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The Super League Discussion

The European Super League plan collapsed. But it might not be dead forever
Published Fri, Apr 30 20211:33 AM EDTUpdated Fri, Apr 30 20213:46 AM EDT
Michael Considine
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Key Points
  • Florentino Perez, the president of Real Madrid which was one of the clubs involved, has told Spanish media that the project, or one very similar, will still move on.
  • His Barcelona counterpart Joan Laporta has stressed that the ESL clubs are open to dialogue with UEFA, Europe’s governing body, in a bid to revive the project.
106870254-1618841893217-gettyimages-1306454978-b50i7684_2021031094121072.jpeg

Kevin De Bruyne of Manchester City celebrates after scoring their team’s fifth goal with team mates Phil Foden and Riyad Mahrez during the Premier League match between Manchester City and Southampton at Etihad Stadium on March 10, 2021 in Manchester, England.
Clive Brunskill | Getty Images Sport | Getty Images
LONDON — While the soccer community celebrated the failed launch of the European Super League last week, the motivating factors behind the proposal haven’t gone away.
Now known as the “dirty dozen,” 12 powerful European soccer clubs tried to form their own enclosed league, which was scuppered just days afterward due to pressure from fans, authorities and governments.

These teams, particularly in Spain, are still nursing pandemic-induced debt, while revenues at many clubs around the world have been hit after virus restrictions forced games to be played behind closed doors — evaporating matchday incomes.
What comes next?
Florentino Perez, the president of Real Madrid which was one of the clubs involved, has told Spanish media that the project, or one very similar, will still move on.
His Barcelona counterpart Joan Laporta has stressed that the ESL clubs are open to dialogue with UEFA, Europe’s governing body, in a bid to revive the project.
Simon Chadwick, a director of Eurasian sport at the Emlyon Business School, believes suggestions that the Super League has fallen apart are naive, telling CNBC that Europe will get a “super league by a different name,” adding that it is “a case of when, not if.”
Chadwick argues that the coming years will bring further polarization and industrial concentration, with the big clubs set to accumulate further power, and the gap between them and the smaller clubs growing further.

American inspiration
This, he says, will be seen through how major clubs look to develop new revenue streams, with over-the-top broadcasting set to feature prominently.
He compares the NFL’s recent TV rights deal, worth around $110 billion over 11 years, to the English Premier League’s current domestic broadcast deal worth £4.7 billion ($6.6 billion), secured in 2018 and due to run out this year.
While the NFL has grown in popularity outside of the U.S. in recent years, it is still dwarfed globally by England’s Premier League, with the UEFA Champions League also having an avid worldwide audience.
Tech companies have joined the bidding wars for the Premier League’s broadcast rights in recent auctions, easing the logistical obstacles to global distribution.
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VIDEO01:02
J.P. Morgan apologizes for its role in Super League for soccer

New owners
The fallout from the Super League proposals has also seen some fans call for new club owners.
Spotify CEO and founder Daniel Ek has expressed his interest in buying Arsenal, telling CNBC he has secured the funds for a potential offer for the North London club.
But current owner Stan Kroenke, who also owns NFL franchise the LA Rams, has ruled out any sale, stressing he would not entertain any offer.
Meanwhile Jim O’Neill, the chairman of British think tank Chatham House and former chair of Goldman Sachs Asset Management, and the hedge fund manager Paul Marshall have called on the owners of Manchester United, the Glazer family, to cut their majority stake to a maximum of 49.9% in a bid to allow for a broader group of investors to have a say in the running of the club.
Chadwick downplayed the prospect of current owners looking to sell, adding that “if this is such an unprofitable, difficult business that doesn’t yield the kinds of returns that owners are looking for,” then Manchester United’s owners, the Glazers, would have pulled out a long time ago.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/30/the...llapsed-but-it-might-not-be-dead-forever.html
 
They will also have 5% of Uefa competition revenues withheld for one season, starting in 2023-24, and this money will be redistributed, including in the UK.

This is what will fire the SL clubs back up. Instead of UEFA showing some humility that their model might be broken, they do more of the same BS.

Let the offline conversation reconvene.

If I was Boris I would send UEFA a massive bill for unpaid export duties for the English football product.
 
They will also have 5% of Uefa competition revenues withheld for one season, starting in 2023-24, and this money will be redistributed, including in the UK.

This is what will fire the SL clubs back up. Instead of UEFA showing some humility that their model might be broken, they do more of the same BS.

Let the offline conversation reconvene.

If I was Boris I would send UEFA a massive bill for unpaid export duties for the English football product.


They're naffing nuts. They really are. Any opportunity to line their pockets. I'd bet there is a 95% administrative cost to redistributing that money.
 
No apologies are necessary. I was just wondering why money keeps coming up when it is the constant in all sports now. NFL being the prime example. That is who football is competing with.
Is football really competing with the NFL? I thought the NFL season lasts for roughly 4 months. Purely on how often football is played allows it to have a stronger appeal. Of course there is still a big US market to be tapped into but I don't think making football to be like the NBA is the way to go. I was under the impression that the NBA TV numbers have been in decline of late.

Apart from places like India where the competition is against cricket. Surely the main competition is between football leagues rather between different sports (if you exclude niche local sports). So English teams should be working together to create an offering that will appeal to global supporters to spend their money on watching the premier league and their European games rather than on La Liga or Seria A etc
 
Is football really competing with the NFL? I thought the NFL season lasts for roughly 4 months. Purely on how often football is played allows it to have a stronger appeal. Of course there is still a big US market to be tapped into but I don't think making football to be like the NBA is the way to go. I was under the impression that the NBA TV numbers have been in decline of late.

Apart from places like India where the competition is against cricket. Surely the main competition is between football leagues rather between different sports (if you exclude niche local sports). So English teams should be working together to create an offering that will appeal to global supporters to spend their money on watching the premier league and their European games rather than on La Liga or Seria A etc


The NFL is coming to Europe.

Rugby has started its global push but their ruling bodies make FIFA look intelligent.
 
Well, at least some clubs had the cojones to back what they believed in.
They are also the clubs that have the most to lose by the Super League not going ahead. The budgets that even lower half teams in the premier league can afford is taking talent out of the other top leagues. The years of Barcelona & Real not allowing for the distribution of TV money throughout the league more equitably has made their TV product less appealing and those teams are going to face the brunt of it. That's why they, more than any of the English clubs, need this Super League to go ahead in order to keep their status quo.
 
The NFL is coming to Europe.

Rugby has started its global push but their ruling bodies make FIFA look intelligent.
But even if it does, fans are willing to pay the money to see their teams play every week and more. NFL due to the nature of the sport just can't do that. The same with rugby. With rugby, part of the reason why the 6 nations has been so popular and such a success is because it is essentially on free stations. They are taking a big gamble if they move to a route of trying to get more money from it.
 
But even if it does, fans are willing to pay the money to see their teams play every week and more. NFL due to the nature of the sport just can't do that. The same with rugby. With rugby, part of the reason why the 6 nations has been so popular and such a success is because it is essentially on free stations. They are taking a big gamble if they move to a route of trying to get more money from it.

It's also an interesting question whether we'd rather have a European Super League with international teams in it rather than clubs. It wouldn't make any difference to Sky or BT Sport as eventually the viewing figures would be way higher than club games anyway. I'd love the football fans to feel like their counterparts in the 6 nations or the Ashes.

UEFA are obviously trying something with The Nations League, but it all needs prioritising and supersizing.
 
It's also an interesting question whether we'd rather have a European Super League with international teams in it rather than clubs. It wouldn't make any difference to Sky or BT Sport as eventually the viewing figures would be way higher than club games anyway. I'd love the football fans to feel like their counterparts in the 6 nations or the Ashes.

UEFA are obviously trying something with The Nations League, but it all needs prioritising and supersizing.
I think the Nations league is maybe the best "new" thing that UEFA have done in a long time. It really is a huge improvement on the endless, pointless, boring international friendlies that we had before
 
Is football really competing with the NFL? I thought the NFL season lasts for roughly 4 months. Purely on how often football is played allows it to have a stronger appeal. Of course there is still a big US market to be tapped into but I don't think making football to be like the NBA is the way to go. I was under the impression that the NBA TV numbers have been in decline of late.

Apart from places like India where the competition is against cricket. Surely the main competition is between football leagues rather between different sports (if you exclude niche local sports). So English teams should be working together to create an offering that will appeal to global supporters to spend their money on watching the premier league and their European games rather than on La Liga or Seria A etc

The real competition and one of the things the SL said they were going to address and had a strategy to do so was simply this; around 40-50% of 16-24 years olds in Europe have no interest in football, they are tomorrows crowds and as it stands they prefer e-sports or some other sport.

These numbers are in stark comparison to just a few years ago, in the year 2000, it was around 85% of 16-24 year olds put football as their first love and their main participation sport.

Covid will make this worse, just as killing team sports off in our schools is now absolutely known to be the major cause of these football ills.

Supposedly, the SL had a plan of how to funnel big money down to football's roots, and including all the levels along the way - so it was a radical plan.

Could it have worked, could it have reveresed these trends? I have no idea, but at least they said they had a plan to tackle it as opposed to the flaccid plans of the FA and UEFA, who frankly as guardians of the game, have let us all down badly.
 
The real competition and one of the things the SL said they were going to address and had a strategy to do so was simply this; around 40-50% of 16-24 years olds in Europe have no interest in football, they are tomorrows crowds and as it stands they prefer e-sports or some other sport.

These numbers are in stark comparison to just a few years ago, in the year 2000, it was around 85% of 16-24 year olds put football as their first love and their main participation sport.

Covid will make this worse, just as killing team sports off in our schools is now absolutely known to be the major cause of these football ills.

Supposedly, the SL had a plan of how to funnel big money down to football's roots, and including all the levels along the way - so it was a radical plan.

Could it have worked, could it have reveresed these trends? I have no idea, but at least they said they had a plan to tackle it as opposed to the flaccid plans of the FA and UEFA, who frankly as guardians of the game, have let us all down badly.

I don't blame the FA though. Give them their empowerment back as a governance body in the game and I'll put it at their door.

One thing I hope a government review does is clearly define roles and responsibilities around these bodies. Right down to the level where UEFA could be told they are no longer empowered to decide where grassroots money goes if it is derived from these shores. Right down to the level where the PL are told they have nothing to do with fixture scheduling or refereeing.

Whilst appreciating the wrongs of the past, I'm actually all for re-empowering The FA and letting them have a chance to play an important role, unencumbered from the other nonsense.
 
I don't blame the FA though. Give them their empowerment back as a governance body in the game and I'll put it at their door.

One thing I hope a government review does is clearly define roles and responsibilities around these bodies. Right down to the level where UEFA could be told they are no longer empowered to decide where grassroots money goes if it is derived from these shores. Right down to the level where the PL are told they have nothing to do with fixture scheduling or refereeing.

Whilst appreciating the wrongs of the past, I'm actually all for re-empowering The FA and letting them have a chance to play an important role, unencumbered from the other nonsense.

I'm less confident of the FA, having dealt with them in the past and having to do so now over my future son-in-laws academy, my confidence in their decision making ability or in even making the right 'guesses' is rock bottom, their inability to act on data and empirical evidence of ineffective policy making actually depresses me.

I for one believe that they need a root and branch reform with a completely new structure for a new age, a few tweaks here and there just won't cut it - we need a breakaway strategy that can define all the aspects of how football should and could be run, including dealing with legacy issues once and for all.
 
I'm less confident of the FA, having dealt with them in the past and having to do so now over my future son-in-laws academy, my confidence in their decision making ability or in even making the right 'guesses' is rock bottom, their inability to act on data and empirical evidence of ineffective policy making actually depresses me.

I for one believe that they need a root and branch reform with a completely new structure for a new age, a few tweaks here and there just won't cut it - we need a breakaway strategy that can define all the aspects of how football should and could be run, including dealing with legacy issues once and for all.
Complete sense there Ex, they probably already know this, but for me! nobody seems to have the bollox to speak out in favour of what you write about.
 
They are also the clubs that have the most to lose by the Super League not going ahead. The budgets that even lower half teams in the premier league can afford is taking talent out of the other top leagues. The years of Barcelona & Real not allowing for the distribution of TV money throughout the league more equitably has made their TV product less appealing and those teams are going to face the brunt of it. That's why they, more than any of the English clubs, need this Super League to go ahead in order to keep their status quo.


We fall into that SL category but from a PL perspective we are in the "lucky to be asked" category.
 
Here's the copy and paste....

We have seen football fans around the world come together to show their strength of feeling regarding the future of the game we all feel so passionately about, with strong views expressed on the proposed establishment of a new European Super League (ESL).

It’s important to underline that we entered the ESL with the expectation that the format, rules and structures would evolve through dialogue with key parties, namely the Premier League, FA, UEFA, FIFA and, crucially, fans. It should never have been conveyed with certainty when it was in fact a framework agreement for consultation going forward.

We should have challenged and reconsidered the annual access system. We wholeheartedly regret that we involved the Club and that the legal process itself meant we were unable to consult our fans early on – we apologise unreservedly.

We have all learnt lessons from recent events and have reviewed fan engagement as a priority. As a result we shall be liaising with key stakeholders and establishing a Club Advisory Panel, comprised of elected representatives from the different constituencies of our fanbase, inclusive and reflective of our fans’ diversity. The Chair of this Panel will be appointed annually as a full Non-Executive of the Club Board. We believe this provides for authentic, genuine representation and will ensure fans are at the heart of Club decision-making, something we greatly welcome.

The selection criteria, mandate and constitution will be developed by independent advisors in consultation with fan groups to ensure it is truly representative of our supporter base. Further details will be released in due course. Going forward we shall constantly look to review and improve these new lines of consultation. We shall also fully support the government review into football governance.

We are disappointed that the Board of the Tottenham Hotspur Supporters’ Trust (THST) has not yet met with the Club. The THST, with whom we have worked and, indeed, promoted, for 20 years has called for the resignations of the Executive Board over the ESL – individuals who have lived and breathed this Club for the best part of two decades. We have offered on several occasions to meet Board-to-Board and discuss an open agenda – excluding a change of Club ownership and the resignation of the Board. Our door remains open on this basis.

We are excited to be welcoming 10,000 fans back next week. Our stadium will hopefully soon re-open to full attendances and non-football events will return. Like many clubs, we shall need to recover from the loss of substantial revenues. The still-new stadium is the game changer in our progress – it will deliver the revenues for investment in the First Team. Be assured, we are absolutely clear that the heartbeat of the Club is success on the pitch and our fans. It’s important to now get behind Ryan and the team as we look to finish the season as strongly as possible and strive to retain a European spot.


https://www.tottenhamhotspur.com/news/2021/may/club-update/
 
Club update
Club announces fan representation on the Board
@SpursOfficial
Tue 11 May 2021, 15:45|




We have seen football fans around the world come together to show their strength of feeling regarding the future of the game we all feel so passionately about, with strong views expressed on the proposed establishment of a new European Super League (ESL).
It’s important to underline that we entered the ESL with the expectation that the format, rules and structures would evolve through dialogue with key parties, namely the Premier League, FA, UEFA, FIFA and, crucially, fans. It should never have been conveyed with certainty when it was in fact a framework agreement for consultation going forward.
We should have challenged and reconsidered the annual access system. We wholeheartedly regret that we involved the Club and that the legal process itself meant we were unable to consult our fans early on – we apologise unreservedly.
We have all learnt lessons from recent events and have reviewed fan engagement as a priority. As a result we shall be liaising with key stakeholders and establishing a Club Advisory Panel, comprised of elected representatives from the different constituencies of our fanbase, inclusive and reflective of our fans’ diversity. The Chair of this Panel will be appointed annually as a full Non-Executive of the Club Board. We believe this provides for authentic, genuine representation and will ensure fans are at the heart of Club decision-making, something we greatly welcome.

The selection criteria, mandate and constitution will be developed by independent advisors in consultation with fan groups to ensure it is truly representative of our supporter base. Further details will be released in due course. Going forward we shall constantly look to review and improve these new lines of consultation. We shall also fully support the government review into football governance.

We are disappointed that the Board of the Tottenham Hotspur Supporters’ Trust (THST) has not yet met with the Club. The THST, with whom we have worked and, indeed, promoted, for 20 years has called for the resignations of the Executive Board over the ESL – individuals who have lived and breathed this Club for the best part of two decades. We have offered on several occasions to meet Board-to-Board and discuss an open agenda – excluding a change of Club ownership and the resignation of the Board. Our door remains open on this basis.

We are excited to be welcoming 10,000 fans back next week. Our stadium will hopefully soon re-open to full attendances and non-football events will return. Like many clubs, we shall need to recover from the loss of substantial revenues. The still-new stadium is the game changer in our progress – it will deliver the revenues for investment in the First Team. Be assured, we are absolutely clear that the heartbeat of the Club is success on the pitch and our fans. It’s important to now get behind Ryan and the team as we look to finish the season as strongly as possible and strive to retain a European spot.
 
As this is the established thread and I didn't think it needed a new one. I will comment on here.
Its a bit grovelling and I guess it needed to be. The part about signing up with a view to negotiate and evolve as one of the 12 is how I saw it. I wasn't totally against it because I didn't know the shape it would take.