Football's Magic Money Tree

[Chester Perry]

Real Madrid, PSG and Manchester United are not the only clubs who will be looking to making significant buys this summer - Barcelona may have just won la liga (again) but they are aging and need to freshen up - Antoine Griezmann is a probable target now he has confirmed he is leaving athletico, but how are they going to pay for him, fee and wages? - The Telegraph continues it's mission to query the finances of the Spanish big two - transcribed as likely to soon go behind a paywall


Antoine Griezmann being sold to Barcelona by Atletico Madrid? Fine: but how are they going to pay for him?
Sam Wallace - Chief Football Writer

A tough Tuesday for those behind the original 2018 Antoine Griezmann film La Decision which chronicled every conceivable aspect of his life in the build-up to his putative departure from Atletico Madrid and culminated with him announcing that, actually, nothing was changing.

The production team had got almost everything when it came to the elite footballer lifestyle; massive houses, massive tellies, home tattooing services, Fortnite addiction – just not the dramatic ending. Imagine how they must have felt when Griezmann surfaced on a video on Atletico’s website this week somewhat dazed and dishevelled, looking as though he had been dragged from his bed in the middle of the night by Diego Simeone’s famously combative assistant German Burgos.

No moody shots of him in a hoodie, no drone footage of his huge garden, but what a plot twist. Griezmann announced he will be leaving Atletico, although for reasons that will later become clear he cannot say where he is going. Witness-protection perhaps, given the startled look in his eyes and the fact that Burgos almost certainly knows where he lives.

Of course, all the signs point to Barcelona, who along with Real Madrid are being linked with every new hotshot or disenchanted superstar in Europe.

Griezmann has a buy-out clause of about €120 million (£105 million) in the contract that he signed at Atletico which kicks in on July 1. He says that, at 28, he is ready to leave the club, now 32 per cent owned by the Israeli billionaire Idan Ofer. But for where?

For their part, Barcelona have been very quiet, their financial situation similar to Real Madrid. The Catalan club are cash poor with nothing like the funds to make a signing of this size without cutting back elsewhere.

Their intermediary accounts for the first half of the season are overdue, although the full accounts will have to be submitted in time for the club’s general assembly in September when members will get a chance to question president Josep Bartomeu on the finances.

This month may well see Barcelona seal their second consecutive domestic double against Valencia in the Copa del Rey final on May 25. The league title is their eighth in 11 seasons. The question that remains is how they meet the wage bill that is coming at the end of June. They pay their players twice yearly, a total bill of €633 million spread across two payments becoming due at the end of January and the end of June. Last season they opened a €140 million credit line with a New York-based lender to cover that bill, and it may well be the same again this summer.

Even so, they need to wait until July 1 and hope that by then they can move on one or more of their squad – perhaps even Philippe Coutinho or Ousmane Dembele – to fund a summer rebuild. The most important part of the negotiation for Griezmann would be to persuade Atletico to accept that Barcelona pay for him in instalments. If Atletico want the money up front, then Barcelona have a problem.

Not one that faces Paris St-Germain, or even the likes of Manchester City or Manchester United, as Barcelona will be aware. It was an embarrassment to the club last summer that Atletico were able to beat Griezmann’s €17 million annual wage offer from Barcelona. Strictly speaking, the great cinematic denouement to La Decision should have been Bartomeu staring out at the empty Nou Camp car park, while in the background someone played a sad, wistful arrangement on the office piano.

Barcelona are still run as a functioning members’ club accountable to their socios, as opposed to the faux democracy over which Real Madrid president Florentino Perez presides. Yet the financial problems are notably similar.

Neither have the kind of cash that the new-money clubs can wield for the marquee transfers, they have the two highest wage bills in European football, and both are struggling this summer to offload high-earning unwanted stars to make way for new names. Both clubs are very fortunate that La Liga rules absurdly do not include money owed to fellow clubs in transfer fees and add-ons among the debt carried by a club.

Under Barcelona’s constitution, should debt exceed a sum equal to twice that of their annual EBITDA [earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation], the board have two years to remedy the situation or, failing that, resign. Last year the club had just €40 million in cash at the end of June, forcing them to borrow in order to pay their twice-yearly wage bill.

At 28, Griezmann comes at a premium price. Playing for Atletico, the expectation was always that one or other of the big two would be in a position to sign him at some point, but for the salary, the transfer fee and the long-term value, he comes with considerable risk.

As ever with Real Madrid and Barcelona, the fans believe that the money will come from somewhere. Perhaps there is a market out there for Coutinho, which allows Barcelona to pay back their considerable liability to Liverpool and still get out with a profit. Perhaps they will eventually sell poor old Rafinha, who keeps coming back like a lucky peseta every time a transfer breaks down. But at some point this club will have to explain to its members that the funds to sign every available big name who declares he wants a transfer are not simply going to appear by magic.

Atletico, the great debt zombie, currently the owners of two stadiums and €506 million in the red, may yet just accept the instalments payment model and let Barcelona have Griezmann on credit. In the meantime, a window is open for the likes of PSG and others in the Premier League. Griezmann and his representatives clearly believe there is a move out there for him. The clock is now ticking for Barcelona to find that money.

[Chester Perry]

Following post #1054 (PSG), # 1062, #1063 (Southampton and China) and #1065 (Man City and UEFA) I thought back to a Simon Chadwick tweet from yesterday -

UEFA to kick Man City out of Champions League? Qatar playing politics with football? China engaged in nebulous sponsorship deals? For the West, there's an inconvenient reality in all of this....

'Autocracy's Global Ascendance'

he then linked the following long (I apologise for that in advance), deep article from "Foreign Affairs" Magazine from the May/June 2018 issue - it is a bit of palava to get to so I will transcribe. I wouldn't normally post this kind of political analysis (It doesn't mention football or sport even once) but it is very clear that this way of thinking has deeply influenced his perspective that I have shared on this thread and I think it is important to understand his reference points whether we agree with him or not.


The End of the Democratic Century - Autocracy's Global Ascendance
By Yascha Mounk and Roberto Stefan Foa

At the height of World War II, Henry Luce, the founder of Time magazine, argued that the United States had amassed such wealth and power that the twentieth century would come to be known simply as “the American Century.” His prediction proved prescient: despite being challenged for supremacy by Nazi Germany and, later, the Soviet Union, the United States prevailed against its adversaries. By the turn of the millennium, its position as the most powerful and influential state in the world appeared unimpeachable. As a result, the twentieth century was marked by the dominance not just of a particular country but also of the political system it helped spread: liberal democracy.

As democracy flourished across the world, it was tempting to ascribe its dominance to its inherent appeal. If citizens in India, Italy, or Venezuela seemed loyal to their political system, it must have been because they had developed a deep commitment to both individual rights and collective self-determination. And if Poles and Filipinos began to make the transition from dictatorship to democracy, it must have been because they, too, shared in the universal human desire for liberal democracy.

But the events of the second half of the twentieth century can also be interpreted in a very different way. Citizens across the world were attracted to liberal democracy not simply because of its norms and values but also because it offered the most salient model of economic and geopolitical success. Civic ideals may have played their part in converting the citizens of formerly authoritarian regimes into convinced democrats, but the astounding economic growth of western Europe in the 1950s and 1960s, the victory of democratic countries in the Cold War, and the defeat or collapse of democracy’s most powerful autocratic rivals were just as important.

Taking the material foundations of democratic hegemony seriously casts the story of democracy’s greatest successes in a different light, and it also changes how one thinks about its current crisis. As liberal democracies have become worse at improving their citizens’ living standards, populist movements that disavow liberalism are emerging from Brussels to Brasília and from Warsaw to Washington. A striking number of citizens have started to ascribe less importance to living in a democracy: whereas two-thirds of Americans above the age of 65 say it is absolutely important to them to live in a democracy, for example, less than one-third of those below the age of 35 say the same thing. A growing minority is even open to authoritarian alternatives: from 1995 to 2017, the share of French, Germans, and Italians who favored military rule more than tripled.

As recent elections around the world indicate, these opinions aren’t just abstract preferences; they reflect a deep groundswell of antiestablishment sentiment that can be easily mobilized by extremist political parties and candidates. As a result, authoritarian populists who disrespect some of the most basic rules and norms of the democratic system have made rapid advances across western Europe and North America over the past two decades. Meanwhile, authoritarian strongmen are rolling back democratic advances across much of Asia and eastern Europe. Could the changing balance of economic and military power in the world help explain these unforeseen developments?

That question is all the more pressing today, as the long-standing dominance of a set of consolidated democracies with developed economies and a common alliance structure is coming to an end. Ever since the last decade of the nineteenth century, the democracies that formed the West’s Cold War alliance against the Soviet Union—in North America, western Europe, Australasia, and postwar Japan—have commanded a majority of the world’s income. In the late nineteenth century, established democracies such as the United Kingdom and the United States made up the bulk of global GDP. In the second half of the twentieth century, as the geographic span of both democratic rule and the alliance structure headed by the United States expanded to include Japan and Germany, the power of this liberal democratic alliance became even more crushing. But now, for the first time in over a hundred years, its share of global GDP has fallen below half. According to forecasts by the International Monetary Fund, it will slump to a third within the next decade.

At the same time that the dominance of democracies has faded, the share of economic output coming from authoritarian states has grown rapidly. In 1990, countries rated “not free” by Freedom House (the lowest category, which excludes “partially free” countries such as Singapore) accounted for just 12 percent of global income. Now, they are responsible for 33 percent, matching the level they achieved in the early 1930s, during the rise of fascism in Europe, and surpassing the heights they reached in the Cold War when Soviet power was at its apex.

As a result, the world is now approaching a striking milestone: within the next five years, the share of global income held by countries considered “not free”—such as China, Russia, and Saudi Arabia—will surpass the share held by Western liberal democracies. In the span of a quarter century, liberal democracies have gone from a position of unprecedented economic strength to a position of unprecedented economic weakness.

It is looking less and less likely that the countries in North America and western Europe that made up the traditional heartland of liberal democracy can regain their erstwhile supremacy, with their democratic systems embattled at home and their share of the world economy continuing to shrink. So the future promises two realistic scenarios: either some of the most powerful autocratic countries in the world will transition to liberal democracy, or the period of democratic dominance that was expected to last forever will prove no more than an interlude before a new era of struggle between mutually hostile political systems.

THE WAGES OF WEALTH
Of all the ways in which economic prosperity buys a country power and influence, perhaps the most important is that it creates stability at home. As the political scientists Adam Przeworski and Fernando Limongi have shown, poor democracies often collapse. It is only rich democracies—those with a GDP per capita above $14,000 in today’s terms, according to their findings—that are reliably secure. Since the formation of the postwar alliance binding the United States to its allies in western Europe, no affluent member has experienced a breakdown of democratic rule.

Beyond keeping democracies stable, economic might also endows them with a number of tools to influence the development of other countries. Chief among these is cultural clout. During the apogee of Western liberal democracy, the United States—and, to a lesser extent, western Europe—was home to the most famous writers and musicians, the most watched television shows and movies, the most advanced industries, and the most prestigious universities. In the minds of many young people coming of age in Africa or Asia in the 1990s, all these things seemed to be of a piece: the desire to share in the unfathomable wealth of the West was also a desire to adopt its lifestyle, and the desire to adopt its lifestyle seemed to require emulating its political system.

This combination of economic power and cultural prestige facilitated a great degree of political influence. When the American soap opera Dallas began airing in the Soviet Union in the 1980s, for example, Soviet citizens naturally contrasted the impossible wealth of suburban America with their own material deprivation and wondered why their economic system had fallen so far behind. “We were directly or indirectly responsible for the fall of the [Soviet] empire,” Larry Hagman, one of its leading stars, boasted years later. It was, he claimed, not Soviet citizens’ idealism but rather “good old-fashioned greed” that “got them to question their authority.”

The economic prowess of Western democracies could also take on a harder edge. They could influence political events in other countries by promising to include them in the global economic system or threatening to exclude them from it. In the 1990s and the first decade of this century, the prospect of membership in organizations from the European Union to the World Trade Organization provided powerful incentives for democratic reforms in eastern Europe, Turkey, and parts of Asia, including Thailand and South Korea. Meanwhile, Western sanctions that prevented countries from participating in the global economy may have helped contain Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in the years following the Gulf War, and they were arguably instrumental in bringing about the fall of Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic after the war in Kosovo.

Finally, economic power could easily be converted into military might. This, too, did much to enhance the global standing of liberal democracies. It ensured that other countries could not topple democratic regimes by force and raised the domestic legitimacy of such regimes by making military humiliation a rarity. At the same time, it encouraged the spread of democracy though diplomatic leverage and the presence of boots on the ground. Countries that were physically located between a major democratic power and a major authoritarian power, such as Poland and Ukraine, were deeply influenced by the greater material and military benefits offered by an alliance with the West. Former colonies emulated the political systems of their erstwhile rulers when they gained independence, leaving parliamentary democracies from the islands of the Caribbean to the highlands of East Africa. And in at least two major cases—Germany and Japan—Western military occupation paved the way for the introduction of a model democratic constitution.

In short, it is impossible to understand the story of the democratic century without taking seriously the role that economic power played in spreading the ideals of liberal democracy around the world. This also means that it is impossible to make informed predictions about the future of liberal democracy without reflecting on the effects that the decline in the relative economic clout of the democratic alliance might have in the years and decades to come.

THE DANGERS OF DECLINE
At first glance, the conclusion that affluence breeds stability seems to bode well for the future of North America and western Europe, where the institutions of liberal democracy have traditionally been most firmly established. After all, even if their relative power declines, the absolute level of wealth in Canada or France is very unlikely to fall below the threshold at which democracies tend to fail. But absolute levels of wealth may have been just one of many economic features that kept Western democracies stable after World War II. Indeed, the stable democracies of that period also shared three other economic attributes that can plausibly help explain their past success: relative equality, rapidly growing incomes for most citizens, and the fact that authoritarian rivals to democracy were much less wealthy.

All these factors have begun to erode in recent years. Consider what has happened in the United States. In the 1970s, the top one percent of income earners commanded eight percent of pretax income; now, they command over 20 percent. For much of the twentieth century, inflation-adjusted wages roughly doubled from generation to generation; for the past 30 years, they have essentially remained flat. And throughout the Cold War, the U.S. economy, as measured by GDP based on purchasing power parity, remained two to three times as large as the Soviet economy; today, it is one-sixth smaller than China’s.

The ability of autocratic regimes to compete with the economic performance of liberal democracies is a particularly important and novel development. At the height of its influence, communism managed to rival the ideological appeal of liberal democracy across large parts of the developing world. But even then, it offered a weak economic alternative to capitalism. Indeed, the share of global income produced by the Soviet Union and its satellite states peaked at 13 percent in the mid-1950s. Over the following decades, it declined steadily, falling to ten percent by 1989. Communist countries also could not provide their citizens with a lifestyle that would rival the comfort of the capitalist West. From 1950 to 1989, per capita income in the Soviet Union fell from two-thirds to less than half of the western European level. As the German writer Hans Magnus Enzensberger put it, playing off the title of an essay by Lenin, Soviet socialism proved to be “the highest stage of underdevelopment.”

New forms of authoritarian capitalism may eventually suffer similar types of economic stagnation. So far, however, the form of authoritarian capitalism that has emerged in Arab Gulf states and East Asia—combining a strong state with relatively free markets and reasonably secure property rights—is having a good run. Of the 15 countries in the world with the highest per capita incomes, almost two-thirds are nondemocracies. Even comparatively unsuccessful authoritarian states, such as Iran, Kazakhstan, and Russia, can boast per capita incomes above $20,000. China, whose per capita income was vastly lower as recently as two decades ago, is rapidly starting to catch up. Although average incomes in its rural hinterlands remain low, the country has proved that it can offer a higher level of wealth in its more urban areas: the coastal region of China now comprises some 420 million people, with an average income of $23,000 and growing. In other words, hundreds of millions of people can now be said to live under conditions of “authoritarian modernity.” In the eyes of their less affluent imitators around the world, their remarkable prosperity serves as a testament to the fact that the road to prosperity no longer needs to run through liberal democracy.

AUTHORITARIAN SOFT POWER
One of the results of this transformation has been a much greater degree of ideological self-confidence among autocratic regimes—and, along with it, a willingness to meddle in Western democracies. Russia’s attempts to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election have understandably drawn the most attention over the past two years. But the country has long had an even greater influence on politics across western Europe. In Italy and France, for example, Russia has helped finance extremist parties on both sides of the political divide for decades. In other European countries, Russia has enjoyed even more remarkable success in recruiting retired political leaders to lobby on its behalf, including former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder and former Austrian Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer.

The big question now is whether Russia will remain alone in its attempt to influence the politics of liberal democracies. The answer is almost certainly no: its campaigns have proved that outside meddling by authoritarian powers in deeply divided democracies is relatively easy and strikingly effective, making it very tempting for Russia’s authoritarian peers to follow suit. Indeed, China is already stepping up ideological pressure on its overseas residents and establishing influential Confucius Institutes in major centers of learning. And over the past two years, Saudi Arabia has dramatically upped its payments to registered U.S. lobbyists, increasing the number of registered foreign agents working on its behalf from 25 to 145.

If the changing balance of economic and technological power between Western democracies and authoritarian countries makes the former more susceptible to outside interference, it also makes it easier for the latter to spread their values. Indeed, the rise of authoritarian soft power is already apparent across a variety of domains, including academia, popular culture, foreign investment, and development aid. Until a few years ago, for example, all of the world’s leading universities were situated in liberal democracies, but authoritarian countries are starting to close the gap. According to the latest Times Higher Education survey, 16 of the world’s top 250 institutions can be found in nondemocracies, including China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Singapore.

Perhaps the most important form of authoritarian soft power, however, may be the growing ability of dictatorial regimes to soften the hold that democracies once enjoyed over the reporting and dissemination of news. Whereas the Soviet mouthpiece Pravda could never have dreamed of attracting a mass readership in the United States, the clips produced today by state-funded news channels, including Qatar’s Al Jazeera, China’s CCTV, and Russia’s RT, regularly find millions of American viewers. The result is the end of the West’s monopoly over media narratives, as well as an end to its ability to maintain a civic space untainted by foreign governments.

THE BEGINNING OF THE END?
During the long period of democratic stability, the United States was the dominant superpower, both culturally and economically. Authoritarian competitors such as the Soviet Union quickly stagnated economically and became discredited ideologically. As a result, democracy seemed to promise not only a greater degree of individual freedom and collective self-determination but also the more prosaic prospect of a vastly wealthier life. As long as these background conditions held, there seemed to be good reason to assume that democracy would continue to be safe in its traditional strongholds. There were even plausible grounds to hope that an ever-growing number of autocratic countries would join the democratic column.

But the era in which Western liberal democracies were the world’s top cultural and economic powers may now be drawing to a close. At the same time that liberal democracies are showing strong signs of institutional decay, authoritarian populists are starting to develop an ideological alternative in the form of illiberal democracy, and outright autocrats are offering their citizens a standard of living that increasingly rivals that of the richest countries in the West.

It is tempting to hope that Western liberal democracies could regain their dominance. One path toward that end would be economic. The recent economic success of authoritarian countries could prove to be short lived. Russia and Saudi Arabia remain overly reliant on income from fossil fuels. China’s recent growth has been fueled by a soaring debt bubble and favorable demographics, and it may end up being difficult to sustain once the country is forced to deleverage and the effects of an aging population hit home. At the same time, the economic performance of developed Western economies could improve. As the residual effects of the Great Recession wear off and European and North American economies roar back to life, these bastions of liberal democracy could once again outpace the modernized autocracies.

Projections about the exact speed and degree of the shifting power balance between democratic and authoritarian countries should therefore be taken with a large grain of salt. And yet a cursory glance at Western GDP growth rates for the past three to four decades shows that, due to demographic decline and low productivity growth, Western economies were stagnating long before the financial crisis. Meanwhile, China and many other emerging economies have large hinterlands that have yet to experience catch-up development, which suggests that these countries can continue to make considerable gains by following their current growth model.

Another hope is that emerging democracies such as Brazil, India, and Indonesia may come to play a more active role in upholding an alliance of liberal democracies and diffusing their values around the world. But this would require a radical change in course. As the political scientist Marc Plattner has argued, these countries have not historically thought of “the defense of liberal democracy as a significant component of their foreign policies.” Following the Russian annexation of Crimea, for example, Brazil, India, and South Africa abstained from voting on a resolution in the UN General Assembly that condemned the move. They have also opposed sanctions against Russia. And they have tended to side with autocratic regimes in seeking a greater role for states in regulating the Internet.

To make things worse, emerging democracies have historically been much less stable than the supposedly consolidated democracies of North America, western Europe, and parts of East Asia. Indeed, recent democratic backsliding in Turkey, as well as signs of democratic slippage in Argentina, Indonesia, Mexico, and the Philippines, raises the possibility that some of these countries may become flawed democracies—or revert to outright authoritarian rule—in the coming decades. Instead of shoring up the dwindling forces of democracy, some of these countries may choose to align with autocratic powers.

Hopes that the current set of democratic countries could somehow regain their erstwhile global position are probably vain. The most likely scenario, then, is that democracies will come to look less and less attractive as they cease to be associated with wealth and power and fail to address their own challenges.

It’s conceivable, however, that the animating principles of liberal democracy will prove deeply appealing to the inhabitants of authoritarian countries even once those peoples enjoy a comparable standard of living. If large authoritarian countries such as Iran, Russia, and Saudi Arabia undertook democratic reforms, the aggregate power of democracies would be boosted significantly. If China were to do so, it would end the era of authoritarian resurgence in a single stroke.

But that is just another way of saying that the long century during which Western liberal democracies dominated the globe has ended for good. The only remaining question now is whether democracy will transcend its once firm anchoring in the West, a shift that would create the conditions for a truly global democratic century—or whether democracy will become, at best, the lingering form of government in an economically and demographically declining corner of the world.

[Chester Perry]

lots of comments tonight about the fact that the 2 finalist in the Championship play offs are among those suspected of violating FFP

https://twitter.com/tariqpanja/status/1 ... 1372820486" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

https://twitter.com/KieranMaguire/statu ... 3941733376" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

Following the independent's piece on Baku (see post #1064) comes this - we were already aware of the problem that Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Arsenal's Armenian midfielder faced, now Arsenal Supporters trust have raise a further issue for fans

https://twitter.com/AST_arsenal/status/ ... 6893078529" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

As Paul Hayward of the Telegraph suggests - being Baku'd is on the verge of entering football lexicon

https://twitter.com/_PaulHayward/status ... 2267270144" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Vegas Claret]

football is ******

[Swizzlestick]

lots of comments tonight about the fact that the 2 finalist in the Championship play offs are among those suspected of violating FFP

https://twitter.com/tariqpanja/status/1 ... 1372820486" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

https://twitter.com/KieranMaguire/statu ... 3941733376" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Derby didn’t violate anything. They owned a profitable asset, which was sold to a separate corporate entity at market rate. Mel Morris being a shareholder of both is sort of irrelevant. In fact, I believe Derby invited Steve Gibson and Boro to look at their accounts more in depth but they declined.

[Chester Perry]

Man City case has been referred to UEFA's financial control body following investigation

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/48292248" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Uefa Statement

https://twitter.com/tariqpanja/status/1 ... 9441885184" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

City's response

https://twitter.com/tariqpanja/status/1 ... 6982136832" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

Derby didn’t violate anything. They owned a profitable asset, which was sold to a separate corporate entity at market rate. Mel Morris being a shareholder of both is sort of irrelevant. In fact, I believe Derby invited Steve Gibson and Boro to look at their accounts more in depth but they declined.

I said suspected - and that is still being looked into by more than just Steve Gibson - Derby have pulled off 2 accounting tricks in 2 years to avoid the impact of FFP, if they fail in the playoff's, next season is going to be pretty drastic for them - as they are up for sale while in the Championship (and that Sale will seperate them from their Ground and Training complex as they are owned seperately (combined price will be too big for a club in the Championship. - Though if they go up, all bets are off, just look at Leicester, QPR and Bournemouth

[Chester Perry]

@AndyhHolt has been on fire this week building the case for his prospective manifesto for the game - this morning was as relevant to us (even if we stay in the top league for ever) as it was to his own club

https://twitter.com/AndyhHolt/status/11 ... 9564149761" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

The price of failure on a football pitch - highest paid Directors in the Premier League 2017/2018

https://twitter.com/KieranMaguire/statu ... 4563666944" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Burnley continue to hide how much they pay their Chief Exec by not having him on the board (seems a few others copy that model)

[Royboyclaret]

Absolutely crucial to Derby that they achieve promotion, as emphasised by the levels of celebration on the pitch last night by owner Mel Morris. Of course we also had a period of 7 seasons when the Club did not own Turf Moor from 2006 to 2013 and it was not the most comfortable of times for everyone concerned, particularly Barry Kilby.

[Chester Perry]

Tifo football look at why, even though Ronaldo (CR7) took a pay cut to join Juventus, he is better off - and it is not good news for the big 2 in Spain (which may explain the enormity of their wage bills)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IP5vufl ... e=youtu.be" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

For those that question the financial games at Derby (also illustrates just how much Leeds have got their act together off the pitch)

https://offthepitch.com/a/head-head-fin ... y-vs-leeds" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That still doesn't mean Leeds are financially secure - may have to sell some players this summer to balance the books

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/20 ... -deciding/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

In post #1020 I highlighted that

“P.S.G. and UEFA have a tangled relationship. The team’s owners also run beIN Sports, the broadcaster that is UEFA’s biggest media rights buyer. Both the club and beIN Sports are run by Nasser al-Khelaifi who was elected to a position on UEFA’s executive board earlier this year.”

well that comes as part of UEFA's tangled relationship with ECA (the clubs body) as @Marcotti explains

https://twitter.com/Marcotti/status/1128946005184065536" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I should say that it is not unreasonable for clubs to be represented in this way - it is probably a welcome move. The ECA have been politically astute with this candidate though. And as is mentioned in that thread, they also have the indirect influence of Rick Parry (ex Liverpool) and David Gill (ex Man Utd) in there

[Chester Perry]

Burnley drop 5 places to 32nd in Brand Finances Football world top 50

https://brandfinance.com/images/upload/ ... free_1.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Napoli, Wolves, Lyon, Ajax and Watford are those who have overtaken us

[Chester Perry]

If you thought my posts on the connections that influence the football we watch are complex - you would be right - Simon Chadwick gives us a few relationship maps that are currently in play with the football news stories we have been reading

https://twitter.com/Prof_Chadwick/statu ... 7746933760" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Royboyclaret]

Burnley drop 5 places to 32nd in Brand Finances Football world top 50

https://brandfinance.com/images/upload/ ... free_1.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Napoli, Wolves, Lyon, Ajax and Watford are those who have overtaken us

Burnley's brand value has dropped by 15% ?........the biggest reduction in the PL ?

What's all that about ?

[Chester Perry]

Back to where this thread started - Manchester Utd have posted quarterly financial results (they could well beat out complete 2018/19 results on all fronts. Of course the Glazers had to take their share out (currently £11m+ a quarter)

https://twitter.com/KieranMaguire/statu ... 4935641088" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

Remember the story of the week (Man City/UEFA) from post #1046 and I said it provoked a bit of a social media ****storm - well hear is a good article explaining what happened

https://www.football365.com/news/pitchf ... th-problem" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

Football Benchmark compares the revenue of the big 5 leagues

https://twitter.com/Football_BM/status/ ... 2918864896" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

but if you read the thread they don't make the calculations in the same way for each league and consequently La Liga is given an extra Euro 500m for it's own commercial revenues -

What is evident is that la liga is making strides in catching up with the PL

https://twitter.com/Football_BM/status/ ... 5466913792" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

https://twitter.com/Football_BM/status/ ... 4952059904" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and is making concerted efforts to carry on doing so, which is why they are so vocally angry about the post 2024 ECA/UEFA proposals

[Chester Perry]

Burnley's brand value has dropped by 15% ?........the biggest reduction in the PL ?

What's all that about ?

I thought we were overvalued in last years list see our posts on the topic last time #309 through #312 and press perception has a lot to play.

these things jump around and are inevitably already out of date - it is not unlike the valuation on the club using the Markham Multivariate model is it in that sense

though how you combine the two to get a more realistic valuation of the club as a buyer/seller I am not sure

A key stat is that we are one of the 17 English clubs on the list and are above Bournemouth, Southampton (that's surprising) and Brighton - long may that continue

EDIT - If you look at the report in detail it gives you an approach to the methodology, there are a host of reasons for the drop including revenue (if we are looking at the current season - that had come down significantly both in PL monies and player sales. Commercials should be up, I am sure I read somewhere that LaBa were paying £10m for the shirt sponsorship (£6m with Dafabet)

[AndyClaret]

I thought we were overvalued in last years list see our posts on the topic last time #309 through #312 and press perception has a lot to play.

these things jump around and are inevitably already out of date - it is not unlike the valuation on the club using the Markham Multivariate model is it in that sense

though how you combine the two to get a more realistic valuation of the club as a buyer/seller I am not sure

A key stat is that we are one of the 17 English clubs on the list and are above Bournemouth, Southampton (that's surprising) and Brighton - long may that continue

EDIT - If you look at the report in detail it gives you an approach to the methodology, there are a host of reasons for the drop including revenue (if we are looking at the current season - that had come down significantly both in PL monies and player sales. Commercials should be up, I am sure I read somewhere that LaBa were paying £10m for the shirt sponsorship (£6m with Dafabet)

According to swiss ramble dafabet was £2m, and LaBa is £5M

[Chester Perry]

According to swiss ramble dafabet was £2m, and LaBa is £5M

3 year and 2 year deal respectively I think- a very healthy increase and follows through on Garlick's thoughts that we could do better with the commercials

surprised at some of those who earn less now I have looked at it

https://www.statista.com/statistics/254 ... e-by-club/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

We have had summary reviews of the PL financial accounts of 2017/18 but now we have one for the Championship (even without submissions being made my Sheff Wed and Bolton to date) the prime point of note is just how many clubs are relentlessly under the belief they will find salvation in the PL.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... -year.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[duncandisorderly]

I get enough of these on here to risk talking about it elsewhere

Just to quickly say, please don't. I think this is probably the best thread on this and the old board combined. (apart from princesshales, obvs)
Some of it is, I'm not ashamed to say, a bit beyond my ken, but I get the general feel of the sport as a whole through your (and roys) contributions to this thread, so don't **** off elsewhere.

[Chester Perry]

The BBC Dan Roan examines the potential of Man City's referral to UEFA's Adjudicatory Chamber

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/48296885" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

It has taken a while but the European Leagues Organisation has finally put out it's response to both the UEFA and ECA proposals it promised last week. Unsurprisingly it has said a fundamental rethink needs to occur.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/48302526" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The ELO statement

https://europeanleagues.com/all-europea ... petitions/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

A sound commentary on recent events from Gabriele Marcotti

http://www.espn.com/soccer/blog/marcott ... and-others" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

that commentary makes reference to this piece he did back in 2016 tearing apart Agnelli's belief that the Champions League was worth as much as the NFL

http://www.espn.co.uk/football/blog/mar ... omparisons" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

In post #1086 Simon Chadwick gives us a few relationship maps that are currently in play with the football news stories we have been reading. This article he co-wrote gives more information to the one that centres on Saudi Arabia

https://www.policyforum.net/saudi-arabi ... influence/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

@AndyhHolt asks who the EFL board is working for and gives his thoughts on B teams in the EPL

https://twitter.com/AndyhHolt/status/11 ... 3830370305" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

- this week has been real a real consolidation of the things that directly impact the viability of the pyramid that he has grievances with.

[Chester Perry]

Sky Italia's football benchmark on how MAn City and PSG became top football clubs and global brands as a result of middle Eastern investments - as usual subtitles at the icon 5th in from bottom right

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_cont ... USxMSysyE8" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[aggi]

Big drop indeed, £15m from the £119m of the previous season.

Likely to be someway offset, however, by a significant drop in the Wage bill. The £81m from last season included a £23m bonus for finishing 7th. Of course, from a financial perspective, retaining our PL status for another season was another giant step forward as the Club goes from strength to strength at least off the pitch.

I would suspect a lot of that bonus is down to staying in the premier league though so I'd expect a chunky one (although not as high) this season.

[Chester Perry]

I would suspect a lot of that bonus is down to staying in the premier league though so I'd expect a chunky one (although not as high) this season.

I have a theory that squad and staff bonus is all the PL prize money earned if we stay which this year is £11.5m

[Chester Perry]

The EFL are to discuss changes to their FFP rules to cover the creative accounting that has emerged in the last couple of seasons to avoid it's penalties - and things look ominous for Sheff Wed who have reportedly still not submitted accounts to the EFL that were due last December

from The Times - behind a paywall so transcribed (if you register you can get 2 free articles a week - which is what I do)

Sky Bet Championship clubs accused of selling grounds then renting them back to exploit FFP rules - Matt Hughes, Sports News Correspondent

The English Football League will review its financial fair play rules this summer after complaints from clubs in the Sky Bet Championship that their rivals are exploiting the system by selling off their grounds and leasing them back as a way of balancing the books.

Sheffield Wednesday and two other Championship clubs are believed to have followed the example of Derby County, who revealed last month that they sold Pride Park to the club’s owner Mel Morris for £80 million last year, enabling them to record a pre-tax profit of £14.6 million for the 2017-18 season. Aston Villa are understood to be considering selling Villa Park if they fail to win promotion to the Premier League in this month’s play-off final.

Under EFL profit and sustainability rules that prohibit clubs recording losses of more than £39 million over a three-year period, there is nothing to prevent such sale and lease-back schemes, which are an accepted method of solving cashflow problems in other industries. Many clubs consider it unethical, however, and the EFL board has agreed to review its regulations. It is understood that the subject will be on the agenda at the end-of-season meeting of Championship clubs in Portugal next month.

Several clubs have expressed anger that their Championship peers appear to be using creative accounting to bypass financial fair play (FFP) regulations that have resulted in Birmingham City being docked nine points and Queens Park Rangers fined £42 million for breaches in the past 12 months. Derby and Villa are understood to be two of the clubs most at risk of breaking the EFL’s £39 million loss cap and incurring sanctions if they are not promoted to the Premier League. Wednesday and Leeds United are also at risk.

The EFL introduced a set tariff for FFP breaches this season. A maximum of 12 points could be docked, although a further nine can be added if an aggravated breach is proven.

One owner of a Championship club told The Times: “According to the rules it’s not cheating, but we should change the way the rules are written. In this instance fair play doesn’t mean anything. It’s not ethically correct.”

The chief executive of another club added: “My owners are furious about this and demanding change. It’s not a level playing field at present as the rules are meaningless.”

Villa raised £4 million through the sale of a car park close to Villa Park last year and will look at selling the entire stadium as an option to raise funds if they are in breach of the EFL’s spending limits this summer. Wednesday’s situation is even more intriguing as they have yet to file accounts for the year ending July 2018. These were due on April 30.

The Times understands that the club have also failed to file accounts to the EFL which were due last December, which could lead to them being fined. A club spokesman said that any new arrangement regarding Hillsborough would be clear in their accounts, which they insisted would be published in the next few weeks.

“The long-term sustainability of all EFL clubs remains of paramount importance and we will continue to work with Championship clubs in respect of the rules at next month’s summer conference,” an EFL spokesman said. “Clubs have also been reminded of the stringent processes undertaken in reviewing financial submissions and that in the event any club is found to be in breach of the rules, they will be referred to an independent disciplinary commission.”

[Chester Perry]

Old news but not mentioned elsewhere - Now the season has ended there is plenty of speculation about who is going where in the summer transfer window - it is entirely possibly that a lot of this summers biggest potential transfers might not happen because one agent has been given a 3 month ban - initially in Italy, then FIFA made it worldwide - He is allowed to return to his business activities the day after the PL transfer windows shut. This is going to be an interesting watch given the players under his charge and if effective may leave an awful lot of clubs unhappy as they can either not get rid of players they want to or sign the players they are targeting

http://www.insideworldfootball.com/2019 ... er-window/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... suolo.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

A good article in the Independent by Jonathan Liew arguing that objectivity is being lost in punditary -

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/foo ... 18826.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

the final paragraph is perhaps the most scathing attack on how the game is eating itself as broadcasters follow the populist route that seems to be dominating our lives currently - I agree with him (as this thread probably testifies)

[Chester Perry]

We all know by now just how important commercial income is to the big clubs, and even to clubs like ourselves who are drastically over reliant on TV revenues. But, what about the EFL, in the Championship Leeds lead the way with a much larger commercial revenue than anyone else, this allows them to compete with clubs on 2nd and 3rd year parachute payments. Lower down the structure it gets harder, much harder if you are a club the size of Accrington, those who follow @Andyhholt know because he freely shares much of his financials.

The EPL now has a club that was smaller than Accrington only a couple of years ago, but whose commercial income is likely to be the largest in the bottom 2 leagues. And this is not because the major shareholder is the 8th wealthiest in the English football pyramid (including the PL) but because of the group of friends who are each minority share holders - particularly the most recent of those to join the party. These friends are collectively known as "the class of 92" and the newest minority shareholder is David Beckham (who knows a bit about how to earn commercial income). The prize for commercial sponsors of Salford City is not the club per se, but access and association to it's directors, and there is no other club in the EPL that can offer anything to match it.

https://digitalsport.co/salford-city-th ... ho.twitter" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

In post #1089 we saw the story of the online ****storm when the NY Times broke the story of the impending judgement of Man City from UEFA and it's likely consequences. Here is another piece (there have been many recently) that looks at the difficulty of separating the admiration for football excellence and condemnation of misdeeds by Jonathan Wilson (@jonawils).

https://www.si.com/soccer/2019/05/17/ma ... =si-soccer" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and here is a piece he did for his own publication "The Blizzard" (a thoroughly interesting and deep football periodical from what I have seen) on what he called The War for Truth examining the games relationship with social media and the erosion of faith in the institution of journalism

https://www.theblizzard.co.uk/article/war-truth" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

EDIT: of course there are a growing number of things that are difficult to forget when talking about City Football Group, Abu Dhabi and the UAE

https://twitter.com/JamesPiotr/status/1 ... 4409970688" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

following his thread yesterday (see post #1099) @AndyhHolt gives further insight on how the EFL betrayed him and it's members to appease the PL and how streaming will kill collective ownership of media rights

https://twitter.com/AndyhHolt/status/11 ... 4079569920" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

Back to that Edit in post #1107 - it must be remembered that Man City are not the only club with ties that can make the genuine club fan wince as @MiguelDelaney reminded last year

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/foo ... 35996.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

as regular readers know I have posted about soft power, sports washing and even the ascendance of Autocracy because of it's impact on the game. What I am increasingly coming to acknowledge is the game is more a metaphor for the world we are in than ever before. A world where what we are witnessing within the game we see being replayed here

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/2019051 ... comes-next" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and one where it is even possible to manipulate truth to what you want it to be if you have the means

https://twitter.com/carljackmiller/stat ... 3629500418" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and where all that seems to matter is how people react at an emotional level - it is about feelings

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/eu-elec ... ews-russia" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

which is probably why city have been so punchy in their response to the investigation being referred tot the adjudicatory chamber

https://www.theguardian.com/football/20 ... -innocence" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and it has been matched by a large number of their fans online

https://twitter.com/EwanMacKenna/status ... 5027508225" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


The rabbit hole is growing (see post #683)

EDIT Removed the analogy of who I suggested I may be feeling like as I was wrong to make it and I apologise

[Chester Perry]

I have often spoken about how much the Glazers using the club to fund their purchase of the club have cost Man United over their years both to themselves and their bankers. @KieranMaguire takes a look

https://twitter.com/KieranMaguire/statu ... 3576260610" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

he forgot to mention the Share issue in New York that raised another £150m for the family

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19210107" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

So Man City have another trophy, have an unprecedented domestic treble, how will time look back on this period of unprecedented success

https://twitter.com/sportingintel/statu ... 2870598657" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and this is what one city fan at Wembley has to say when he broke into the press box today

https://twitter.com/RobHarris/status/11 ... 1040248837" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Royboyclaret]

So Man City have another trophy, have an unprecedented domestic treble, how will time look back on this period of unprecedented success

https://twitter.com/sportingintel/statu ... 2870598657" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and this is what one city fan at Wembley has to say when he broke into the press box today

https://twitter.com/RobHarris/status/11 ... 1040248837" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Tend to agree that Manchester City's dominance of the game will ultimately result in it's ruination. Will it be the treble again next year and the year after. Is that what the game really wants?

As an aside, what was the disagreement today between Emirates and Etihad? Did one attempt to upstage the other?

[Chester Perry]

I think this might explain it Roy - petty stuff from the usually very slick City/Abu Dhabi operation

https://www.joe.co.uk/sport/man-city-ac ... nal-232167" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

There were rumours of the 2 state owned Airlines merging last year after they began co-operating in parts of their business

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-etih ... M027F?il=0" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Royboyclaret]

I think this might explain it Roy - petty stuff from the usually very slick City/Abu Dhabi operation

https://www.joe.co.uk/sport/man-city-ac ... nal-232167" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

There were rumours of the 2 state owned Airlines merging last year after they began co-operating in parts of their business

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-etih ... M027F?il=0" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Ah, right. Never a club to miss out on a potential marketing opportunity.

Pretty poor really and hardly necessary.

[Chester Perry]

The vast monies that the PL brings in (especially from overseas) is usually ascribed to it's historic competitive nature, Jonathan Liew effectively suggests that Pep and the investment in City from Abu Dhabi has effectively turned it into any other European Leaguge.

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/foo ... LPqBalz3Hc" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

as @RorySmith says: (the) History of football is basically just one team doing something new, excelling, and then other teams either catching up or finding a way to counteract it. That is what always happens. But for the life of me no idea how you do either of those things with Man City.

In just over a years time the PL (still looking to replace Richard Scudamore) and at a time when it's new tv rights revenue distribution rules will be come visible in the prize money paid will begin possibly the most important ever cycle of media rights sales with the possibility that its USP no longer there. The onus on Chelsea (1 year transfer ban in place), Spurs (not used to spending at those levels), Arsenal (no significant money and a hole in the recruitment dept) and Man Utd (significant revenue drop from no CL and a well documented lack of football strategy) is one that looks to much for them. Liverpool are over course are on a different level, but Europe looks their best chance for Silverware like this season

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/foo ... 20451.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

And there will be hope that Wolves, Leicester and possibly Everton can continue to improve and challenge.

https://statsbomb.com/2019/05/the-premi ... is-coming/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

EDIT: I will add this article from at @MiguelDelaney

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/foo ... 20441.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

No apologies for including 3 articles from one paper - it is all great writing and all asks pertinent questions in a week where journalists are being absolutely pilloried for doing so

[Chester Perry]

@AndyhHolt takes aim at the "fit and proper" test enforce (sic) by the EFL as he continues to outline his grievances with the powers that be in the game

https://twitter.com/AndyhHolt/status/11 ... 4434219009" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chester Perry]

Following much protest about it's pricing for the cup semi-finals and final the FA has agreed to consult with Fans in the coming months over pricing for future games

https://offthepitch.com/a/fa-consider-r ... -criticism" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The biggest problem for me is that they refuse to consider the travel implications for fans, and the rounds they have gone through, The FA treat it as major single sporting event, and price it accordingly (they have been known to compare it to centre court at Wimbledon or even the superbowl among other events), and for the neutral and sponsors it is, So why not make the club allocations affordable or in line with the £30 away ticket in the PL (or even matchday tickets at their club) and charge the other 30k+ the price they think the event is worth.

The real problem is they made such a mess of the financial operations over the last 15 years (including building Wembley) that they have to fleece fans (many northern, if you look at cup semi finals/finals in that time)

[Chester Perry]

Following on from the theme of post #1115 Jonathan Wilson of the Guardian has given up and wants to shove City off to a Superleague

https://www.theguardian.com/football/20 ... -is-broken" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

there are other ways to fix the game Jonathan and you know it

[Chester Perry]

What yesterday's cup final did reveal was just how big a "nearly" year it has been for Derby, there was the potential to have a number of worst ever performances expunged from the records but they all fell away most at the last hurdle and there is still the play-off final to come.

Worst ever FA Cup final defeat: Bury 6 - 0 Derby 1903 - equalled yesterday
Most goals conceded in a 38 game Premier League season: 89 Derby 2007/2008 - a late season rally kept Fulham to 81
Fewest goals scored in a 38 game Premier League season: 20 Derby 2007/2008 - Huddersfield 1-1 draws against Man Utd and Southampton took them to 22
Lowest points in a 38 game Premier League season: 11 Derby 2007/2008 - Huddersfield passed that on 26th Feb when defeating Wolves for the 2nd time this season, they still only managed 16 points though

[Chester Perry]

@AndyhHolt takes aim at the "fit and proper" test enforce (sic) by the EFL as he continues to outline his grievances with the powers that be in the game

https://twitter.com/AndyhHolt/status/11 ... 4434219009" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Rovers fans going nuts at @AndyhHolt after this thread had the "temerity" to suggest Jack Walkers actions were not "fit and proper" (he also mentiond Eddie Davis and Ellis Short) it is a mini version of the city fans - the world is going down the pan becasuse people defend the things they love out of blind loyalty and refuse to acknowledge another point of view