Disgusting but inevitable, the Super League money grab shows too much is never enough

I hope the Premier League, the FA and Eufa inflict a total ban on these clubs.

Certainly, if the Premier League and the FA don't stand up to these clubs and ban them from the minute they sign up to this so called "Super League", English Football will suffer a decline, if these clubs are allowed to set their own terms for participting in the Premiership and the FA Cup.

Kick them out of the PL. I know this will cause finanical havoc but the longer we wait the harder it will be to bring them to heel. Let them be a mid table team in a Super League and see how much their "global fans' enjoy it. We're not going to be cannon fodder for their reserve teams at the weekends.

I'm happy watching 11 honest pros battling it out with proper clubs like Villa and Wolves for the title. "Big Six" can play Madrid every Wednesday if they want.

An interesting piece Lyndon. A critical word is inevitable, because that is what this whole affair is. Inevitable from a long way back.

Also an interesting take on the capacity of BMD, which at 52000 is basically our present attendance, plus the waiting list, plus the seats for the away fans. Maybe it was planned with this ESL development in mind.

Now we await the considered reactions from those bastions of integrity, EUFA, FIFA, PL, FA etc. And of course the various lawyers, accountants in the cold grey light of dawn

Brilliant Lyndon.
A perfect summation.

Given the quality of your work, do you have a journalist background?

Very good article Lyndon. Like teh above posts, I would kick them out. Yes there will be short term pain but I feel long term gain. If the PL, uefa and fifa cave in to these clubs then the game is dead anyway, even more so than it is now. Let them become the pariah, the ones that killed the spirit of football.

It's been in the post for a long time. I wrote some recent comments on a different super league thread speculating the big English clubs wanted to lock up income streams in euros to hedge the currency risk, and I was absolutely correct.

Football is been threatening to eat itself for many many years now. This moment right now is absolutely historic - it's the moment football jumped the shark. Stay tuned, this will run and run and run....

Not a great time to be borrowing a shitload of money for a new stadium as an aside. Everton that.

Very compelling piece of writing Lyndon.

I've commented on the other thread. What I think will play out is different to my personal view on this, on which I share the almost universal contempt for the way these clubs have behaved.

They elite (yes Tottenham?!) have deliberately fired the first shots. I believe we will now see an inevitable game of cat and mouse, who blinks first and political games. There will be some sort of middle ground, although it won't really be middle ground, it will lean towards the wishes of the elite but involve some sort of compromise on their part.

All is saved!

Oliver Dowden our Culture Secretary, is to make a statement on this, this afternoon. Apparently Ministers are under pressure to take action as well.

Now that should be interesting as a bunch of free marketeers are being asked to take action against what is basically a free market initiative.

Given the way Liverpool have acted in all this, perhaps Everton can now end cordial relations with them. And if BMD becomes a victim, then the City Council should do likewise.

There is so much to unpick here.

I can't imagine the average fan of any of these "Big Six" clubs want to leave the PL.

The proposals are for a midweek league, in theory not "interfering" with league fixtures (I think it will).

Is some of the sour grapes from the other 14 PL clubs based on the fact that they aren't in a position to be involved? (It's not a view I hold, but there can be a hint of envy in outrage).

Isn't a European Super League inevitable? We've heard this sort of thing for years, I first remember hearing it mooted in the 80s.

Is it not just a power grab by clubs from UEFA and in turn a money redistribution? We've seen similar moans in the PL about the distribution of TV money.

Is there an issue that foreign ownership of clubs has lead to a dissociation with the traditions of domestic football?

This issue won't go away, even if these particular proposals are quashed. The globalisation of football and the huge strides in broadcast technology surely mean that it is possible to increasingly monetise the "content," discuss it and gamble on it, all with branding and global partners fully onboard, each buying into the super-slick product that is a "Super League."

Agree with what you say Simon and I've been trying to detach my personal view from what is happening. This is a preemptive strike by the 12 to start shaping the conversation about restructuring the format of European competition.

Can I see this ESL going through? I doubt it will. For a start UEFA are adamant that players involved will be banned from playing for their country. So if the ESL does commence, the only way out for players with serious international aspirations will be to run their contract down. Players will not want to sign for any of the ESL clubs, for fear of jeopardizing their own international aspirations. Highly unlikely, but ESL clubs could be left with no players, or all "Over the hill" players.

So what if it does go ahead, and these six clubs are to remain in the premier league? What kind of teams will they be fielding? And, here's the biggie for me, what if they play a weakened team in the premier league all season, and end up being relegated?

It's being reported that the remaining premier league clubs are demanding immediate sanctions against the six clubs, and even want suspensions imposed from the current season. The remaining fourteen clubs are to meet with the premier league tomorrow, so let's hope their sanction requests are granted.

And one more thing, there will be fifteen clubs guaranteed the safety of avoiding relegation, while there will be five clubs invited to participate. Is this for one season only, and what happens if their own national league won't let any of these five clubs back in to their league?

My hope is that Everton will wake up to how selfish and treacherous Liverpool are.

All the sympathy Everton showed Liverpool over Heysel and Hillsborough counts for nothing.

Liverpool are a disgrace and need to be kicked out the Premiership immediately.

The Premier League will be stronger for it in the long run.

This is our golden opportunity! All the rebel clubs should be expelled, leaving us and a few others to contest the premiership. As things stand we must win a multiple titles over the years or at least finish towards the top. We then are in the champions league every year, playing PSG/Bayern Munich/Dortmund/Ajax etc. Possibly winning the occasional Champions League. In both cases catching up with the RS! What's not to like!

And the greedy 6? They will come crawling back, begging to be let back in. Yes, for a few years the 'fans' who live in USA/Asia will love it - paying top dollar for an exclusive armchair experience, but the real fans will get bored witless as the RS play Juventus again and again and again every year. And, to please the 'new' fan base, games will be franchised out to Qatar or Chicago or Bangkok etc. What fun as a RS fan - watching Liverpool v Athletico at Soldiers Field in Chicago in 40 degrees C (or minus 20 C) at 3am in the morning. Yes, let them go, I couldn't care less.

Charles at 14
Spot on!

Excellent article, Lyndon.

Your opening words: greed, arrogance, cynicism, naked opportunism could be applied equally relevantly to those who cut themselves adrift from the Football League and sold their clubs' souls to Rupert Murdoch. You point out that "there is plenty to regret about the path it (the PL) has taken English football down" but that it was more evolution than revolution.

This is the only part of your analysis that I would take mild issue with; I think it was all more clinically planned than evolutionary. The PL is an insatiable monster, which having created a huge divide within its own 20 clubs and a vast chasm between it and the rest of English football, will eventually eat itself. I ask myself often the rhetorical question: would I rather be watching top flight football in the 1960's, 70's and 80's or the PL?

The driving forces behind the secession from the Football League were motivated by exactly the same adjectives you use to describe those behind this I'm all right Jack concept. Sadly there is a stand at Goodison named after one of those driving forces 30 odd years ago. What a pity he lacked the same drive to oppose Thatcher when his own club, Football League Champions, were banned from Europe because of Liverpool fans at Heysel.

It's the best they can do for a bargaining chip, they want more tv money and wild card entrance into the Champions League. They'll want more share of the PL tv money too.

Because they are not getting what they want. The toys are well and truly out of the pram.

I hope that in response that the PL UEFA and FIFA don't dare offer any concessions that will damage competition.

They should teach them a lesson and impose much more equitable sharing of TV money and enhance competition.

Then an independent body with a charter needs to be set up to legally protect fans and the game itself from wanton greed and any future anticompetitive actions.

Government minister Dowden in parliament. Government “won't hesitate to protect one of our treasured institutions, football. Bbe in no doubt if they [FA, EUFA, etc] can't act, we will. We will put everything on the table to prevent this happening.”

Great article, Lyndon. Encapsulates the issue perfectly.

The best, and only, parliamentary debate I've ever seen. All the members standing and stating the name of the club they support. 100% against this stupid ideas.

Dowden is wearing his Everton club tie proudly.

I honestly can't see the sustainability of the league especially due to the comments from the ESL about this isn't aimed for legacy (current) fans, but for future fans. It actually just shows how out of touch these owners are with the game and the naivety they have about 'legacy' fans. As the old saying goes 'Football without fans is nothing'. That's what this league is going to breed, these new fans are going to be the fans that people hate: 'plastics'. We all know the people who have a Chelsea, Man City and a Barca shirt and will support whoever is in fashion that season.

We've seen the impact what the lack of fans has done to games due to Covid. Fans are the lifeblood of any team, if you're replacing them with faceless customers/tourists, it will be just like playing in front of no fans as they'll be no atmosphere. This whole premise is around the funding coming from worldwide tv deals. Other than the fans of these clubs in this country, no one is going to pay to watch the games of one of their former rival teams. While these international fans will be rabid to watch the teams to start off, there's a good chance that many will get turned off due to the repetitiveness of the games. Also, how many of the Super Sunday 'big 6' games already that are hyped beyond belief are boring 0-0 or 1-1 affairs.

As I said in yesterday's thread breaking this news, we are going to learn a lot about the resolve and integrity of the national and international governing bodies and many an individual involved in the game.

The initial reaction from all quarters is overwhelming appalled by the declaration.

There will be a great deal of brinkmanship and arm wrestling before this is definitively resolved.

The little we do know of the detail is revealing. The broad strokes are these:

The ESL intends to have 15 founding clubs. The named 12 plus three ‘guests'. You have to believe, given the Dirty Dozen signatories, that the likes of Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund and PSG were on the invite list, but declined, or it might well have been the ‘Filthy Fifteen'. Five other clubs would qualify for the 20-strong ESL each season, based on their domestic league performance.

Even with the closed shop of 15 there appears already to be in place pre-determined benefits based on ‘who-knows-what' criteria. Of the total 3.5 BILLION euros paid to 15 members (what the 5 seasonal ‘qualifiers' receive has not yet been specified, based on what I've read so far), there will be 350m euros for six clubs, 225m euros for four clubs, 112.5m euros for two clubs and 100m euros for three clubs.

That alone puts six clubs at a considerable advantage to the other 14. A super-duper elite within the super-elite.

The ESL has apparently already sent a letter to Fifa president Gianni Infantino and Uefa boss Aleksander Ceferin issuing notice of legal proceedings in European courts designed to block any sanctions the two governing bodies may try to enforce over the formation of the ESL. An acknowledgement then that their initiative is sure to be challenged with banning sanctions against those who enlist.

Aleksander Ceferin in his ferocious attack today on the clubs and individuals involved has already declared he will be consulting with UEFA's lawyers to firm up their own legal options.

With FIFA and UEFA the long-standing administrators of the game their statutes determine which clubs can play in which competitions, as well as regulating who can manage and play both club and national football.

Potentially, as an elite player or coach, if you follow your club into the ESL you are considerably limiting your employment options. Managers will be sacked. Players will not make the grade and will age. If you are contracted to this rogue league, you risk having no other option outside this ‘elite' group should your contract be terminated.

For youth players the situation is even more fraught. The attrition rate at academies is huge. Currently, you may ‘fail' at a top club, but still have a career is lesser leagues. Again potentially, if you hail from an ESL academy but don't make it to their first team, that's it. Your career as a professional footballer withers in the cradle.

This dilemma extends to the ‘five annual qualifiers' based on their domestic league performance. Potentially, if a club qualifies and enters the ESL for one fleeting season, they could find themselves ostracised and unable to return to their domestic league. Homeless and unloved.

This strikes me as very much a boardroom decision made by a few suits whose principle driving motive is pure avarice. Now they will be extremely savvy players, but superficially it does not appear that they have canvassed opinion and viability of this proposal from the different stakeholders who this will directly impact upon the most.

Players. Managers. Fans.

A helluva lot for everybody working within football to weigh up. Never mind the fans. But then…who is minding the fans' opinion in all this?

All concerned are going to have to pick a side in this. And when they do, we will learn a lot about their individual resolve and integrity on this question.

Should this come to pass, I see it as a wonderful opportunity for Everton. But that can wait for another day.

Initial reports suggest that the legal position is unclear. One lawyer said that, as European and American law stands, it would be difficult for UEFA, FIFA or the FA to impose sanctions (eg kicking them out of the domestic league, banning players from internationals etc). However, he gave the caveat that it would only take a slight nudge in opinion towards the sporting heritage and community arguments to allow a judgement against the ESL. If so, the suggestion was that the ESL would not go ahead.

The law firms will be licking their lips - there is potentially millions of pounds in fees to be had here - but most lawyers tend to recommend dispute resolution rather than litigation; in other words, compromise.

My worry is that compromise will give the greedy owners far too much. My fervent hope is that this is the big moment when we all take a good look at what is positive, and what is negative, about the current state of the game. What most fans want, and most clubs, is a more level playing field rather than an even bigger slice of the pie going to just a few clubs.

On a lighter note, have you seen that our own Peter Clarke has been appointed to the PFA players board

Good luck to the lad, always like to see our ex pros doing something.

Hopefully they'll have something to say as well

I think one of the possible sanctions Dowden mentioned was legislating for a windfall tax against any benefits that may be gained from ESL.

These have many precedents in our taxation history over the years

This is getting better Chris, because it'll just mean a few English clubs might have to relocate away from these shores forever!

Interesting Chris.

Can you expand on the precedents please

Mourinho sacked! Some on here may get excited...

Yes Thomas,

The banks, pension funds, power and oil companies and Utilities Companies, over the years. Some recent talk about big IT companies. By Labour governments, so to hear it from a Tory Minister is a bit surprising.

A few years since the last one

Thanks Chris.
The Labour Governments involvement in such matters is not surprising.

Saying and doing is a totally different thing when it comes from a tory

Nice work Lyndon, I'm leaning toward Project Big Picture 2.0 here but the desperation seems real. These clubs are leveraged and are probably in precarious shape if current TV revenues cannot be realized sometime soon.

You're preaching to the converted Thomas. A lot of Dowden's announcement was rhetorical and window dressing. It was only under questioning that the windfall tax was mentioned as an option.

At the end of the day, he was saying it's down to the Organisations like PL, FA etc to take necessary action but they would do anything to facilitate that. They also said they would initiate an investigation/ enquiry into the governance of football. That should kick the can down the street for a bit.

Even America had a windfall tax once! Even Thatcher!

👍 Thanks Chris.

Do you really think the quango won't have considered the response of the lower cast plebs in FIFA/EUFA/EPL etc? They'll have all bases covered. 'restraint of trade etc, so it will turn into an Ethics debate, a medieval morality play freak show, with the gods warring amongst themselves, and us sad sods exchanging our souls for a ticket and watching gormless and disenfranchised.. let's get the 12 Originals back in a top tier playing on front of fans earning less than £15k a year guaranteed a ticket.

SKY acting as the voice of the people and representing the heart and soul of football. we're witnessing new black hole depths of irony here lads.

Lyndon, you most of all know the power of words and I like the way you have commented. Let the words Judas and traitorous be forever associated with them. Cynicism, greed and arrogance. Let us batter them with those words. Judas club Liverpool, Traitorous City. We are in the right, every fan of football. My God, if ToffeeWeb is united then football is.
They can and must be defeated and then, no compromise they are gone for good.

Let's aim our ire at the individual owners, by name, not the clubs (as their supporters might be just as much against all this), as Neville and Carragher are saying. Their fans are allies in this, not enemies.

Superb article Lyndon. I'm disgusted but not surprised because Utd, Arsenal and our greedy neighbours have American owners, who are only here to make money, and don't forget during Covid, remember how Spurs and Liverpool wanted to furlough non playing staff, absolutely shocking the least paid of all there employees, that's who your dealing with. It's a total insult by our neighbours.

£3 billion! Who would say no?

Once you go you don't come back! The football governing bodies need to act quickly. Expelled from their league they play and all European competitions. All players playing for those clubs banned from world international competitions.

Next season the premier league should be rebranded and renamed. Meaning all those clubs who have left cannot return to their domestic leagues for a minimum of 25 years and must start at the bottom!

The government cannot stop this. Do we not think lawyers have not been scrutinising the legality of such a league? Yes they have!

How do we stop this? Rub their hands with more silver? Making the leagues more one sided than they are already. Let them go! It will devide cities and people but this is life.

As fans we dream of a billionaire owner pouring millions into our club. They are business people not fans. Fans are to blame for this super league as much as the owners. We the fans demand more!! That comes at a cost!!

Very good point, Christy. And you know what they were doing it to save a pittance. What Spurs and Liverpool attempted then was immoral and vile; there is nothing their greed will not countenance.

Have I got this right? The ESL would have 15 'founder' members plus 5 other teams from national leagues somehow being promoted and relegated no matter where they finish. So just one season each in ESL. What if one of the 5 actually won it, they would then be relegated back to their national league?

Seeing as there are already 6 English clubs amongst the 20 I doubt that any other English teams will be allowed to be amonsgt the additional 5 anyway!

Kick them out the Premier league and the Champions league for a start. Invite Rangers and Celtic to replace two of them maybe two more from take an extra.two from the championship and maybe two from France. Cant play for England, to which some players will leave those clubs. Final point how the hell can Spurs who never win a thing be classed as an elite club. They will be all begging to come back within 3 years. Fans boycott subscription TV for it and refuse to go to games. End of in a heartbeat.

Understand the consquences of kicking out the Big Six. Total finanical devastation for the rest of the EPL. TV deals will be cancelled and reduce massively. All the EPL clubs will go bankrupt unless they have a sugar daddy (which we do).

On the other hand there must be CONSEQUENCES for the traitors. I fear some compromise where there permanent wealthy status will be further entrenched. I would say now is the time to put that in reverse. Take a hit now whilst we still can fight them. Maybe just kick out Man U - seems to be the ring leader maybe Liverpool as well. That would n't harm the PL's TV deals too much and make a point to the others.

The current so called big six weren't always the big 6.

We must now act with integrity and tell the ESL clubs they either give the idea a miss or quit the EPL. It is the most popular league in the world and will survive expelling the ones who don't come in line.

Have no relegation this year and promote the top 3 in the championship.

Should make for a far more competitive league.

I'm not sure this is all about greed of the owners of these clubs. I think it is all about getting more money in to pay exorbitant wages of Players (plus the cut for the agents). When you have the likes of Pogba, who although being a good player, has hardly set the EPL on fire, demands £500,000 a week, it shows that existing TV Money, money from EPL and CL etc... will not cover the additional costs.

With the likes of Barca and Real Madrid both being close to a billion Euros in debt, this is their last chance of getting more money as they already control their own TV deals.

At the end of the day, the greedy 6 will need EPL agreement to play in the ESL. If that is withheld that would certainly force them to make a decision, however, I would expect that with a few brown envelopes the powers that be at the EPL would give that agreement. Money talks.

It's heinous greed. However, I can't help thinking what if there had been no Heysel? Kendall keeps us at the top for 10 years? Lineker stays. Steven stays, Kanchelskis. Rooney stays. Club goes Stock Market. We would be there with them no doubt. Fo the first time for years I actually feel a great deal of sympathy for the Reds I went to school with 50 years ago who no doubt feel betrayed. Now its time for supporters to play their part. Boycott. Leave the greedy clubs to the knobhead tourist and armchair supporters. Go watch Marine/ Wigan/Tranmere or if you live elsewhere, your local team. If you're a proper supporter who lives too far away to go to games don't subscribe to whatever EuroDisney TV channel they air on.

Surely if the 6 are expelled domestic football returns to some form of reality. Yes we lose all or most of the TV money but all that means is that the players are paid a lot less, not that clubs go out of business - no 60 grand a week for a bang average journeyman. We go back to the gate receipts being an important revenue 'stream' Yes we will see lots of overseas players disappearing but personally I'm looking forward to football as it was in the 70's and 80's but with better pitches and less fighting!

Charles @59, essentially, I agree. The Super League clubs are trying to claim that any problems with the game can only be solved by bringing in more money, whereas it seems pretty obvious to me that, if there are are structural problems within the economies of football, it is best solved by reducing outgoings. The agents and players are sucking the game dry. Whenever money has come into the game, wages have been inflated to soak it all up.

I don't begrudge the "talent" receiving the bulk of the reward - in fact, it's a good thing. But if it's killing the game, then it needs reigning in.

Is the "product" so much better now that we are paying players more money? I honestly don't remember watching us win the title under Howard Kendall and thinking "yeah, this is great, but it would be much better if everyone on the pitch earned ten times as much".

My big worry is whether we now lose the Bramley Moore project. But, if we can fill that ground every week (which we can), and if there is still an appetite for Premier League football on TV (which there is), then is it still affordable? If not, then I guess it's another decade of splinters up your arse in Goodison.

The RS will probably end up at BMD and we will end up at our old ground! Money talks and they could almost pay for it from their ESL signing on fee. Can we possibly hate them even more!

This, whether one likes it or not is part of a process, that has been going on in sport since time immemorial, but particularly over the last twenty years. Like many people on this site, I follow a number of sports. Cricket with the IPL, the Big Bash and above all central contracts, has denuded the grass root game of its players. Jimmy Anderson hardly graces Lancashire with his presence, but these players still want a testimonial. Rugby League can find a place for Toronto (cock-up) and the Catalan Dragons, but traditional teams like Widnes and Featherstone are out in the cold. Every year some Rugby Union club calls for an end to promotion and relegation and finds obscure rules to make it difficult or impossible for the Cornish Pirates or Rotherham to be promoted.
The American model and two of our six are American owned, is such that a team can have twenty years at or near the bottom and their income is guaranteed without the threat of relegation.
To see Neville, Carragher (both employed by Sky and with their jobs on the line) joining Prince William and Boris Johnson as the defenders of the people's game is frankly nauseating.
Football ceased to be the people's game a long, long time ago. Roy Keane talked of the takeover by the prawn sandwich brigade a long time ago. To afford a season ticket for two or more members of a family requires a middle class salary.
Yes, this exercise is greed, but all sports suffer from greed by the top clubs or countries and football has been lucky to survive so far. If it doesn't happen now I'd take bets that it will happen in the very near future.
Spurs last won the league in 1961,I was fourteen, and have been trophyless for almost as long as Everton, yet they've managed to get into this elite.
I disapprove of this move, but see it as part of the Americanisation of sport and some of the moral outrage is posturing, football is no different to other financial entities under capitalism and I'm afraid money rules.

It should say three, not two are American owned.