Masters makes first moves to limit influence of the rebel six

Stan, I think Woodward's departure is terrific. And I liked John Henry's apology.

These are clearly the untrustworthy people, and hopefully their malign influence, and that of their bosses has been reduced. It may be that they also lose their club jobs too.

I hope this is just the start!

It's not just financial. The executives of the Prem clubs are friends and colleagues, and the execs of the 14 recognize that their (non-owner) counterparts at the 6 were overwhelmingly opposed to the SL venture themselves. As Chris points out, this has also served the purpose of getting rid of the shitbuckets among them (Woodward), but I think major club punishment is unlikely.

Brian #15, have you seen the apologies from the other 11 Stupid League owners?

I’ve always felt the word sorry has two meanings, especially for someone who tends to say it quite often, and if he feels the fans are the lifeblood, then why do you think he never consulted them?

You seem to be a intelligent man.
Did you believe the apology from Henry was sincere?

If it’s not fair, it’s not sport.

As Colin says @1, it is a start and Mr Masters has to be supported by all who criticised the Cartel . Including all fans and politicians.

He will certainly need all the support he can get .

Oh, and UEFA delete those preposterous legacy coefficients as a free pass to the Champions League!

What a self -serving, anticompetitive insult they are.

Don't believe for one minute anybody at this level hasn't got a clue. They fully understand which way the wind blows. Any small holes in their understanding such as national and cultural nuances around the game are long since adequately briefed by consultancy, PR and such. There's only ever a lack of understanding when it suits to portray it.

As to the Yank thing - the US is a powerhouse country with a commensurate business structure and hence largely represented in ownership across sport. It's not an inherent "Yankness" thing but a brutal and committed global business ethos. Not much American to be found at Chelsea, Tottenham and City - nor the involved continental European teams.

Is Chelseas chairman a yank?

However, if the Super League would’ve had us, we’d have been in it. And the same for all other clubs

Reading LFC forums the only people taken in by JH's folksy sincerity are fellow yanks. What a shifty fucker he is.

I like the the power stripping the league has starting doing to limit their power within certain elements of the game. The league has a bit of a conundrum though on what measures it can take against them. While we would all love big point deductions and heavy fines, the league has to take into the views of the fans/players as well. Especially as this has nothing to do with them. Overly heavy measures has the possibility of alienating the average fan and they may think the ESL wasn't that bad of an idea after all. We all saw their fans up in arms the last few days demanding whatever punishment that needs to be done, but when push comes to shove, how many would accept a huge points deduction that would affect this or next season's position. If anything, I think more than likely it maybe a upto a 10 point deduction this year to the RS & Man U for being the ring leaders and 3-6 for the other 4.

The protectionism of "no relegation" is pure American sport it's no coincidence the figure head was a European (Perez) but the 3 VPs were yanks.

Kristian#30. Kristian, if there's any points deduction whatsover I will eat the hat of my cousin Cabbage head McGraw.

The only thing these millionaire owners and chairmen are upset or sorry about is the opportunity for more and more millions in their pockets hasn't worked out - they all clearly don't give a fuck about the fans in reality, all of them speak with fork tongues.

It is somewhat a little ironic when you have a group of multi millionaire's calling another group of multi millionaire's greedy !

Everton FC isn't perfect by any means but it still retains a modicum of decency which the likes of Arsenal and United used to have but have lost since the inception of the Premier League. It could be argued that that decency cost Everton dearly when the European ban was given in 1985.

I believe Everton were right to voice their disquiet at the proposals and it had nothing to do with its place in the current pecking order, it had to do with integrity and sportsmanship, which has more often than not been a feature of the club since its inception - the one feature that the other lot forgot to take off us.

You’re right Barry. Maybe it’s that kind of ruthlessness that gets you filling up the trophy cabinet. With the exception of Spurs and recently Arsenal.

It’s perhaps that kind of ruthlessness as you say that Everton FC do not have.

I would of course like us to be more successful but I don’t think I’d be willing to trade that for a ruthless and capitalist regime.

I think generally football fans get treated like dirt compared to any other ‘members club (A season ticket for me makes you a member, as you would be at a Golf Club, or any other Sports club, Gym etc). Fans are taken for granted and clubs know that the product they present to us will always generate interest and therefore more people to take your ticket if you give it up.

But facilities are often sub standard and they can’t wait to get you in and out of the stadium.

At these so called ‘bigger clubs’ the treatment is worse.

My friend is a Man Utd fan. Season ticket holder for a number of years. He did not attend some CL games and Cup games last year, left his seat empty as he had been obligated to purchase the tickets but could not
Make it.

The club emailed him and asked him to consider whether a season ticket ‘was the right product’ for him. In other words, strong arm tactics to get him to give it up.

For each game he paid for but didn’t attend, they just see it as lost revenue from the concessions, merchandise etc.

Disgusting. I hope we never become that

Meanwhile, I'm still waiting for the slimy piece of shit to apologise to the rest of us for trying to shaft us on the sly, and willfully attempting to destroy the game we love. Remember, as they said after Trump's braindead mob stormed Congress: a failed coup is a still a coup.

He's the worst of the worst. And this time I'm talking about Henry, not Trump.

Slamming the door shut on what? It ceases to exist now.

This particular proposal and the people it was backed by is now gone.

The concept of a break away league, probably a continental one will remain very much on the table for the future. Anyone behind such a proposal will obviously have a massive task in implementing it as this one has obviously been a disaster.

Rich and sophisticated business people don’t get involved in Football because they love the sport, or the tradition or the fans.

They do it because it is an excellent investment opportunity. Great business. Massive returns. Mr Moshiri is no different.

They've got away with it.

Worse. UEFA already has bent over backwards for them in revamping the "Champions" League to give them more certainty of qualification. All they're bitching about is more money.

Watch now as the Premier League starts to make concessions. What will it be? Greater share of the overseas broadcast deal (currently split 20 ways)?

Thin end of the wedge.

And Matt, those committees matter a good deal. That is where the football meets the business model.

Mike they wouldn’t see it as shafting the fans though. They’d see it as giving them the opportunity to watch EFC play exclusively amongst an elite group. Giving them the chance to visit Milan, Barcelona, Madrid etc frequently to see their team. How many games have we played competitively against these clubs in our history?

And the fans? They’d attend in droves.

I agree they made a statement, with their statement. But it’s easy to comment on and criticise a members only club that will never allow you to join.

I'd love to think in a parallel universe if we'd have been one of those monied / gloried (except Spurs) clubs - we'd have stood firm. But I doubt it. Football in England - and Everton with it - ceased being a sport a long time ago. Back in the 80s Everton's annual turnover was £5m. Or about what some of the bang average players now "earn" in a season.

And as to those Committee suspensions. Let's see what happens next season? They'll be crying about lack of representation next...

And that's Groucho Williams, performing at the Monaco Ritz thru next weekend. Take a bow Groucho!

You don’t the reasoning behind this do you?

Madrid and Barcelona are in humongous amounts of debt.

The Italian clubs have had to tighten their belts for the last 15 years.

Tottenham, Arsenal and Liverpool stand a very realistic chance of not qualifying for CL football this season.

Chelsea stuttered and know how quickly they can fall out of contention. Man Utd have stuttered in recent years. Man City recognise how easy the slide out of the top 4 can be and how quickly it can happen.

These clubs from a financial perspective are terrified of losing champions league football for a year. To lose it for a number of years is an unmitigated disaster.

Therefore create a monopoly regime and join it. That was their plan.

Dortmund, FC Bayern on the other hand are extremely well run and hugely profitable football clubs who just happen to dominate their country in terms of domestic football. Champions League qualification and progress is not an issue for these clubs nor has it been since the mid 90s with the exception of a Dortmund stutter.

PSG. Super rich. A non competitive league. Will qualify for champions league every year and will likely reach the latter stages of it most years.

They must be ruthless and put these traitor clubs in the equivalent of Hades.

They deserve no sympathy and no mercy, they’ve taken the proverbial piss on a scale not seen.

Hopefully massive annual penalty fines and points deductions and competition banning for the next 7 years.

It will be interesting to see if the sponsorship deals in life for the dirty six, will be terminated by the respective organisations.

Hopefully this will be another indirect punishment and put these scheisters on skid row.

This from the Guardian's Scott Murray, writing in The Fiver this morning about the club "resistance" to the Super League:

See, it’s a great relief … until you factor in the complete and utter destruction of the few thin slivers of trust that remained between fans and the institutions they support. And the queasy sensation of having agreed in principle with an argument put forward by Boris Johnson. And the uneasy feeling of still having been played, given that under cover of this going off, Uefa quietly ratified its all-new, really-rubbish, mega-distended Swiss Cup, which we’ll probably now have to suck up and like too, while the performatively reluctant Chelsea and Manchester City appear to have emerged from this entire fiasco as heroes, despite their spendthrift oligarch overlords having pied-piped everyone towards the precipice in the first place.

To be scrupulously fair to the likes of Chelsea and City – and indeed PSG, sitting there, just out of shot, equally doe-eyed and innocent – they only accelerated a process that had been heading this way for years, superleagues of various domestic and continental hue having been mooted in one form or another since the 1950s. So when apportioning blame, it’s all about timing your run, which explains why Everton, prime movers in the superleagueification of English football as one of 1992’s preposterously arrogant Big Five, can sit proudly atop their high horse now. Yet there’s only so much fun to be had by wagging a self-righteous finger at someone with dirtier hands, and The Fiver hopes fans of all clubs will soon band together for the greater good, and fight the good fight for the structural change that’d make football a fairer game: SALARY CAPS NOW! Or failing that, class war. Either will do.

Interesting points.

Now, I do tend to believe that our current ownership would have dismissed a Super League invitation out of hand.

But... I'm not at all sure.

As you well know. Ligue 1 is nowhere near as competitive as the Premier League.

Man City - as rich as they were, last season before Pep they just about made the top 4. On goal difference.

So post Pep. They may well be thinking that top 4 is not a cast iron guarantee.

PSG on the other hand have had 10 straight years in the top 2 and will have won 8 titles.

So if we want to keep you on TW, we have to keep trying to kick you off?

He may be many things but unlike the others he is more tuned to fan reaction than Kroenke, Henry and the Glazers. I get the impression Mosh values Kenwright's opinion on the nuanced stuff and Bill would have spotted the size of the shit storm a mile away.

Of course he would have taken the money if the club could of got away with it but that's the point he would have known we never could

There are many ways to do things but there is only one right way, the super six embarked on a self-serving, self-regarding flight of fancy and they failed spectacularly to assess the mood of their own fans and the left behind clubs.

What happened in the late 1980s was a reaction to the European ban and the arrival of the Premier League was possibly the right call at that time, given the falling attendances and really poor facilities on offer.

What has happened in the last decade or so is that the rich owners want to guarantee success based upon their recent 'history' in the European competitions and their attractiveness to global television audiences.

The arguments for the big clubs in the late 1980s had some merit and they didn't decide to throw the other clubs to the wall in their quest to keep the English clubs competitive when European football was back on the agenda. The inception of the Champions League in its original form was initially exciting and interesting but as the bigger clubs pushed the envelope the games lost a lot of appeal to the neutrals.

We all want Everton FC to be amongst the biggest and best clubs in Europe but we don't want Everton FC to behave in a similar fashion to the breakaway clubs. They haven't thus far and they didn't back in the late 1980s. Hindsight is a wonderful thing and given the state of the game today compared to four decades ago, a lot has changed and mostly not for the better - but to charge Everton FC as being just like the other six is extremely unfair at this time.

And by the way, not a dig Mike but I don't trust that Smarmy Fiver Dude.

What do Everton stand for?

Can you reference it all for me? Some proof to back up anything you say we stand for?

When the Premier league was developing all the clubs were involved in the process and kept informed of developments.

Would the likes of Brighton and Crystal Palace have been stable but for Premiership funding.

The dirty dozen took knowledge gained from the Premiership meetings and behind everyones backs thought they were Billy big balls. The arrogance of these clubs is staggering especially Spurs who have only won the league twice and the last time was 1961.

We all know that a few insincere apologies will be made and certain scapegoats heads will roll but I believe as always the public indignation will be cosseted by behind the scenes handshakes and bonhomie.

John Henry summed up perfectly ,"The crocodile tears of insincerity from Liverpool"

John Henry summed up perfectly ,,,1,07:35:29,,109.249.181.24,ok,23848,04/22/2021 07:35:29,Tomrichards2@outlook.com,reader,,,no 1149467,40704,toffeeweb,22/04/2021,Jim Bennings,hughes_james71@yahoo.co.uk,"Phil

I agree Iwobi was a panic buy when we probably thought we were quite close to sealing the Zaha deal, but we stupidly paid over the odds.

Even when Iwobi has played in the middle he's shown nothing, he's not as technically accomplished as Sigurdsson and he's not on the same planet as James Rodriguez (who I still think is at his best in the middle).

To think we handed Arsenal £50 million for Iwobi and Walcott combined is mind boggling.

Ceferin is the godfather to Agnelli's daughter and the two have worked closely together on the plans for the Champions League changes.

But Agnelli tells his friend: 'Don't worry, nothing is going on, I'll call you in an hour.' He switches his phone off. There is no further contact.

"A snake" indeed

Totally agree. Everton’s morals and motivations are not the issue here. Nobody can talk about them with any authority, here or anywhere else.

What we’ve just witnessed is yet another egregious power grab by several of the usual suspects. No ifs or buts. In plain sight.

That is the only issue that should be on the table, and the responses of the governing bodies. All the rest is PR and media dressing.

Those responses will tell us plenty.

Spot on. This is all about the six clubs that intended to blow the premier league apart. We all know their media machines, especially the one about 1/2 mile away, will be running at full capacity telling all and sundry how good they are.

Everton FC have conducted themselves with total kudos.

Great journo this lad. Perfect summation

It’s a good piece, and a decent antidote to the PR blitz currently going on.

Pep Guardiola “ESL chapter now closed”

That's it then, is it? We just accept to brush this under the carpet? I expect we will get drip-fed more of the same over the next days and weeks Unbelievable.

Similarly, if Usmanov is backing Everton, it's someone else with mega assets, who might wield more power and influence than we might imagine.

In short, this whole thing is complex, involving battles between wealthy owners with conflicting interests, and the outcome could go either way. In favour of the coup perpetrators if the other 14 don't oppose them, or in favour of significant change in current arrangements if they wish to really use their power to oppose the coup machinations.

It's not easy for the supporters of those clubs going forward. They now know where they stand in their clubs affections.

The Americans want to make money, pure and simple. Matt Busby, Bill Shankly, Joe Mercer, Bill Nicholson, Dave Sexton and Bertie Mee mean nothing to these guys. The traditions of the game mean nothing to them.

The objective of the owners was to be to kill off all other rivals. You kill competition, you increase your profit.

What will really be interesting to see is how things pan out over the next couple of years. This venture should result in the loss of power and control by the 6 clubs but I would not hold my breath.

Zero tolerance and long memories are needed from the 14 remaining clubs!

Pep said it all last night: This chapter is now closed, we move on.

From what I can make out of these new Champions League proposals, the increase from 32 to 36 clubs with the coefficient working in favour of the greedy six have them almost what they needed anyway without going through the hell they have just created for themselves.

Can somebody please tell me the answer to the following: If Everton finished 4th at some point and Liverpool 7th, does Liverpool's coefficient give them a place instead of Everton or as well as in the following season's Champions League?

Harry Catterick, a name to be reckoned with. The manager of our greatest team, a team that did not fulfill its total potential.

I can't answer the query raised in your contribution; however, it does look to me as if the new Champions League format has given the ESL clubs a lot of what they were looking for anyway. The new format should be immediately withdrawn or amended.

We play one of the ESL clubs tomorrow evening; hopefully, we give them a good doing and increase our chances of European qualification via the merit door.

It will be interesting to see how Sky rewrite the history of this venture over the next period time, who will be the good cops and who won't. They have already started on the task.

I think the answer to your question is yes very possibly, as always UEFA have not been specific other than to say that each year they could catapult 2 teams into the Champions league, who haven't qualified through their league position. UEFA I don't think have specified how often a club can be catapulted into the Champions league, and the only clubs that will be catapulted in are those clubs with very good European Cup/Champions league pedigree.

But if say one year Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, Liverpool, Ajax, Man Utd, Barcelona don't make it which 2 are selected. But bye and large I think the record of these clubs most years most of these clubs will make it so for the select few they will have Champions league football guaranteed. Lets also remember this ws in place before the announcement of the ESL.

I read yesterday that each club had or have committed to pay £8 million to JP Morgan as a set up fee, so whatever happens these clubs will have to pay this money. I hope at some point some journalist will dig and find out when these first proposals were discussed and when did JP Morgan come on board. Obviously Perez was going to be the chairman and Henry and Glazier vice chairmen, so by that alone tells us who were the main protagonists in setting this up. All apologized to their fans, this group don't give a minutes thought to the fans.

I see no date has yet been set for a meeting of all the Premier league clubs, as to what proposals they are considering. UEFA also havent set a date to make any recommendations as to what punishment should be metered out. Wont it be ironic if City beat PSG as that means this years Champions league final will be between 2 clubs who tried to destroy this competition.

It’s no use walking away from this problem and leaving them to it, the answer is a final solution that ends all their attempts, there has to be one.

Did they not change the rules when they finished 5th to allow them to enter the Champions League? This was a one-off rule change, never to be repeated, I believe.

He went on to say that the new Champions League didn't go far enough, and he said that the format was stale and only got interesting at the quarter-final stage. So he said that it was right that the most important clubs play each other from the beginning.

The arrogance of the man knows no bounds and I daresay Henry, the Glaziers and Kronke all feel the same despite them pulling out for now.

As a first gesture to help them out, we should immediately return Delph to Man City and Iwobi to Arsenal.

The punishment must fit the crime, but already the PR machine is on at full tilt, isn't it? I think we can forget about the likes of Uefa or Fifa doing anything about this, so that leaves the Premier League, FA and the government in the spotlight.

So I'll not hold my breath, but as ever I'm open to being pleasantly surprised, and I hope the remaining 14 clubs remember their principles and their fans when the crunch comes.

I'd be surprised if Fifa & Uefa take any action at all, so it really comes down to what action our own authorities will take – or are legally able to take. James Corbett was on Radio Merseyside last night suggesting it may not be as straightforward as people think – or would like.

The concern has to be that, if no sanctions are imposed, the ESL members will reconvene and come up with another version in the next year or two.

As much as I dislike government intervention, it may be a necessary evil.

I do so because it's one thing to have opposition fans sneeringly make the groundless accusation against Everton and another altogether when (thankfully very, VERY few) of our own make the charge as well.

Yes, 29 years ago Everton chairman and then President of the entire Football League Philip Carter was one of the 'Big Five' who behind the backs of all his members initiated the PL. I for one felt a degree of shame at that.

However, the meritocracy of promotion and relegation was retained. It was not a closed shop as the ESL would have been. That other clubs - the soiled six - maximized the opportunity that the PL offered whilst Everton didn't is down to poor management and planning at boardroom level.

The Everton of today is not the Everton of 29 years.

Why is it a 'given' that Moshiri's Everton would 'of course' have accepted membership to the ESL?

Compare our conduct to the soiled six in the last 12 months alone. Everton was the first club to immediately reassure all its full-time and part-time staff that they would not be laid, off, that we would not take up the government's furlough scheme, that ALL staff would be retained and paid in full. This we did.

Compare this to 3 of the soiled six. 'Them', Arsenal and Spurs. They didn't hesitate to do all of the above quicker than grease lightning. And guess what? As with this week, due to their own fan pressure, they had to backtrack and apologize.

Everton's conduct in the community during the pandemic (always, in fact) has been exemplary, even praised by an avowed Red councillor in the unanimous decision at LCC's planning meeting to support both the BMD and Goodison Legacy projects.

Then we have the same soiled six in October proposing 'Project Big Picture' which would have greatly reduced the voting power and balance of all 20 PL clubs. As a long standing founding and permanent member of the PL Everton actually stood to gain from the move as the proposal was that 9 clubs - including ourselves - would have greater voting power as the one club, one vote system was dispensed with.

Once again, in the meetings that followed, Everton and DB-B was the most damning voice of the proposals. In recent memory then we have Everton - a potential beneficiary of the proposed changes - condemning them and wanting no part of them.

Same again this week. DB-B with the excellent club statement on ESL, together with Moshiri's calm but surgical dismissal of the same on Talksport.

In answer to the question would Everton ever join such a proposal as the ESL, Moshiri was emphatic. 'Never. Never.'

To me it is absolutely absurd to be calling out Everton as some of our own in this thread are doing. Direct your wrath to where it is better merited.

I've heard that there is a reluctance by the FA to punish the fans, players and managers. That is wrong. Fans, players and managers were never involved in the 'crimes of the owners' when Rangers were demoted to the bottom of the Scottish league. Nor were the fans involved when points were deducted from the likes of Wigan, Bury and Birmingham for financial misdemeanours committed by the owners. Again, the fans of these clubs all suffered.

It was the owners who committed the offences, but punishment was meted to all the innocents within that club. That is how it works. This should be no different just because they are 'The Big Six'. That is so unfair and shows inequity again to the small and unimportant.

According to the Real Madrid president this morning, this planning has been going on for 3 years... 3 years! He also bleats the project is not over.

The penalties should be severe and swiftly administrated. Failure to do so will mean the insidious six will rise again.

#93 Jay - great post.

Hey anyone see Rodriguez's condemnation of the ESL on Twitter? In the translation I read he says something about "what may be my only season in England". Is this a mistranslation?

I heard your "Never. Never" being shouted out in a stentorian Northern Irish accent.

Great words by Carlo today.

The last sentence is worth repeating.

Nothing should be allowed to divert the attention from this self-serving, anti-competitive cartel and how to immediately bring them under control.

The Yanks and other owners have been rightfully (and righteously) hammered for their disrespect to the competitive tradition of English football.

But Lewis and Levy at Spurs are Brits. They, of all people, should have known better. Shouldn't they be pilloried on an even higher level? Why do they seem to be getting a pass in the British press coverage?

And where was England's captain in all this? Other players were outspoken in their opposition to the Super League, but did anybody hear a word from Harry Kane?

Believe me, I understand the depth of the ire at the RS and MU, but I think Spurs -- who would have been hangers-on in the SL -- deserve some special contempt they haven't really gotten.

Doubt there's an escape clause for him either; he signed a 2-year contract, can't see us agreeing to an out for him tbh.

I agree that his injury problems have dented his first season somewhat, but he's the best footballer in the team, by a mile and I think we need to build around him. This means anticipating that he isn't going to play 40 games so bringing in other creative options this summer.