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Financial Fair Play

Beach, it's not that i disagree with that last post, but you start your story very randomly.
It's like writing about western - muslim relationship and starting with 9/11 whereas everything started with the crusades.

The sugar daddies didn't come out of the blue. I (strangely) compare them to a people's revolution after a dictatorial regime. When you leave aspiring clubs no hope to become big, they will get desperate. I will not repeat the rest of the story because everybody knows what my point is, but most of your postings are rather manipulative (in a way, and saying it that way of course is a gross exageration). You are bright, know the subject very well, but you omit things...

For you the decline of football started when Roman Abramovich took over Chelsea, whereas in reality that was merely a reaction to what was the beginning of unfair competition and financial gestion.
 
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Well said Gerd. I agree.

Ryan does make some great points as usual. I like what he says too but yeah the truth is, it's not so black and white.

It's all grey... it's not all so easily able to be summed up in numbers and football's problems didn't start with Roman Abramovich.
 
Absolutely not - the real issues started with (international and domestic) TV rights not being split in a progressive way imo.

The point I'm trying to make (clearly badly) is that teams used to have wage structures that were closer to one another. Yes, United and Arsenal had the highest, but they were at most about 2x those of smaller clubs. That was because the advantage of United or Arsenal (or Liverpool etc) was mainly a big stadium, and a strong fanbase.

If the Telegraph's figures are correct, it suggests than 2010/11 Chelsea's wages were 13x higher than Blackburn's. That is crazy. Two teams with that large a discrepancy shouldn't be in the same league (I realise they're now relegated).

Put another way, and far more eloquently by a poster on another forum:

Last season marked the culmination of several years of Newcastle planning. They bought risky but talented signings, developed and nurtured them, had a great manager and managed to finish above Chelsea. Superb signings, great training and the best manager in the league enabled them to, for one season, overcome the wage differential between the two clubs.

That enabled them to strengthen this summer to the tune of £8m or so, and still be in the black.

Chelsea spent almost £90m. In a year when they lost (est.) £50m or so.

That's why FFP should exist. Why 'do a Newcastle' when you can 'do a Chelsea'?
 
beachryan said:
That term is supposed to refer to positive economic gains. Not buying something. That's like saying I'm speculating to accumulate when I go to the store with a quid to buy a Twix.
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No.

It's like buying 2 players who you can't afford but could afford (+ others) if those players helped you to become more successful in the future (eg. Everton sign Moutinho and Darren Bent and get 4th spot) It's a gamble - it's speculative - but if it works it can act as a catalyst to greater success. It's the basis of nearly all economic activity.
 
beachryan said:
Somewhat a propos, copy of a letter I've just sent to F365 (so sorry about the format) but the point remains. The premier league is becoming more and more unequal with each passing year:

As someone that deals with numbers for a living, I thought it would help to do some very quick analysis into Premier League finances, just to show what a dire situation this 'league' is turning into. I use the term lightly because a sporting league should really only exist between relatively competitive teams, and the following will show that's hardly the case. The argument from fans of the sugar daddy clubs tends to be 'well it's always been that way' - but looking at the numbers, that's just not true. The league is less equal than it was 10 years ago, and is getting worse.

Using the Telegraph's analysis (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/fo...pending-from-the-200001-season-to-201112.html), we can compare the wages of the top 3 teams to the bottom 3 teams (where available). So in 2000/01 that was United, Liverpool and Arsenal vs. Bradford, Coventry and Man City. The top 3 spent 2.7 times as much as the bottom 3. That number was similar in 2001/02.

Fast forward to the latest available year, and comparing the top 3 in 2010/11 with the bottom 3 available (No Birmingham data, so replaced with Wolves) - that figure has jumped to 4.8. It's a way of measuring the 'league inequality' - and it's jumped in the last decade.

Another way of looking at it - in 2000/01 the highest spending team (Chelsea?!) spent 3 times as much as the lowest spending team not relegated. In 2010/11 the highest spending team (still Chelsea) spent 13 times as much as the lowest not relegated (Blackburn).

So before all the City and Chelsea fans come out crying that they only did what the system would allow, I'd encourage them to pause and think what impact it's having on the league itself. Not on the Uniteds, or Liverpools of the world who will be fine. Chelsea and City's ability to operate at massive financial losses each year has distorted the league more than it has ever been in the prem era, probably more than ever in history of British football.
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In 00/01 the highest spending team was Leeds(not Chelsea) with 30mill. The lowest spending team not to be relegated was Newcastle who spent -4.1m. The lowest actual net spenders not to be relegated was Derby who spend 0.5m. So the net spending inequality here is x60.

Fast forward to 11/12 where Chelsea are the highest spenders with 58m and compare it to the lowest net spenders not to be relegated, West Brom, who spent 2.6m. The spending inequality here is about x22.


We can look at some other facts which are interesting also:

In 01/02 Utd, the 3rd place finishers (and 2nd highest spenders), spent 12 times as much as the 4th bottom club

In 10/11 City, the 3rd place team (and 2nd highest spenders), spent less than 12 times as much as the 4th bottom club

In 11/12 Chelsea, the highest spenders, spent under 3 times as much as the 4th bottom team.

and in 02/03 Utd splashed out nearly 30m whilst the 4th bottom club spent a total of -4mill

This is quite surprising:

In 02/03 the top 4 spent a combined 82mill whilst the bottom 4 spent a combined 4mill. That's 20 times as much

In 10/11, the Year which City spent their most on the likes of Yaya and Silva, the top 4 spent a around 220m whilst the bottom 4 spent about 50m. That's around 4.5 times as much.



I wouldn't use these numbers to suggest that football spending has, in the last few years, with City and Chelsea, become more equal, I only suggest that spending goes through peaks and troughs and the huge differences we see can and did happen before the spending of Chelsea and City. Football has not been a level playing field since the early 90's (if it has ever been a level playing field) with the impact of Sky, the subsequent European Cup changes (Utd's CL win wouldn't have happened had they been forced to play by the same rules as Liverpool, Forest et al did in the decades prior - the same can be said of Liverpool's last CL success, of course) and the huge improvements seen in the world of technology. Whoever happened to gain success in this period would have been artificially propelled commercially, Utd gained their successful period in a very fortunate time. I don't attach any blame to them, of course, but it has to be acknowledged. We didn't have a "Sky 4" for no reason...
 
Godotelli said:
Stuff
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I kind of respect you for going through the numbers, but I did say early on that I was looking at wages, not transfer fees. Transfer fees are more temporary, wages you're stuck with. As with any company, single year expenses can be funded by any number of things, but ongoing operating costs are what are paramount to survival.

Hence all the figures I used were wages.

Which makes a lot more sense to use to compare clubs - one year a club will do some investing, maybe the next year it won't. Some years United/Arsenal have virtually no spend whatsoever in the transfer market because their squad is already sorted. But they still spend wages of > 2 or 3 times other clubs.

If you don't think that today's premier league is more disparate in terms of team quality than ever before...well I just disagree.

When I was growing up it wasn't normal for teams to have literally 2/3 internationals that can step in at every position. It's not just England either, I mean just look at La Liga! Barca and Real could play their second teams and easily walk the league.

The Bundesliga is the only top division that at least resembles a league.

I don't know, it's clear you're not going to agree - you're a city fan - of course you must be in dreamland that the Sheikh chose you over, say, Newcastle or Liverpool. Enjoy it. I had all these issues before City came into the big bucks.

The only way to fix things is a salary cap. And it'll never happen.

What will be interesting will be if Abramovich or Mansour ever run into any kind of financial difficulties or re-priotising of their financial imperatives.
 
Godotelli said:
No.

It's like buying 2 players who you can't afford but could afford (+ others) if those players helped you to become more successful in the future (eg. Everton sign Moutinho and Darren Bent and get 4th spot) It's a gamble - it's speculative - but if it works it can act as a catalyst to greater success. It's the basis of nearly all economic activity.
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This is bullsh*t and you know it. I can't tell if you're a WUM or not.

If Everton somehow borrowed £40m to buy Bent and Moutinho they'd have to:
a. Borrow from a bank and pay interest plus at some point pay the bank back
b. Be in and do well in the CL for at least 2 seasons to just cover the transfer fees, no matter the wages.
c. Stay in the CL beacuse they'd have to pay the loan interest as well as the increased operating costs.

And you've kind of proved your point. Everton wouldn't take that gamble because if they screwed up or if one of those players got injured, the club could go out of business. That's a gamble. It has risk.

Whereas a team could, hypothetically of course, purchase Adebayor, Santa Cruz, Johnson, Jo, SWP, Robinho, Bridge, Given, Ben Haim, and others and just say, well that didn't work out.

It was a gamble. That cost probably more than £300m. That didn't work out.

Oh wait, City are fine aren't they? How is that possible? Oh because their 'gamble' wasn't a gamble at all. It was like buying a Twix.
 
beachryan said:
This is bullsh*t and you know it. I can't tell if you're a WUM or not.

If Everton somehow borrowed £40m to buy Bent and Moutinho they'd have to:
a. Borrow from a bank and pay interest plus at some point pay the bank back
b. Be in and do well in the CL for at least 2 seasons to just cover the transfer fees, no matter the wages.
c. Stay in the CL beacuse they'd have to pay the loan interest as well as the increased operating costs.

And you've kind of proved your point. Everton wouldn't take that gamble because if they screwed up or if one of those players got injured, the club could go out of business. That's a gamble. It has risk.

Whereas a team could, hypothetically of course, purchase Adebayor, Santa Cruz, Johnson, Jo, SWP, Robinho, Bridge, Given, Ben Haim, and others and just say, well that didn't work out.

It was a gamble. That cost probably more than £300m. That didn't work out.

Oh wait, City are fine aren't they? How is that possible? Oh because their 'gamble' wasn't a gamble at all. It was like buying a Twix.
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No, not a WUM, you're just putting up a strawman. City are utterly irrelevant to my point but you just can't help yourself, can you?. My point was that FFP will make it harder for other clubs to compete because the option of investing/speculating in the short term in order to benefit in the long term is punished.
 
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beachryan said:
I kind of respect you for going through the numbers, but I did say early on that I was looking at wages, not transfer fees. Transfer fees are more temporary, wages you're stuck with. As with any company, single year expenses can be funded by any number of things, but ongoing operating costs are what are paramount to survival.

Hence all the figures I used were wages.

Which makes a lot more sense to use to compare clubs - one year a club will do some investing, maybe the next year it won't. Some years United/Arsenal have virtually no spend whatsoever in the transfer market because their squad is already sorted. But they still spend wages of > 2 or 3 times other clubs.

If you don't think that today's premier league is more disparate in terms of team quality than ever before...well I just disagree.

When I was growing up it wasn't normal for teams to have literally 2/3 internationals that can step in at every position. It's not just England either, I mean just look at La Liga! Barca and Real could play their second teams and easily walk the league.

The Bundesliga is the only top division that at least resembles a league.

I don't know, it's clear you're not going to agree - you're a city fan - of course you must be in dreamland that the Sheikh chose you over, say, Newcastle or Liverpool. Enjoy it. I had all these issues before City came into the big bucks.

The only way to fix things is a salary cap. And it'll never happen.

What will be interesting will be if Abramovich or Mansour ever run into any kind of financial difficulties or re-priotising of their financial imperatives.
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Ok, I thought when you said "Another way of looking at it - in 2000/01 the highest spending team (Chelsea?!) spent 3 times as much as the lowest spending team not relegated..." you had switched to transfer spending.

I haven't looked at wages but your comment about the quality of the league I do disagree with. I don't know the cause but teams don't get promoted and then relegated straight away like they used to (IIRC)

Regardless, I agree with a previous poster that teams spending fortunes in order to enter the top/Sky 4 is a reaction to the monopolisation brought into effect in the 90's. It is not the root problem. But the likes of Utd, Arsenal et al didn't care back then because they were benefiting. It's no wonder they are desperate to bring in FFP rules to the PL. You reap what you sow. Fuck em
 
Beach, i agree with you that wages are more important than transfers since wages are more permanent.

The Everton example is not ar unrealistic as you think however....i Belgium KV Mechelen did this in the late eighties...they got away with it for a couple of years (if winning a Euro Cup and the Super Cup) and then collapsed financially. Leeds made a similar gamble later on...

Of course it's not a good way to act, but it happens.
 
gerd said:
Beach, i agree with you that wages are more important than transfers since wages are more permanent.

The Everton example is not ar unrealistic as you think however....i Belgium KV Mechelen did this in the late eighties...they got away with it for a couple of years (if winning a Euro Cup and the Super Cup) and then collapsed financially. Leeds made a similar gamble later on...

Of course it's not a good way to act, but it happens.
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Exactly my point - those clubs truly took a risk by spending because they have to live within their own means.

City, Chelsea, PSG and so forth don't take 'risks' on transfers, because they can just write them off with no long term effect.
 
I think Lazio is in a way similar to your Everton example. Spent ambitiously to bring in Stam, Mendieta, Claudio Lopez, Crespo etc.... they won Serie A and were a threat in Europe for 2 years. The team went bust for many reasons - but one of them was their crazy spending to become a 'giant'.

Same as Fiorentina a few seasons back - they got to the semis vs Bayern in the CL and failed to qualify in the next season - the team was completely dismantled and a mess until recently.
 
That Fiorentina was nothing like that Lazio team. Lazio overspent and destroyed itself. That Fiorentina was a well and timely constructed team, that fell apart due to Prandelli leaving, crucial players leaving and a bad mercato after the good seasons. By the way they were eliminated in the CL in the second round. They did reach the Uefa cup semi's (unluckily elimated on Penalties against a much weaker Rangers) though.
 
I like Zenit, and it might not be fair to use it example as there is a lot clubs worse on this matter but...what I feel it's unfair is having teams that spend a LOT but don't create that kind of money. Correct me if I'm wrong, but where does Zenit gets money to build a great new stadium (given, right?) and afford to buy to spend more than 100M € in 2 years (did Zenit sold anyone meanwhile?)?
Zenit has a lot less supporters than Benfica. Zenit has a 20'000 people stadium...where do they get the money? I mean, Benfica has the most club members in the world...that's a lot of money going in every month. I, as 250'000 other Benfica fans, pay around 150€ every year just to be an 'official' fan.
Benfica has received in the last 3 seasons or so almost 300M € in transfers... even so, we struggled to sign a left back for this season and couldn't sign players like Ziegler, Eliseu or José Angel. We simply didn't bought anyone... Having to pay a stadium and loans, it's not easy to keep finances balanced...

How can this be fair?
 
dominic said:
That Fiorentina was nothing like that Lazio team. Lazio overspent and destroyed itself. That Fiorentina was a well and timely constructed team, that fell apart due to Prandelli leaving, crucial players leaving and a bad mercato after the good seasons. By the way they were eliminated in the CL in the second round. They did reach the Uefa cup semi's (unluckily elimated on Penalties against a much weaker Rangers) though.
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yeah della valle's fiorentina has nothing to share with cragnotti's lazio. they never had financial problems because the della valle family did never "overreach" from a financial point of view. the team just ended its cycle (and now they're rebuilding). midclass teams always have an "expiration date", because smart owners (like the della valle family) know they can't renew their best players' contracts, once they "outgrow" the club. if anything della valle's fiorentina is an example of how a club should be run.

fiorentina's previous ownership instead (cecchi gori) did exactly what cragnotti did with lazio. they overspent for several seasons, and eventually they led the club on the brink of bankrupt. others good examples, as gerd mentioned, are parma previous owner (tanzi) or ferlaino's napoli (ferlaino was napoli's owner in the days of maradona) and sensi's roma.
some of theese clubs faced bankrupt and had to start over from serie c (fiorentina and napoli), others were saved at the very last minute (and not without serious financial sacrifices), like lazio, parma and roma. all theese clubs were eventually saved (or rebuilt from scratch) by new owners (della valle in firenze, de laurentis in napoli, lotito in lazio, ghirardi in parma). the only owner who didn't left the ship as it was sinking was sensi (roma), who, after some very tough seasons (and with great sacrifices) managed to save roma from his own mistakes and bring it back to a healthy financial governance (and now he's gone aswell).

there is a big difference though between italian clubs and english clubs. serie a's cash flow is ridiculous when compared to the epl. serie a clubs never generated big incomes. even during the so called "golden age" the clubs were never really rich. it was only because of the "generosity" (and stupidity) of the owners (who used to put in the clubs millions of their own personal money) that those clubs could afford those crazy expenses. once the situation "got ugly" those owners had nothing to do other than watch their ships sinking (or desperately try to save them). they couldn't sell the clubs to a new munificent owner, because the clubs had no appeal whatsoever for any investor.
english clubs instead, although burdened with debts and crazy wages, still manage to generate huge incomes and also have a much higher appeal for foreign investors (mainly because of their real estate assets, such as stadia and training facilities).
sure it's far from an ideal situation, but i'm inclined to believe english clubs' situation today, serious though it may be, it's still not as desperate as italian clubs' situation in the late 90s\early 2000s.

to make it simple, if everton's owner screws up his club's financial situation (and suddenly realises he won't be able to fix the problem with his own resources anymore), he might still be able to find a buyer for the club... someone who takes a look at the books of the club and says "sure the situation is pretty ugly, but if i manage to restructure this business and give it a new governance, this might actually be a decent investment... i mean the incomes are there and the cash flow is pretty steady... i just need to "skim the fat" (easier said than done, i know) and this business could generate a decent profit and gain me huge visibility in the process"
this is some sort of a "lifeboat" italian clubs couldn't count on in the late '90s, because their clubs just weren't profitable enough to appeal anybody (wich left the owners without any options).
of course i haven't done any research on the matter, so that's just my personal feeling about this situation.

anyway i entirely share beachryan's concerns. something should be done to stop clubs recurring to debt (at least if it's to cover running expenses, such as wages.... loan should still be available to fund real estate projects, such stadia building) and also to put a leash on this crazy inflation process regardin players' wages. every time a new sugar daddy comes into a league, the ripple effects deprive most of the other owners of some puschasing power and that can be a very dangerous slippery slope.
but then again, isn't this the purpose of financial fair play? this is an honest question; i haven't read anything on financial fair play yet, so i'm still completely ignorant on this subject.
Gerd said:
The sugar daddies didn't come out of the blue. I (strangely) compare them to a people's revolution after a dictatorial regime. When you leave aspiring clubs no hope to become big, they will get desperate.
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i don't see it this way, gerd. or at least this is not the conclusion i draw, looking at the history of european football. the advent of munificent owners in football wasn't some sort of a reaction to the frustration of midclass clubs.
the simple truth is football is an amazing mediatic vehicle. the visibility granted by this industry is probably its biggest asset, for those who decide to step in (and if there's anyone in here who works in marketing they might elaborate this point much better than me).
just think of the popularity gained by arbamovich after "buying" chelsea (although i wouldn't really say he bought it:P). how many people outside russia knew roman abramovich before? the popularity gained by berlusconi (who was arguably the very first sugar daddy) when he bought milan, changed the course of italian politic history for the last 20 years (it wasn't just that, obviously, but milan played a key role in boosting berlusconi's image and feeding his political ambitions). u can't put a price on such an amazing asset.

so that's why, as soon as football's mediatic exposure grew big, several millionaires, with huge financial resources, got into this market in order to use a club for promoting and conveying their image and visibility.
the reason why berlusconi bought milan, abramovich bought chelsea, the reason why sheiks are showing a growing interest in this industry.... it has nothing to do with the frustration of midclass clubs.... to be more specific it has nothing to do with football as a whole.
football, as an investment, is quite a bad business actually. but owners usually aren't there for the money. they get into this market to gain something wich is quite hard to value in mere financial terms and figures....but wich is clearely worth the effort.
 
#71 said:
I like Zenit, and it might not be fair to use it example as there is a lot clubs worse on this matter but...what I feel it's unfair is having teams that spend a LOT but don't create that kind of money. Correct me if I'm wrong, but where does Zenit gets money to build a great new stadium (given, right?) and afford to buy to spend more than 100M € in 2 years (did Zenit sold anyone meanwhile?)?
Zenit has a lot less supporters than Benfica. Zenit has a 20'000 people stadium...where do they get the money? I mean, Benfica has the most club members in the world...that's a lot of money going in every month. I, as 250'000 other Benfica fans, pay around 150€ every year just to be an 'official' fan.
Benfica has received in the last 3 seasons or so almost 300M € in transfers... even so, we struggled to sign a left back for this season and couldn't sign players like Ziegler, Eliseu or José Angel. We simply didn't bought anyone... Having to pay a stadium and loans, it's not easy to keep finances balanced...

How can this be fair?
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I do not think that Zenit has fewer fans than Benfica, this is one team in the city of five million, and the most successful club in the vast country in recent years.

Zenit or Gazprom does not have a new stadium is not any relationship. This Municipal Stadium, created out of the city budget, when it is ready it will be the club to rent.

this is an article from Forbes in Russian http://www.forbes.ru/sobytiya-opini...ika-samogo-uspeshnogo-futbolnogo-kluba-rossii

this year
21 mln sponsors, 20 stadium, 19 uefa cups, 17 trade( jersey etc), 10 tv

p.s. In any case, yesterday showed plateni for anyone to create a financial Fair Play for poor clubs from smaller countries. Plus Rubin and Atletico .... The rich have no problem and will not be, this is Fair Play
 
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Ben it's hard to disagree with you that people like Berlusconi and Abramovich become sugar daddies because of publicity. On the other hand, do you really think Abramovich needs publicity (unless he has plans to go in politics).

I'm also glad that you mention Berlusconi and Milan. Don't you think it's weird that nobody sees harm in what Berlusconi did with Milan in the late 80's? People complain about Man City and Chelsea (also about Zenith, but less about PSG). Is it because Berlusconi did it before all the other sugar daddies did it?
Personally i was most outraged by Milan and Berlusconi (and that while Milan used to be my favourite Italian club since being a child, because of a comics series about Vincent Larcher who played for Milan, it used to be my favourite comics series...). But nobody seems to be bothered.
IMO the first thing that needs to be done (before the financial fair-play) is an even an fair division of the huge amount of television money. Afterwards you can begin to think about financialm fair-play and even sanction clubs like Chelsea, Man City, PSG and others.

Sports is all about equal opportunities and in today's football there are no equal opportunities.
Some clubs can win after a race of 100m, while others only can win after a marathon. That is not fair and it is an open invitation to sugar daddies.

As to the ownrship of clubs: IMO they should be owned by the fans. I feel attracted by the socio system of barcelona and Madrid, but that is not a guarantee for making good decisions.
 
Thanks for the reply Asiat!
Well, I know Russia is an huge country...Benfica has around 14 million fans, according to latest 'studies'. It is said it has 6 millions in Portugal, and lots abroad (because there's a lot of portuguese living outside and the former african colonies). Maybe I thought wrong, as I thought it was more of a city club, having lots of big clubs on Moscow, for example.

About the revenues, they are not very different from Benfica actually, except for Merchandising where you sell an huge amount. Even the ticketing revenue is very big considering your stadium size, tickets in Russia must be even more expensive than here..

But as I was saying, Benfica has more or less the same revenues as Zenit and it's impossible to imagine Benfica spending 90M € in two tranfers (and I'm not even talking about the wages). If Benfica spends 25M €/season, it's already known we are living beyond our possibilities and we are risking to make a lot of profit on the next sale... We sell because we need to...not because it's an excelent deal (most of the times).

Benfica has to have a lot of more debts...otherwise I don't understand.

Anyway, I totally agree with you..it always look like the smaller clubs are the ones being punished. Everybody sees it's not normal what happens with some clubs but UEFA does nothing. PSG, with the new tax in France, will have to spend more 300M €! But yet, they are look on those who owe 300'000 €. In Portugal we say about the bad leaders: 'Talk tough to the smaller and soft to the bigger'.
 
Lo Zio makes sense about sugar daddy using the club to market themselves. My little research through the owner's of Malagà is evidence of their fail adventures was short term. The main adjective was to get permission to built a resort. Which would of bank rolled any funds dumped into the Malagà's project.

Once they were denied investment to such plans by the City. They began to withdraw the efforts of the club almost over a few weeks span. So, in theory they tried to percieve themselves as long term invester of the community. Marketing on steroids lol and with the after effect of losing lots of €€€€€ in the process. Which blessed a few clubs one being Arsenal to get Cazorla could of never gotten so cheap.They must of delivered it with small untraceble bills to enhance the prospect.*jk !
 
Gerd said:
Ben it's hard to disagree with you that people like Berlusconi and Abramovich become sugar daddies because of publicity. On the other hand, do you really think Abramovich needs publicity (unless he has plans to go in politics).
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as bebo pointed out, publicity isn't important only for politicians. whether u're an architect or a doctor or a lawyer, public relations can always enhance your profile and offer u more opportunities. and as for a high profile businessmen (such as abramovich), they're public figures, just as politicians, and and some good marketing can provide them with a network of connections.

the malaga example bebo provided us fits like a charm (btw, thanks for the info buddy, i didn't know that story about malaga owners ;) ).
i can offer u another example. do u know why zamparini bought palermo... sure, zampa is hardly a sugar daddy (he's more of a sugar son of a b***), but then again the reason why everyone (not just sugar daddies) buy football clubs is almost always the same.... anyway zampa couldn't care less about palermo. he's not even from here (he's from northern italy). he bought palermo because he wanted to build a mall.
that's how zamparini became a millionaire; building malls (and selling them afterwards). first he tried it in venezia. he bought venezia football club (many years ago) and presented the city council with a project to build a new stadium and a mall. venezia's city council said "ok for the stadium, but we'll never give u the permits to ruin venezia's landscape and skyline with a mall"..... so he immediately left venezia, sold the club and came to palermo. after bringing palermo back to serie a, he made the same offer to palermo's city council, and this time he had all the permits. we're still waiting for the new stadium, but the mall (wich was what zampa's biggest concern) has been already built and just this summer (after so many years), he was able to unveil his new mall.
now, u must know that red tape is a killing machine in italy (and even more so in southern italy)... zamparini would have NEVER gotten the permits to build his precious mall without the network of connections he established thanks to his polularity and position as palermo football club owner. long story short, everyone can use some publicity.
gerd said:
I'm also glad that you mention Berlusconi and Milan. Don't you think it's weird that nobody sees harm in what Berlusconi did with Milan in the late 80's? People complain about Man City and Chelsea (also about Zenith, but less about PSG).
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nobody refers to berlusconi as a sugar daddy TODAY, because fans have a short memory. besides many people probably don't even know that, before berlusconi, milan wasn't such a succesful and world-wide established club.
just a few months ago i remember reading a post from a guy in one of the club threads; he was complaining about all theese new sugar daddies, saying how chelsea, man city and so on won't ever be able to buy that tradition and history clubs like milan can display.
i remember finding that post very funny, as the guy clearely had no idea that milan has that tradition and history only because of berlusconi.... and that berlusconi did exactly what modern sugar daddies do today, to provide milan with such a legacy.

so to reply to your question, the reason why people don't complain about berlusconi today is ignorance or short memory.... but if u go back to the days when berlusconi took over milan, well there were many people seriously concerned about the inflation process his advent brought to serie a.
infact if u listen to those owners i mentioned before; cragnotti, sensi, tanzi, cecchi gori, ferlaino... those nutcases who brought their own clubs on the brink of disaster, they will tell u that they were forced to overspend by berlusconi.
cecchi gori (the fiorentina owner who led his club to bankrupt and serie c dumping) says that "once berlusconi came, he changed the rules of the game. he raised the stakes so much that the ripples of his high wages-policy effected the entire league. all of a sudden most of our players (not just the top ones) were asking for wages twice as high as they were 2 seasons before. so every other italian club owner had only 2 options; call it a day and sell the club or try to keep up with berlusconi manoeuvres."

and since (like i said before) serie a clubs were never easy to sell, most of them remained and try to play berlusconi's game. but while moratti and agnelli had enough financial resources to match berlusconi's wages, most of the others didn't.... so eventually they all fell.
of course berlusconi had every right to do whatever he wanted with his money (as every other sugar daddy today).... but a league is like an ecosystem; if u compromise the balance, then everyone else is somehow effected.
Gerd said:
Some clubs can win after a race of 100m, while others only can win after a marathon. That is not fair and it is an open invitation to sugar daddies.
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yeah it may be, but still that's not the reason why sugar daddies decide to make a move into football. besides sugar daddies need no invitations.... here in palermo we've been inviting them for years and we still got no answer :P

let me make a practical example. in serie a the gap between rich clubs and all the others is even bigger than in england (sure our situation isn't as tragic as the spanish, but the epl is a fair competition compared to serie a!). napoli was the 4th club in the league in terms of incomes in 2011 with 60 millions euros... do u wanna know where napoli would rank in the epl (based on incomes)? stone dead last. in 2011 the epl club wich declared least incomes was wigan, which generated 50 millions pounds. that would be 62 millions in euros, 2 millions more than napoli. and napoli is one of the richest clubs in our league! palermo hardly generates more than 20 millions euros every year.

so, by your logic, since the gap between rich clubs and poor clubs is even higher here in italy, we should be able to attract even more investors..... and yet we don't. why is that? it's because investors don't care about the clubs they buy..... or perhaps yeah, meaybe some of them care about those clubs, but still that's not the reason why they bought them. abramovich didn't buy chelsea because he thought "oh man, those poor chelsea fans haven't won a thing in such a long time! i gotta do something about this!"
football is an investment to those businessman who buy clubs. an investment in marketing and money. and that's why they don't come in italy; because we can't offer any of that. there's no money to be made in italian football and serie a doesn't offer the same mediatic exposure the epl does.
so that's why rich businessmen across the world buy chelsea, man city, liverpool, arsenal... and they don't buy palermo, lazio, fiorentina, inter or roma.
it has nothing to do with those equal opportunities u referred to.
gerd said:
As to the ownrship of clubs: IMO they should be owned by the fans. I feel attracted by the socio system of barcelona and Madrid, but that is not a guarantee for making good decisions.
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yeah... history tells us it's a guarrantee for terrible decisions actually.... and madrid and barçelona are a perfectly good example of why that is NOT a good idea. the chairmanship of the club becomes an electoral affair and is often exploited by people who are more interested in politics than in football; just think of the whole ciudad deportiva affair between don florentino and madrid's city council or the dirty stuff ramon calderon pulled off to hold his position at the club... heck, even laporta (who actually did a great job for barça) decided to run for barça president only gain political consensus.
and that's still nothing compared to what happened in argentina were the "fans ownership" often hid some very dirty stuff (there's a nice story about how the aliança anticomunista took over san lorenzo de almagro, many years ago... but it would take too much time talking about it).
long story short, fans ownership is an even worse option than sugar daddies.
 
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Good post Ben. The story about Argentina doas interest me, since i'm very fond of Argentinian football (this is the league i would want to follow most of all).
 
lo zio said:
yeah... history tells us it's a guarrantee for terrible decisions actually.... and madrid and barçelona are a perfectly good example of why that is NOT a good idea. the chairmanship of the club becomes an electoral affair and is often exploited by people who are more interested in politics than in football; just think of the whole ciudad deportiva affair between don florentino and madrid's city council or the dirty stuff ramon calderon pulled off to hold his position at the club... heck, even laporta (who actually did a great job for barça) decided to run for barça president only gain political consensus.
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There`s talk of Catalonia, State of Europe...Next season the away kit will be their flag colours. The Club is leading the campaign for independence from Spain. A new United states of Spain?! Politics in football seems very dangerous, a tilting of power w/ no stability.
 
#71 said:
Even the ticketing revenue is very big considering your stadium size, tickets in Russia must be even more expensive than here..
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I do not know what prices are in potugal. but for example, the price of a 3 match aboniment CL.

best seats: 529$
bad seats: 166$

and then i mean bad seats i mean BAD seats ) we have small, bad, old stadium, but almost every game sold out the last 13 years.

I understand that we do not earn as much club spends. but we try and have success in this. I think only four Russian club earn something: Zenit, CSKA, Spartak and Lokomotiv, but we have a lot of clubs who spend a lot of money on what is known and not earn anything. Clubs from poor towns that do not have income from stadiums or T-shirts may just say ... ok we have debts of 40 million dollars, and asked government to repay the debt. Or the club will die. And help them. Once again, they are stealing the money and so the circle.
 
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That's indeed very expensive.
Mixing politics with football is just another kind of lack of fair play, but that's even harder to regulate...
 
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