Leicester City Nemesis to the Big Bully Boys of Europe

[davieG]

25 minutes ago, Oxfordfox83 said:

Nah Davey you’ve missed the point completely. It’s fine for them to enter, we *want* them to enter. 
 

They’re just absolutely not allowed to win.

They should be jolly grateful to be involved, and know their place!

Hmm I think for this Super league they don't want anyone else in there.

[HighPeakFox]

Put simply, they've spent loads of money, it doesn't necessarily work if the management & structures aren't good enough, so rather than learn from that, they just want to change the rules so their corrupt game can continue without interference. And it's nothing to do with Brexit/EU/pathetic patriotism, it's to do with the international language of greed.

[Golden Fox]

Everyone is coming at this from an historic football point of view. However, football is out of kilter with how worldwide sports operate these days.

 

The US sports are all franchises - they can limit the teams to 30-32 (mainly based on media markets) & smaller cities can have the 'B teams' in their own competitions.

 

Formula 1 uses this franchise model.

 

The biggest emergence in global team sports in the last 10 years is cricket - IPL, Big Bash - which are all franchises.

 

It is only going to go that way - even quaint County Cricket gets it... why have 20 teams with unbalanced resources when you can kick out the teams you don't want, and just have teams you do want in the flashy test stadiums and go with a franchise model - and can call it "The Hundred".

 

We'll look back at this discussion in 20 years and be amused that football was still clinging onto this thought that a village side could rise up and challenge the elite.

 

Our best bet is to win the league again and force our place in this new league.   

[Rain King]

3 minutes ago, Golden Fox said:

Everyone is coming at this from an historic football point of view. However, football is out of kilter with how worldwide sports operate these days.

 

The US sports are all franchises - they can limit the teams to 30-32 (mainly based on media markets) & smaller cities can have the 'B teams' in their own competitions.

 

Formula 1 uses this franchise model.

 

The biggest emergence in global team sports in the last 10 years is cricket - IPL, Big Bash - which are all franchises.

 

It is only going to go that way - even quaint County Cricket gets it... why have 20 teams with unbalanced resources when you can kick out the teams you don't want, and just have teams you do want in the flashy test stadiums and go with a franchise model - and can call it "The Hundred".

 

We'll look back at this discussion in 20 years and be amused that football was still clinging onto this thought that a village side could rise up and challenge the elite.

 

Our best bet is to win the league again and force our place in this new league.   

Absolute bull

[ALC Fox]

1 hour ago, filbertway said:

2018

I thought they got the the first knockout round whereas Atalanta reached the quarter final last season?

 

Edit: yeah, fair enough, Roma reached the SF in 17/18 and then Round of 16 in 18/19. Feels like a lot longer since any of their European games were hyped up though.

Edited 26 January 2021 by ALC Fox

[filbertway]

Just now, ALC Fox said:

I thought they got the the first knockout round whereas Atalanta reached the quarter final last season?

They had a couple of mental games against Barca in the quarters and then Liverpool in the semi's. 

[HybridFox]

Best thing for football if a non "big 6" club wins it this year. Whether that's us or anyone else. 

 

Stick two fingers to their super league 

[Oxfordfox83]

13 minutes ago, Golden Fox said:

Everyone is coming at this from an historic football point of view. However, football is out of kilter with how worldwide sports operate these days.

 

The US sports are all franchises - they can limit the teams to 30-32 (mainly based on media markets) & smaller cities can have the 'B teams' in their own competitions.

 

Formula 1 uses this franchise model.

 

The biggest emergence in global team sports in the last 10 years is cricket - IPL, Big Bash - which are all franchises.

 

It is only going to go that way - even quaint County Cricket gets it... why have 20 teams with unbalanced resources when you can kick out the teams you don't want, and just have teams you do want in the flashy test stadiums and go with a franchise model - and can call it "The Hundred".

 

We'll look back at this discussion in 20 years and be amused that football was still clinging onto this thought that a village side could rise up and challenge the elite.

 

Our best bet is to win the league again and force our place in this new league.   

The thing you overlook is that every single sport you mention (or league in the case of The Hundred) is shit and dull. Even the IPL loses most of its lustre once the league takes shape.

 

Also: football works. It doesn’t need repairing. The biggest threat is the threat of disproportionate wealth, to which the solution is absolutely not ‘even more disproportionate wealth’.

[Voll Blau]

30 minutes ago, Golden Fox said:

Everyone is coming at this from an historic football point of view. However, football is out of kilter with how worldwide sports operate these days.

 

The US sports are all franchises - they can limit the teams to 30-32 (mainly based on media markets) & smaller cities can have the 'B teams' in their own competitions.

 

Formula 1 uses this franchise model.

 

The biggest emergence in global team sports in the last 10 years is cricket - IPL, Big Bash - which are all franchises.

 

It is only going to go that way - even quaint County Cricket gets it... why have 20 teams with unbalanced resources when you can kick out the teams you don't want, and just have teams you do want in the flashy test stadiums and go with a franchise model - and can call it "The Hundred".

 

We'll look back at this discussion in 20 years and be amused that football was still clinging onto this thought that a village side could rise up and challenge the elite.

 

Our best bet is to win the league again and force our place in this new league.   

 

If we ever do that, the last place you'd find me is anywhere near a Leicester City match. Imagine if this conversation had cropped up in 2008, fairly certain you'd have had a different point of view given our relative standing at that time...

 

Oh, and not sure I'd be using The Hundred as a brilliant example of how this kind of thing is wanted and/or needed. It's gone down like a bucket of cold sick with most existing cricket fans.

[Vacamion]

 

The involvement in all this of FSG, the Glazers and Kroenke, who are used to a franchise model without the financial uncertainty of relegation and falls from grace, is telling.

 

Those of us who have have spent a lifetime  loving Leicester City will love the club even more because we are the ones throwing a spanner in these plans.

 

 

 

[Aus Fox]

1 hour ago, davieG said:

We should develop this further.

 

Only teams that have won Tier 1 more than 5+ times to play in the PL and so on down the leagues

Only teams that have won the FA Cup 3+ times to enter the FA Cup

Only teams that have won the FL Cup 3+ times to enter the FL Cup

 

All with no relegation for leagues or new entries for Cup competitions

 

Yay!!  We qualify for the Championship and the FL Cup forever.

 

Anyone fancy working out who would be in each competition.

Okay so in the Top Flight we have:

Man Utd

Man City

Liverpool 
Everton

Sunderland

Villa

Chelsea

Arsenal

 

Some cracking derbies there and I am sure Sunderland supporters would vote for this model.

 

The Draw for the first round of the FA cup has been made:

Arsenal V West Ham

Man Utd V Sheff Wed

Chelsea v Wolves

Spurs v Sheff utd

Liverpool v Bolton

Blackburn v West Brom

Villa v Everton

Man City v Newcastle 

 

Not sure what to do about the Wanderers? But it makes a nice even 16 without them.

 
In the draw for the League cup we have

 

Liverpool v Leicester City

Man City v Spurs

Villa v Forest

Chelsea v Man Utd

 

again a nice even 8 teams. It’s almost like it’s meant to be.

 

[David Guiza]

It's been said previously, but it's such an arrogant position to assume that the biggest clubs in each nation have always been that way.

 

The most decorated club in France is still St-Etienne, I believe. 

Genoa have won three times as many Serie A titles as Roma.

Monchengladbach have won as many Bundesliga title as Dortmund

Everton have won 3 more titles than both Chelsea and Man City.

 

Who decides the cut off time? Even if you were to cut it down to the past couple of decades, the amount of titles between 'European Elite' Roma, Spurs, Marseille, and Arsenal is 4. That's the same amount as than Leicester, Montepellier, Wolfsburg, and Nantes in the same time period. 

 

Literally the only benefit would be seeing Forest fans have the door shut in their face as they try and waddle in to the European Cheese Room only to be told that their name's not down as the bosses have never heard of such club. 

[worth_the_wait]

Further to the comments of English clubs ignoring Europe and "going it alone" ...
 
There is, of course, an example of that actually happening.    English clubs were banned from European competitions for 5 years, after Liverpool fans were responsible for the deaths of 39 fans at Heysel in 1985.
 
What's fascinating is how it affected the domestic game.
 
League attendances had been slipping pretty much constantly from a high point of 41.3 million in 1948-49, to 17.8 million in 1984-85.  
 
Heysel had been the tip of the iceberg, but there had been plenty of other domestic incidents that season.  The matches at Luton (v Millwall) and Birmingham (v Leeds) were the worst two, but there had been plenty of others.   In 1985, top-flight English football really was being read the "last rites" and many believed it was in terminal decline.
 
The first season after (1985-86) attendances dropped again to 16.5 million, as the game tried to sort out the hooligan issue, as well as being banned from Europe.   The first year was bad as you could see what we were missing, but then most fans just forgot about Europe and concentrated on the domestic game.
 
Attendances then rose, and in the next 4 seasons they were 17.4, 18, 18.5 and 19.4 million respectively.   By 1990 it was nearly 2 million higher than when we had been kicked out of Europe!
 
And the domestic competitions flourished too.   In the 5 seasons when English clubs were banned:
 3 different teams won the title (Liverpool, Everton and Arsenal)
 4 different teams won the FA Cup (Liverpool, Cov, Wimbledon and Man Utd)
 4 different teams won the League Cup (Oxford, Arsenal, Luton, Forest)
 
Obviously there was a downside.   A few English players went abroad to play football.   Also when English clubs were re-admitted to European competitions, it took quite a few years to get back up to speed with the opposition again.
 
But the domestic game didn't suffer at all, in terms of passion, interest and excitement.

 

 

[Aus Fox]

2 hours ago, davieG said:

We should develop this further.

 

Only teams that have won Tier 1 more than 5+ times to play in the PL and so on down the leagues

Only teams that have won the FA Cup 3+ times to enter the FA Cup

Only teams that have won the FL Cup 3+ times to enter the FL Cup

 

All with no relegation for leagues or new entries for Cup competitions

 

Yay!!  We qualify for the Championship and the FL Cup forever.

 

Anyone fancy working out who would be in each competition.

Also we are in the Championship alongside

 

Sheff Wed 

 

Will we ever get bored of singing ‘Can we play you every week?’

*Sunderland and Man City also qualifies having won 5+ titles but are already playing Premier League football.

 

[davieG]

7 minutes ago, Aus Fox said:

Okay so in the Top Flight we have:

Man Utd

Man City

Liverpool 
Everton

Sunderland

Villa

Chelsea

Arsenal

 

Some cracking derbies there and I am sure Sunderland supporters would vote for this model.

 

The Draw for the first round of the FA cup has been made:

Arsenal V West Ham

Man Utd V Sheff Wed

Chelsea v Wolves

Spurs v Sheff utd

Liverpool v Bolton

Blackburn v West Brom

Villa v Everton

Man City v Newcastle 

 

Not sure what to do about the Wanderers? But it makes a nice even 16 without them.

 
In the draw for the League cup we have

 

Liverpool v Leicester City

Man City v Spurs

Villa v Forest

Chelsea v Man Utd

 

again a nice even 8 teams. It’s almost like it’s meant to be.

 

 

Thanks. You have too much time on your hands.

 

Imagine how boring that would be after 5 years.

[Aus Fox]

4 minutes ago, davieG said:

 

Thanks. You have too much time on your hands.

 

Imagine how boring that would be after 5 years.

The joys of being an insomniac! 

[Foxin_Mad]

1 hour ago, Golden Fox said:

Everyone is coming at this from an historic football point of view. However, football is out of kilter with how worldwide sports operate these days.

 

The US sports are all franchises - they can limit the teams to 30-32 (mainly based on media markets) & smaller cities can have the 'B teams' in their own competitions.

 

Formula 1 uses this franchise model.

 

The biggest emergence in global team sports in the last 10 years is cricket - IPL, Big Bash - which are all franchises.

 

It is only going to go that way - even quaint County Cricket gets it... why have 20 teams with unbalanced resources when you can kick out the teams you don't want, and just have teams you do want in the flashy test stadiums and go with a franchise model - and can call it "The Hundred".

 

We'll look back at this discussion in 20 years and be amused that football was still clinging onto this thought that a village side could rise up and challenge the elite.

 

Our best bet is to win the league again and force our place in this new league.   

 

51 minutes ago, Oxfordfox83 said:

The thing you overlook is that every single sport you mention (or league in the case of The Hundred) is shit and dull. Even the IPL loses most of its lustre once the league takes shape.

 

Also: football works. It doesn’t need repairing. The biggest threat is the threat of disproportionate wealth, to which the solution is absolutely not ‘even more disproportionate wealth’.

The above exactly. All those sports are awful to watch.

 

If that's the way football goes then I am done. 

[Golden Fox]

 

1 hour ago, Oxfordfox83 said:

The thing you overlook is that every single sport you mention (or league in the case of The Hundred) is shit and dull.

 

45 minutes ago, Foxin_Mad said:

The above exactly. All those sports are awful to watch.

1 hour ago, Oxfordfox83 said:

Also: football works. It doesn’t need repairing

All good points.

 

But...

 

 

[Voll Blau]

6 minutes ago, Golden Fox said:

 

 

All good points.

 

But...

 

 

Yes, I'm sure The Hundred will get us somewhere close to that IPL figure when the largest cricket ground in England holds 30k. 

 

Our top level of sport isn't as well watched as the top level of sport in countries which have bigger stadiums and many multiple times our population. Colour me shocked...

[Golden Fox]

1 hour ago, Voll Blau said:

 

If we ever do that, the last place you'd find me is anywhere near a Leicester City match. Imagine if this conversation had cropped up in 2008, fairly certain you'd have had a different point of view given our relative standing at that time...

 

Oh, and not sure I'd be using The Hundred as a brilliant example of how this kind of thing is wanted and/or needed. It's gone down like a bucket of cold sick with most existing cricket fans.

My post had nothing to do with me being a Leicester City fan... I just wanted to spice it up a little as I thought Martin Samuels' article hit the nail on the head perfectly (the quote from Agnelli is just repulsive). The whole concept is against our DNA and nobody on this board would want it to happen - I certainly wasn't arguing for it... but I just wanted to point out how football is an outlier compared to the top level sports in the world today.

 

The point about the Hundred is exactly the fear. Leicestershire CCC being completely bypassed as they are not sexy enough. But the competition was never aimed at existing cricket fans - all about getting the next generation hooked and conditioned to the authorities' favoured teams. I don't want to sound glib with so many horrible things going on in the world, but the ECCB having to drop The Hundred last year did raise a smile.

 

[Golden Fox]

9 minutes ago, Voll Blau said:

Our top level of sport isn't as well watched as the top level of sport in countries which have bigger stadiums and many multiple times our population. Colour me shocked...

The attendance is to do with the catchment area of the team and the size of the stadium.

 

Its not classed as a league, but if you switch to general sporting events, you'll find top of the list is a league for which the UK comprises 50%. (Added to this, we also contribute to the Formula 1 attendance and NFL attendance). Our country is probably the best in the world for turning out for sports events.

 

 

The fact is that the current setup dilutes these fans through so many clubs, it pulls the average down.

 

We are not in the best average attended leagues as we have the likes of Burnley and Fulham in the Premier League, and we let Bournemouth in with a capacity of under 8,000.

 

The logic of the Super League is that if there are only 6 elite teams in the UK, the average attendance would rival the NFL, and supporters would drift from existing teams to one of those 6.

 

I'm not liking any of the arguments I'm making, but the current structure is deeply flawed on many levels (the current dominance of most the European leagues by one or two clubs, clubs in the UK going bust) and it is not how you would go about setting up elite football from scratch if you had the chance.

[UHDrive]

I don't think people will pay the TV monies year on year to watch a repetitive leugue that never changes teams. I really do think there will be a lot of resentment over this despite them being global brands. 

 

However, the government have already said they will step in on the matter and I'd imagine that they will enforce the PL and UEFA as agreed. I cant imagine the government not wanting to mothball this given the money to the tax man and economy.

[Trav Le Bleu]

10 hours ago, justfoxes said:

Great read from Martin Samuel in the Mail Online in which he states that the upcoming New successful clubs like Leicester City are becoming a thorn in the original top four teams who want to break away and have their own European super League, well worth a read very intriguing  !!

 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-9185819/Leicester-nemesis-Europes-cosy-cartel-proposed-super-league.html

 

Surely the original big four teams are Royal Engineers, Woolwich Arsenal, Preston North End and Notts County?

[davieG]

16 minutes ago, Golden Fox said:

but the current structure is deeply flawed on many levels

Surely it depends on what you want that structure to achieve. Ours is not diluted it's got a country wide spread covering big cities and small towns because in most cases the aim is to provide a sport that the local community can feel an affinity with.

 

The only thing wrong with our structure is that it's been hi-jacked by financial people looking to make quick money from a well established, interesting and respecting sporting set up

 

It's almost akin to business asset stripping with the smaller clubs being the assets.

[Webbo]

I wouldn't go out of my way to watch Man U v Liverpool in the PL never mind a competition we're not allowed to enter. As for Bayern Munich v Real Madrid? Who the fvck cares?