The difficulty for Juve is the Italian league other than a handful of teams is an unattractive TV product and they don't raise nearly the revenue needed to help the clubs. I don't even know how long the EPL will rake in the big money. NBC ratings have only been so-so and they over paid for the contract. Will they bid on a renewal? I don't know how much ESPN paid Serie A this past year for rights. CBS is paying €64M for the US rights for the next three seasons (1/5th that paid by NBC to the EPL for a comparable period). That advantage is tough to overcome. Agnelli and the two Spanish teams are looking at the ESL to level that playing ground. However, say the ESL does take off and the EPL breaks apart which is possible. Will the TV money that the English teams receive from the ESL make up for the loss of EPL money? this is tough to predict. I do understand why Juve want the ESL as they probably have gone through such a calculation and see Serie A as a dead end in terms of big TV money. Barca and Madrid want it as the Spanish league is moving to a more equitable distribution of TV revenue and their share will decrease as a result. Barca is essential bankrupt according to GAAP accounting and Madrid is not in much better shape. The ESL is not about competition but trying to maximize revenue. The German clubs can't join because of the way their team ownerships are structured which is why Bayern and Dortmund were always large question marks.
But.....maximizing revenue for these clubs is all about competition. They want to remain competitive, and over time if you are at a constant economic disadvantage vis a vis your competitors, you will not be able to keep up.. i would think an Ajax fan would understand this.
This does not bode well for the ESL in the short term: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/s...European-Super-League-hit-fines-20m-EACH.html It looks like the six EPL teams are all going to pay up and I don't think they want to risk a 30 point fine going forward. Their only recourse would be to leave the EPL and I don't think that's gonna happen. It remains to be seen if La Liga and Serie A take similar steps.
https://football-italia.net/uefa-temporarily-stop-super-league-punishment/ Possibly showing the cracks in UEFA's legal assessment.
If they go through with that given the state oof EU anti-competitive law, they could blow their own organization out of the water. Plus, if they actually knock 3 of their biggest moneymakers out of Europe and their national leagues, UEFA will make the suicidal decisions Serie A took in the bogus Claciopoli look like a scratched knee after a fall on the playground. And turn their Euro comps into All Prem affairs in perpetuity with maybe Bayern and PSG hanging by a thread. Bayern is about to turn over its management so who knows how the Farmer will do in place of Karl Heinz. in a sense it would turn the Prem into the real Super League. Maybe that is their goal. Or at least of the 6 Brit teams that pulled out.
ADL speaks on Super League. For once an interesting take from the MadMan of Napoli: https://football-italia.net/adl-on-super-league-error-and-tv-trouble/ SNIP: “The Super League comes from the fact institutions try to build on our money and our investment. What interest does Real Madrid, Juve or Napoli have in playing the Champions League and going into debt in order to make €70-80-90-100m more when we spent €200-300m to get there? It doesn’t work. “I am part of the ECA (European Club Association) and I always told Agnelli he was getting it wrong with the Super League, because they wanted to become the principle actors of the system, but instead they should’ve democratically left the door open to everyone. “We do need to create another competition and take it away from UEFA, keeping UEFA as some sort of secretary general. We clubs would then give UEFA a percentage of the revenue rather than have them pay us. “Agnelli, Perez and the others made the mistake of not declaring football has failed due to the institutions. They keep promising change and it never happens. It’s always, we’ll think about it, let’s see what happens. Football should be developing continually.” The Napoli President was also asked about his difficult rapport with journalists. “It’s not that I hate journalists. My press conferences are animated because they ask idiotic questions,” insisted ADL. “It’s not that I don’t want to hear their comments, they are simply banal. It sounds like they are all copied and pasted from each other, can nobody think of something new?” De Laurentiis also turned his ire towards the growing impact of television rights and the coverage these companies demand in return. “Can you imagine these players in the locker room concentrating before a game, there’s Kostas Manolas praying and kissing his little religious relics, another has his hands towards the sky in prayer, there’s someone with a ball hanging out, a willy on the right, they arrive with their TV cameras and say they have a contract with Sky or whoever? We’re idiots, then. “When I say football doesn’t work, it’s because we are old-fashioned. Unfortunately, when Sky started in Italy, it was a great television station, very Anglo-Saxon in style. Now you see even RAI or Mediaset are better, because they learned from that model and improved.”
Jees, never thought I would see the day, but he seems to be exactly right. What is wrong with UEFA and where AA and the others went wrong with the Super League. It needs to be open and based on merit and not a closed competition.
This was the problem all along, the original proposal was to enshrine some teams permanently in the ESL. They needed to define the league in a way that if you fail in one year you don't automatically stay in it the following year. There were proposals back 2019 for a Swiss Style competition with relegation from the CL for the next season: Here's a "Swiss system" for the Champions League that has circulated in European football with the group stage effectively replaced by 1 league of 32 teams, although not every team plays each other https://t.co/mbf8ERZ2kH pic.twitter.com/55nqCyIEXs— Rob Harris (@RobHarris) September 9, 2019 This makes sense from a sporting point of view and would garner more support from other UEFA members.
The courts in Spain have ordered UEFA to stop their disciplinary proceedings against Juve, Barca and Real Madrid. They also called for the annulments of the agreement between UEFA and the other 9 teams.
This is not dead. It may morph into something else, but I still think it is coming, esp. once the courts have their say on UEFA's monopolizing tactics and retaliation: https://football-italia.net/gazidis-claims-means-battle-over-super-league-is-not-over/
Gazidis doing a lot of talking: https://football-italia.net/gazidis-on-milan-arsenal-and-wrong-super-league-project/
Super League issues still remain: https://football-italia.net/marotta-on-serie-a-economic-crisis-pif-rumours-and-super-league/
Law suit coming against UEFA/FIFA: https://football-italia.net/super-league-takes-legal-action-and-accuses-uefa-and-fifa-of-monopoly/ The result of this could change European and maybe even World football, like the Bosman ruling did. They are monopolies after all.
This ain't dying folks until the problems that spawned it are fixed. Ceferin needs to go: https://football-italia.net/juventu...-further-entrenched-after-uefas-draw-scandal/
Hey, Hey, My, My.......Super League will never die: https://www.espn.com/soccer/uefa-ch...e-madrid-court-rejects-uefa-appeal-over-judge
The issues in Euro football highlighted by the Super league have not gone away. Milan's Gazidis, who has been in both e Prem and Serie A lays it out. Something must be done. We already see what has happened to a perennial power like Ajax after the Prem was formed. Bot the Spanish league and Serie A were much stronger leagues prior to the Prem being formed but if things continue as they are, the Prem will dominate European football every year: https://football-italia.net/milan-chief-gazidis-on-football-future-premier-league-is-super-league/ SNIP: "......In April 2020, Milan were one of 12 teams which announced they were creating a breakaway European Super League – but the idea was scrapped within days following protests from fans of some of the Premier League clubs involved. Gazidis said the reaction was different in England and Italy and that, while this idea may not be the solution, something has to be done to level the playing field in European football. The former Arsenal director told the Guardian: “Look, the real Super League is the Premier League which has a global audience and is moving away from other European leagues. If we do nothing that will be the future of football. “I’ve lived in that bubble and the Premier League has done a fantastic job. But the Super League proposal was viewed very differently in Italy than England.” One of the main criticisms of the Super League was the fact it was sold as a closed competition which would have prevented some of the more romantic stories in European football over recent seasons which saw some of the so-called smaller clubs qualify for the Champions League. Gazidis added: “Atalanta is a wonderful story. Leicester City is a fantastic story. Our tough choice at Milan was simply to be in [a Super League] or not to be in it. We had to make the responsible choice for the club. Milan was not driving this train. “At Arsenal I was vehemently opposed to the Super League, and blocked it, because the Premier League is completely ascendant. Pressure is being generated in Europe because they will not be able to compete with the Premier League. “It’s not enough to say: ‘A Super League is bad so let’s continue as we were.’ If we do, these tensions and pressures will only grow. We need to talk about it. The most important thing is to have a sustainable model for European football. “Financial fair play is a step in that direction but it’s not completely effective. We need collectively to think responsibly about football’s future. “A future dominated by the Premier League globally is fine if you live in England. But the rest of Europe needs a more positive vision.....”
I don't get excited by the EPL as only two teams dominate the league right now. Most of the others are minows who will never be fully competitive. Sure, you will get a Leicester City every once in a while but by and large you have 3-4 very good teams and that's it. The EPL generates huge revenues from television that most other leagues can only dream about. It's a mystery to me why Serie A television rights were mismanaged for so many years. If you look back to the 1990s it was the destination league for great players. Maybe it was the scandals over match fixing, I'm not sure. I don't watch a lot of EPL matches as they are quite predictable. At least with Juventus, you never know which team Jekyll or Hyde is going to show up. Makes for interesting watching albeit with a lot of frustration. Just a quick note, Dutch U-17s made it to the finals against France. It's on ESPN streaming this Wednesday and you can see CB Dean Huijsen who I wrote about earlier. He is really good but needs to get stronger. Still weird seeing a young Dutch kid in the Juve youth.
This Super league project is as mismanaged as the whole Serie A, no wonder it blew up in their faces.
Super League won't go away: https://theathletic.com/3415507/2022/07/12/super-league-ecj-hearing-facts/
Just a thought... Why not have the Super League played as a summer tournament home, abroad in neutral venues? Looking at the international friendlies in the USA for example, the games are all highly attended. I’m thinking a round robin summer tournament in different venues could be lucrative. Not only for different domestic leagues but for the teams involved. .
Probably because the teams already play so many games, adding another 10-15 would be brutal and doesn’t give the players their summer recovery periods. As the prem gets stronger and richer, I really hope it happens to compete with them. It’s so annoying that newly promoted EPL teams are able to outspend Italian and Spanish clubs who are exponentially bigger. Granted, the EPL marketed their way there and brainwashed so many people about how great they are along the way. But they did get to that bargaining power legally and in a way deserve it. Their production value with NBC compared to what ESPN/Paramount provides isn’t even close.
Juventus played Barcelona to a 2-2 draw in 100-degree heat at the Cotton bowl in Dallas. It was only a friendly and it seemed highly attended. The point is, if the entire club has to travel 7000 miles for a preseason tournament, I’m sure the starters can do the same thing across Europe. With the extra revenue, rosters can be expanded. Sooner or later, the Super League will be inevitable and the clubs will have to get creative on when and where they will be able to play.
I just can’t imagine after 38 league games, domestic cup, and continental cups finished, they then play another 10-15 matches against the best of the best in the summer. Only to jump right back into the new season. To be clear, I also believe that something will be done by the clubs outside of the UK to compete. Perez, Agnelli, Laporte, etc. are not going to be ok with being marginalized by the EPL.