This is similar to when a general contractor bases his bid to the owner on a bid (promise) by a subcontractor to do a certain scope of work for a stated amount. If the sub bails on his bid he can be held liable even though there was never a written contract.
Even if the status of Real Madrid and West Brom were equal, I am not surprised that LA went with Real if only for the fact that AEG is partnering with David Beckham's academies both in LA and near the O2 Dome in London. That, in itself, probably trumps a lot of things in my opinion.
I don't really think it's a case of the legality of the situation or whether someone is or is not upset by another party... it's a question, as I see it, of clubs not jerking other clubs around unless they no choice in the interests of EVERYBODY including, at some point, themselves. IIRC Liverpool made arrangements to play some friendlies abroad and FIFA then decided they would have go through the qualifying rounds of the CL. Obviously they were quite pleased with the chance to do this but the fact still remains that it was FIFA's decision... not theirs. In this instance the MLS side could have simply continued with their plans to play WB and told Madrid, (who, in any case, somebody mentioned had previously messed them around), they couldn'y play them. I've been a strong supporter of MLS and have argued on these boards that Chelsea and other English clubs should play them if they visit the States. Do you really think anyone in the EPL is going to go out of their way to play MLS teams now??? I hardly think so.
Real's situation was a little similar to Liverpool's. They made commitments contingent on their qualifying directly for the Champions League, which they then failed to do. They then offered MLS a game in Madrid in September, which MLS declined because of schedule conflicts. This is the possible unfortunate consequence of the situation.
That is the general principle. One element that has to be proved is reasonable reliance. The trend in California has been to cut back on these type of "almost a contract" cases, especially with business parties. It's not reasonable for experienced business people to think they have a deal when they really don't. WBA will have a hard time finding a lawyer to take this case on a contingency fee, unless they have a lot more evidence than has been shown so far in public. That being said, if what WBA is saying is true, we owe MLS another round of boos. I think all of us would like to see EPL teams play MLS teams, just for the fun of it. If MLS behaves this badly, why would anyone in Europe want to deal with them. My only problem with these friendlies is that it does not make a lot of sense to play them in the middle of the MLS season, especially with so many players out on national team duty. Teams are thin and tired. Of course, when else are you going to do it?
Y'see, that's what's wrong with this whole situation... do we really want to make these things a massive legal deal about playing a friendly. If we're going to have all this 'party of the first part' rubbish. it'll just become too much of a hassle. teams will look elsewhere. In any case having been in business for 35+ years I can assure you that many deals are done just over the phone or face to face simply because you HAVE to trust the other fella to a certain extent. Business just becomes impossible without ANY trust. Well, fair point but, as you say, that's nearly always the situation. In any event these are only friendlies. Nobody's going to try and crock anyone. Well, theoretically, anyway. It's usually just a run out for the players on both sides to experience playing against a different style of play than the one they're used to. That's what's so daft about this situation. It's not like anyone's gonna win anything because they play Madrid in a friendly. If anything WB would be more likely to show some respect to the MLS team.
Me and a whopping 8,999 others went to see Blackburn Rovers play DC United in 2003. At the time Rovers were solidly midtable and had you-know-who coming off a great World Cup. The point being that your bolded sentence is incorrect. There's little evidence that any ole EPL team will draw high attendance in an MLS friendly. A Champions Leauge caliber team - yes, but a low to bottom of the table team - no. It seems WBA didn't want to play just any team, they wanted to play games (sorry - matches) in LA. Is that for the supporters or the players?
The Real Madrid match had been in the works for a long time, probably longer than the West Brom match...they should have told WBA that their match was contingent on the RM match not happening.
Respect? Come on, it's West Brom, the club who went to China a few years and had as they visited the Great Wall, had one player famously say "...well, when you've seen one wall you've seen 'em all really".
Of course, I'm thinking the Adidas folks are happy that Real Madrid will be in L.A....If only to have the chance to sell more jerseys.
I believe AEG did offer the Quakes as an alternative, but West Brom was already threatening the suit/legal action, so they refused (that's what I heard from some of the Quakes players.....)
Well, granted, that may not have been the finest hour in Anglo-Chinese relations but I was speaking more in terms of how much of a test they'd expect the match to be.