it looks like we don't even have to do that.
@elby
FA has to make an example of Mancity. They’ve been plenty obstructive since 2012.
Dry your eyes lad, you know they are corrupt.
Can’t defend the indefensible, well unless you are Mancity and can afford the lawyers.
"@elby
FA has to make an example of Mancity. They’ve been plenty obstructive since 2012.
Dry your eyes lad, you know they are corrupt.
Can’t defend the indefensible, well unless you are Mancity and can afford the lawyers."
It's the Premier League, not the FA. Can't even get that right. Ignorance in abundance.
Following the Saracens precedent again - in around 2014-15 several premiership clubs, including Sarries, deliberately breached the salary cap. But the Premiership itself chose to sweep it all under the carpet without even a rap on the knuckles. The result? Sarries carried on doing it. Similarly here - if Man City aren’t punished properly for whatever it is they’ve done, there’ll be more of the same from others in future.
Although really, the punishment ought to be clear in the rules themselves, rather than having to make it up afterwards. Typically, rugby had to do the latter, which was a total farce.
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