The Champions League is killing Football

Think about once again. And ask yourself. Why they do spend all this money? To get the best players in the world to compete with the other big guns in Europe. To be able to win the CL. It's like chicken and egg.
Dortmund wanted to compete with Bayern Munich and wanted to be on the same level after a few years, but trying this, was ending in a desaster.
The big guns, need the CL, to raise up their value, and of course, at least to have bit of money, to cover this expensive costs. And in the end, it makes the small clubs loosing ground.

 

I still don't get what you want. The tournament won't get more competetive by just allowing champions to participate, this would only mean that fewer teams are running for the title, not more.

Also, the CL is not a financial success without a reason, the people are keen on watching it and pay good money to do so... First, it's way more competetive than the average European domestic league and in the question who wins it, more competetive than the old European Cup, second and most importantly, it has the big name clubs with loads of star players everyone wants to see, except for some "true" football fans who stay with their second or third division teams and moan about commercialisation, but I kind of fail to see why they should be interested in the competition format at all.

The UEFA Cup has way more surprises and way more teams that can win it, everything you state you want to have, but since the star ridden big teams don't play it, noone is interested in it.

And I still fail to see why the group stages are oh-so-boring and changing it back to the old system would be so much better... Yes, the big pot1 teams are almost sure to get through it, and there are few giant clashes between potencial winners, but there are interesting clashes for the second place more often than not, and the big teams won't play each other in autumn anyway, they'll thrash some minnows even if you change it back to the old system. As I stated earlier, there are other reasons more important than the Champions League for the point that teams from small nations are less competetive than in the 80s.

 

Well yes. In the old EC you had teams likes Nothingam Forrest, Celtic, Feyenoord or Aston Villa wining it. Also teams like Stade de Reims, Partizan Belgrade, Leeds or Malmo playing in the final. And it was a more fair competition.

 

What was more fair about it?

And afaik Stade de Reims where apart from Benfica the biggest Rivals of Real Madrid in the late 50s, hardly a small team, Feyenoord got the title at the peak of dutch football, the first of 4 successive dutch titles, not comparable to Feyenoord or even PSV nowadays. Likewise all the English clubs you mentioned were Champions in one of the strongest leagues in Europe at that time, not the midtable or lower division teams they are now, so what was different?

 

Nope. Unless you mean the convention that away teams got their share of the ticket revenue on match days. Which still exists in limited form today.

In actual fact, this is one area where the game has become more open. Foreign tours and merchandise and that sort of commercialism are not new: United introduced corporate tickets to Old Trafford in the mid-1970's, Liverpool took on Hitachi to become the first club with sponsored shirts in 1981 and Liverpool, United, Forest, Everton, Spurs, Arsenal and even West Ham regularly went on summer tours of the US in the 1970's.

Nowadays any member of the Premier League can reasonably expect to be doing summer tours to Premier League branded tournaments and earning the associated revenue. Of course, there's still brand apartheid: a single tour by Liverpool or United to, say, China will earn them more than Portsmouth taking part in a friendly tournament in Malaysia, or whatever. But the potential in that context is biased toward the EPL collectively and no longer exclusive to the big clubs.

Football, sadly for those of us with a longer history in it, is evolving into another branch of the entertainment business. That, in crude terms, means the extent to which it relies on what would traditionally count as a "fan" is decreasing. It can make as much and more money from a larger pool of people for whom a trip to the football stadium is like a trip to the theatre or a day out at an amusement park with the kids. That's why, for instance, fan boycotts don't work: there's tons of people waiting to take up the slack at a Liverpool or a United who don't share the concerns of the proper fan, for whom, in fact, such concerns seem parochial and old-fashioned and essentially disconnected from the product on show. As the revolution brought about by the advent of the Premier League (just 15 short years ago) matures, that reality will extend beyond the biggest clubs and down the pecking order. It's been the case at the "Big Four" for some years now, it's now noticeable at places like Spurs and Villa, Newcastle and West Ham.

 

I don't watch the CL as your typical CL game is painfully boring and it's miles away from the football I know and love in general.

I like the idea of Europe's richest clubs forming a European superleague as that'd mean I can avoid watching them altogether.

 

That. Because there wasn't so much money in the CL a team palying there wasn't geting a big advantage over home rivals. Now the big teams are every year in the CL. This means a lot of money that keeps them on the top of league.

 

A lot has changed in European club football since the 1970s. Only the real league champions got to be in the big cup tournament, for starters. And it was a knock-out tournament from start to finish, no boring group games. And it was long before the Bosman ruling. When there still was a three foreigners per club limit in place.

 

I agree with a lot of what you say, but that last paragraph is surely too subjective to be resolved either way. Undeniably lots of people find the group stages interesting, otherwise stadium attendance and TV viewing figures wouldn't be what they are. But equally undeniably, lots of people find the group stages a total bore, given that as many as three out of six games can be irrelevant if you have either a very good or a very bad run.

This I disagree with. The largest changes in the common denominators in European football in the past 20 years are a) the explosion in TV coverage and b) the Champions' League, designed specifically to exploit and capitalise upon (a). Without those two factors, the age old differential in revenue from big club to small club, big league to small league, would be far less pronounced - and competitiveness would be better now than it is.

 

I think the confusion in this argument is because we’re talking about 2 different things at once. 1) Whether or not the CL is exciting enough (ie. can a change in format make it better?) and 2) how much is the CL hurting the domestic leagues.

Just for fun I’m gonna combine those two arguments together and say, for me, the CL isn’t exciting enough to off-set the damage it does to the domestic leagues.

That’s great, but I don’t really care if the CL is a financial success nor should you. Just because people watch it doesn’t mean it’s good for the game. If all the good footballers in the entire world went to play in England causing every other league in the world to become rubbish by today’s standards, no doubt the Premiership would be an even bigger financial success than it is today and ticket prices would be even higher. Would you like that?

 

If you haven't bothered to read any of my previous posts, then don't tell me "I still don't get what you want." I would be in favor of a salary cap/revenue sharing system implemented across the board in Europe-- no, I don't think we should put the champions of each domestic league into the competition just yet, as Platini had one time suggested, because the current state of domestic leagues is a joke.

If nothing else, let's just abolish the first group stage and put in another two-legged knockout round....

Oh, that's right. The Champions League is far too much of a financial success to even consider this.

 

OK, one last post on this.

The complaint that the CL is a reason why especially the English league is growing more and more top-heavy and the big 4 did not change for years is valid. However the situation is much less problematic in most other leagues - eg the Bundesliga and Serie A tables look almost the same as 20 years ago. And with EC and UC, those competitions would get the big tv contracts the CL gets now, maybe a bit less, if they get less interest from the tv audience, and the money might get divided into more teams, but still a lot of money would be given to the top teams that way, too. Nevertheless, I can perfectly understand that you moan about it, imho this is probably the biggest problem caused by the CL.

Second, a lot of people state that the CL is the reason for the ongoing commercialisation of European football and the concentration on the big leagues. I am very sure that it's actually the other way around, the CL is a symptom and a part of the commercialisation and the concentration on big leagues (and teams), but it's not the reason nor could abolishing it stop the trend. Of course a lot of money is generated by the CL, but for the really big clubs, it's still only a small fraction of their income. The reason is first the ongoing rise of sponsorships and broadcasting deals in the domestic leagues, which started slowly in the 80s, but really took off in the 90s. Second, the Bosman ruling, which more or less ended the protection of domestic players in Europe and led to the big leagues to buy more and more players from all around the world, teams from smaller leagues with young and talented players, like Zürich and Zagreb would still lose their best players long before they reach their peak. The CL is only a logical consequence as a stage for all the big clubs to show off their star selections to an international audience, which is imho probably at least as important to clubs like Real Madrid or ManU as the money part. The CL is nicer than the old system to do that, because all big clubs participate in the same tournament and they all play in it every year, instead of dividing them into 2 or 3 different competitions, so it's a bigger spectacle and you can dismiss the UC as a "loser cup" without fearing to have to play it every other year. If you would change it back, that would mean a bit less money would be generated in the EC, a bit more in the UC, the international distribution might be a bit slowed down since EC & UC are probably not as good for marketing as the CL, but the broadcasting deals for the EPL would still skyrocket, the big clubs of the major leagues would still be able to buy the best players from all around the world, and the commercialisation would still be increasing. Arguably, it might be slightly easier to join or drop out of the "big club" group, since the domination of the domestic leagues migt get tougher/change every now and then (see first point) and the marketing would be harder, but I'm not convinced about that... the dominant clubs in Italy, Spain and Germany were dominant long before the CL, even in England, ManU, Liverpool and Arsenal were already the most frequent winners before the inception of the CL.

I already told you that I don't think the group stages are all that bad, since there are often interesting clashes for the second place, but yes, it is disappointing if teams are out or in second round weeks before the last match day. I would not mind going back to a pure knock out competition, but of course from a marketing point of view, the group stage is nicer since all the teams have 6 matches and 3 of them at home for sure and more money they can rely on.

So... I don't mind the CL. I am not too happy about the increasing commercialisation of football, but I don't think this is caused by the CL and I doubt that abolishing the CL could help it. I agree that the CL plays its role in the building of the big4 in England, but I'm not totally convinced that changing everything back would really be a solution, since clubs would earn a more notable amount of money in the UC, and, frankly, it's not that much of a problem in the league I follow.

And as a last thing: I'm pretty sure this whole discussion is futile anyway, since now and in the forseeable future, it is sports-politically impossible to abolish the Champions League, because first the importand big clubs are backing it, and more importantly because it's too successfull (now that the "evil" is out of Pandoras box, you can't get it in again...)

 

Yep, the Champions League ain't going anywhere soon, whether we like it or not.

In spite of all that I've said, however, I will admit that the knockout rounds can be pretty darn entertaining.

 

Yeah, but they didn't completely obliterate the opposition and drop only 20-25 points the whole season! Look at the # of points that the top 2 teams in England collect in a season since the CL came into existence. There's a clear increasing trend there. Same holds true for Serie "A". In Spain, the trend isn't as clear-cut (however if you go further back, La Liga clearly had more parity in the 1970s and early 80's compared to now).

I don’t think its necessarily a bad thing to have the same teams at or near the top of the table year after year. Afterall it gives you someone to hate. Look at League One in England right now. A lot more interesting with Leeds and Nottingham Forest in there, even though they have the best and 3rd-best records in the league, respectively.

The problem is when the big teams completely dominate to the point where teams like Wigan are better off mailing the 3 points to Anfield, Old Trafford, Highbury and Stamford Bridge rather than showing up to play the match. YAWN

 

Two things though. First, the CL is both cause and effect of the commercialisation. Right back at the start, of course, it was TV. Principally, Sky TV in the UK. But once TV became the driver of commercialisation, a vehicle to exploit it became inevitable. The CL. And once the CL was in place and the rewards started pouring in, the CL also became the principal driver of the ongoing and increasingly virulent commercialisation of the game. Vicious circle.

Secondly, the concentration on the big leagues is absolutely and exclusively down to the CL. With UEFA's acquiescence (some might say connivance), the entire structure of the competition is geared toward the big leagues, because those leagues contain the game's biggest brands and are most likely to drive the ongoing explosion in TV revenue.

As to whether abolishing could reverse the trend: of course not. But no one is really arguing that anyway.

No it's not - we've been over this repeatedly. It's a very significant part of the income of even the biggest clubs. Manchester United's 2006/07 figures, for instance, show that CL income was £42m, out of a total of £245m. That's almost 1/5th of total income, which is hardly "a small fraction". And United are probably an exception because they are in the arguably unique situation of having a huge stadium, which sells out every year, in a country with comparatively very high ticket prices. Most of the clubs we would all agree are Europe's big clubs will post percentages of total income from the CL that will represent far higher percentages.

Highly unlikely. "The money part" is increasingly the only motivation of any kind for these clubs. Being able to parade your players about like a proud Mum at a Deb's ball is not likely to feature in most board rooms as a main interest.

This is true, as I've said elsewhere, it's the degree to which this is true which is changing. In the 15 years since the CL came into being, 11 clubs have occupied the top four spots in the league - and in the past five yers, we've seen the emergence of a more or less permanent top four in England. In the 15 years before the start of the CL, we had 17 clubs in the top four spots. The margins between those clubs were also narrower and there was a greater number of Champions.

You're right to argue that the CL isn't the only reason for this change, but it's a massively significant one.

 

I didn't really want to continue arguing, since we are already starting to run in circles and repeat the same arguments again and again, but these discussions are just too addictive ^^

Correct in England, in Spain the leagues are a bit more top-heavy than they have been, however especially Real already had very dominant seasons before. In Italy it's tough to compare the 16-team seasons of old to 20-team-seasons - since the number of matches was noticably smaller, the table was a bit tighter, but it doesn't look that different to me, and finally in Germany, the tables look pretty much exactly like they did in the 70s regarding the distribution of wins and losses.

First, yes, the distribution of the CL money is unfair and heavily favours the big leagues. BUT. The big leagues already generate incredible amounts of money themselves without any help from the UEFA, and with the Bosman ruling they could buy the players from smaller leagues even without the CL money. Like I said earlier, look at clubs like Tottenham or ManCity, hell, even Energie Cottbus squad consists mostly of eastern Europeans (and several of them are nt players), the second division of England, Spain, Italy and Germany probably all have more money and more stars than the majority of the first divisions elsewhere. CL money is helping, but not necessary for the concentration on big leagues, that would have happened anyway with ongoing commercialisation and Bosman. Also when talking about this, we shouldnt forget about the dissolution of the Yugoslavian and Soviet leagues - with a less prestigious league to play in, less notable opponents to gain experience from and a smaller domestic market in times of increasing commercialisation of the game, it's no wonder that teams like Dinamo Zagreb, Red Star Belgrade or Dinamo Tiblissi lose their talented players faster than they can find new ones.

First, where did you get the 45m Pounds figure for ManU? It's certainly not the prize money payed by UEFA, that's 31.5m € (see http://www.uefa.com/newsfiles/555726.pdf page 6), about half of your figure, but of course this doesn't include ticket sales for the CL matches and potencial bonus payments from sponsors. Second, the money payed to ManU is above average, since they reached the semi finals, which no club can expect to do every year these days. Third, even if we would take away this money from the big clubs completely, they would still be far ahead of the rest financially (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deloitte_Football_Money_League, figures there are from 2 seasons ago, prize money for the cl is max ca 30m €), at the very least outside of England (in England there are some pretty rich non-CL clubs though, Newcastle or Tottenham might still catch Liverpool if they would not have the CL money). The transfer fees might be reduced a bit and the big clubs would have one or the other star less in their squad without the cl money, but they could still outbid everyone else. Of course, without the CL as a marketing tool (see below), the whole thing might not have become as top-heavy as it is.

Yes, money drives these clubs, but where do you get the money from? Thinking of only the money generated directly by the CL is short-sighted... ManU or Real Madrid get the money of the British/Spanish anyway, they want to sell additional shirts, scarfs, sponsorship deals and broadcasting rights in China and the US, and to sell them outside of their home country, parading their players in a prestigous international tournament is just the right thing. Selling the prestigous international tournament itself is fine, but hardly the only point, broadening the consumer market is what's important.

 

It's a financial success thanks to television revenues. In the group stages it's not rare to see CL games played in half-empty stadiums. So while the television viewer is obviously interested, your typical season ticket holder is far more interested in domestic league games. And that is precisely what's going on in football today. The business of football caters more and more to television audiences and less and less to people who actually get off their arse and bother to watch games in the stadium. The sad thing is that the people behind the business of football do not seem to realise that football is nothing without 'real' supporters.

 

It's not an issue now but it will be in the longer term I reckon. The television audience v season ticket holder divide is getting bigger and bigger and as a result there's almost two different brands of football being created. I as a football supporter watch a CL game like I would watch a curling tournament: I don't get it and it's very far removed from the game I love.

 

I just hope my club will never get that blasé.

 

It's only January, but there's an early contender for post of the year right there. I am sure everyone will not agree, but while sometimes change brings about better things, I believe in this case the bloated Champions League has done the opposite. It has introduced a lot of money into the game, but how much of that money is top-heavy? Probably more so than the Premiership broadcasting rights (which are top-heavy enough as it is).

 

Indeed. And the "new school" fans are not in Europe. They are in Asia, and they do not know anything about the old school, or how it was before. When I am in Thailand, and see what is going on there with football, espacially Premier League, that's just amazing ad unbelivable. But basically they cheering only 3 Teams. Liverpool, ManU and Arsenal. They don't know the others, or the history of them.