He is a good journalist, but he seemed to not understand that the salary caps in American sport have very little to do with meeting tax obligations, but rather they are about maintaining fair competition between teams in differing regional market places around the USA.
Chelsea isn't really exploiting a loophole, it's just basic accounting and the reason clubs don't do it due to the fact you could end up with a flop on high wages you can't get rid of
"The idea that people in another country willing to pay more than your domestic market, that's just insane" Hardly when we only get to watch a tiny fraction of the games.
You can't claim that Financial Fair Play is like soft salary cap, because it is the exact and complete opposite. The salary cap stops team that are winning from dominating, and gives the loser a chance to come back in the next seasons. The FFP does the opposite - it stops weaker (or less famous) teams from getting closer to the big names. And it worked. 2004 was one of the best season in the UCL. However UEFA was afraid that they will loose viewers. The hardcore fans of football are going to watch no matter what. But the mass public wants to watch Real Madrid, Bayern and Barca. And in the last 10 years look what happen. The bigger teams are not just bigger, they are smashing everything. In late January 2003 Barcelona were in the relegation zone. Real had similar troubles. Now these two totally dominate Spain. Same thing happened in Germany, were Bayern have 10 consecutive titles, Italy, France, so on. The Champions league is the same as well. Every season the same 5-6 clubs dominate the competition. It is nothing like the 2004 season. The bigger clubs became dominators. And the FFP allows them to spend more than the clubs who wants to pursue. UEFA is very happy, no the glory hunter fans will continue to watch. In any case the FFP is made to do the opposite of the salary cap. Luckily, nobody gives a s*t about the FFP. But the FFP doesn't help.
@@Alf763 it holds two functions, so yes you are correct it does prevent an arms race between billionaire team owners, but also makes teams more competitive.
LMAO. Plastic clubs like City and Chelsea stopped properly well run clubs like Spurs, Arsenal, & Liverpool from winning titles or atleast regularly finished in the top 4. Why should these 3 clubs got shafted for plastic clubs?
FFP - A reaction to Chelsea Changing the loan rules - A reaction to Chelsea Changing the rules on contracts - A reaction to Chelsea. Meanwhile clubs are signing shady sponsorship deals to inflate revenue & selling off parts of their clubs for huge cash injections
i love it lol, we constantly do stuff that is perfectly legal (granted, also risky), everyone loses their absolute sht and yet half the other top clubs around europe are doing actual shady, illegal sht that gets slept on non stop.
@@Tripleexel it was 100% to stop clubs spending outside their means and going out of business. Chelsea were never in danger of that. It was never about fairness.
If LaLiga had an equal distribution of broadcasting rights, that could easily create a more balanced economy for Spanish teams at least on 1 scale. That IS enough to get closer to competition just like premier league and it would definitely ensure more attractive content for people who watch football in Spain. But will Spain ever do that? It remains to be seen.
@@fawazmhmmalhazim9729 yes but through this Bayern basically fund an otherwise poor league mate at the same time. Madrid and Barca spend hundreds of millions on foreign rubbish over and over it’s destroying their domestic league.
Worth saying the prem did that by accident and the greedy 6 have been trying to change that for years. Domestic TV revenue isn't shared equally but international is. The prem just didn't realise how big they would get over seas so left it
Are you on drugs? They keep taking the rivals players because they can . Epl teams can't bully anyone in the epl, sure they can take their players but they have to pay. Bayern have been raping the league . All the German talent just stolen from other clubs
It's pretty good, clubs can invest in other ways to increase commercial income and broadcast income, the Prem will grow with American markets and Asian markets and will increase The Prem as a whole. This FFP won't limit the prems income I don't think. Even match-day revenues could increase with better stadiums and local links and services as the Prem becomes more globally popular. It really shows how the EPL being more fair to its clubs as a whole and the football pyramid has grown the pie for all clubs in England.
People actually need to learn what FFP is before commenting, it’s not about preventing clubs from spending big!The main objective of the FFP is therefore to fight against the poor financial health of clubs not about their spending . In other words clubs cannot spend more than they earn (the famous “break-even” rule). The main way that clubs make money is • Ticketing revenue * Sponsorship and advertising revenues * Revenue from broadcasting rights * Income from commercial activities (sale of shirts and merchandise, refreshment stands, etc.) * Solidarity payments and bonuses from UEFA (e.g. bonuses received following the Champions League) * Income from the sale of player registrations (income from the sale of players) * Surplus from the disposal of property, plant and equipment (e.g. sale of the training centre).
It does nothing to address the "poor financial health of clubs" when they are allowed to claim all kinds of bogus revenue for accounting purposes: -Juventus (and other Italian clubs) with their sale and repurchase of players to create capital gains -Man City and PSG with their inflated sponsorship deals FFP is what you get when you put UEFA accountants in charge of football. It does nothing to make the game more interesting, rather it just provides legal avenues to justify the unjustifiable.
how is it "fair" for Man City to have an annual payroll of 186 million vs Brighton at 41 million. Does it not get frustrating to see the same 3-4 clubs winning every year? Where is the competition.
You can easily make the arguement here that la Liga has knee capped itself in the past half century by constantly prioritising real Madrid and Barcelona over the rest of the league. It has resulted in a product that is far less attractive to international broadcast markets outside the games with the big clubs.
They don't, US sports with hard salary caps have found what actually amounts to an FFP. Not UEFA's monster with built-in loopholes which increase inequality.
What they're calling 'exploiting a loophole' is in fact just a club action for which there is no rule against. And what they are calling 'closing the loophole' is in fact creating a new rule to prevent such actions. This 'loophole' talk is just hyperbole and sensationalism.
I don't like Oil money, but if they want to put a mountain of money into a dedicated fund to underwrite their club - that only the club can draw down - go for it. United's ownership has arguably done more to jeopardize the club: external (purchase) debt, excessive player wages, ridiculous marquee signings and large yearly dividends (compared to other football clubs) than City's. As regards to fairness of competition in UEFA competitions, just cap total wages of squad named for those competitions - same way you can only a certain number of players, certain squad budget. Anything else is the clubs own business. If Europa League had a lower limit than Champions League could mean you get a big team struggling when they drop down, and more giant killings
Does that really work though...because if you just put salary cap irregardless of how much the club is making you end up with a situation where players are being paid a small percentage of the revenue while they are the ones bringing the revenue....
@@geraldsibanda3640 It's a good point and I'd rather see the players (maybe manager & his coaching staff) get it than the owners. Reading it back it wasn't clear what I meant (going to edit it now): I didn't mean a direct salary cap or even that you restrict clubs wage bill for domestic competition. Just on the squad they name for the Champions League. If it was implemented I could see the richer clubs maybe keeping their squads but omitting 1 or 2 star players from their CL squad - keep them just for domestic cups & league.
I LOVE the idea of stricter restrictions for clubs with European desires. It allows for clubs lower down the order to show large ambitions and compete, but also gives their management a really strong incentive to get their act together. Imagine Brighton finishing 5th instead of 8th but not being eligible to play in Europe cause their wage bill is too high. 😂😂😂 Just fantastic. Fans would never demand a prudent wage bill more!
Here's the other good bit... Clubs would be forced to use their money on longer term projects like stadium expansions, training grounds, youth academies etc. None of which count towards the salary cap but are prudent investments in the local area and in the long term future of the club.
To people saying it doesn't work, why are you saying that? Isn't the main goal of FFP keeping clubs from absolving. It's not about stopping City, Chelsea, PSG, etc. from buying up the lot. It's about stopping a club from buying up the lot on debt, then a club getting ruined when the owner can't/won't hold up the club
It's also meant to prevent clubs from injecting money to destabilize the market overall by having certain clubs strongarm the market. This is evident in the fact that one of the main original purposes of the ruling was to preserve the market. Clearly, that hasn't happened, considering how ridiculously inflated the market has become in recent years.
When FFP was first proposed it was literally because the big traditional clubs complained about Chelsea's unregulated spending under Roman Abramovich and wanted something done about it.
@@mr.c1913 its meant to make sure clubs dont spend more than they make from revenue. we sell good, and will sell 5-6 players next summer, thats why FFP isnt doing shit, because we didnt break any bloody rules. love how everyone is crying about us doing perfectly legal stuff but gloss over the shit going on at barca, psg, city, etc, do, wouldve added juve but they got punished already.
I dont think it has much to do with UEFA actually wanting to keep clubs solvent, especially when Chelseas behaviour is the catalyst for this rule change. Strikes me as its about limiting the power of the Premier League, as they've made it clear over the years their disdain for it's success vs the rest of Europe which hasn't done as well commercially. This type of strategy will catch up with Chelsea though down the line when they have players on huge wages they cant shift on, combined with their balance sheet taking big hits.
So how can Newcastle..the richest club in the world compete with Chelsea Utd City Liverpool Arsenal ...what's the point of having the money...the top table doesn't want the party crashing.
As long as we have teams who can just throw around ridiculous figures with impunity to stagnate the market FFP will never work. They'll always find a way around it. And as long as we have owners who can pull BS out of their arse to fund themselves it will never change. I mean, look what Manchester City have done with all their dodgy "sponsorships" from companies that seemingly pop up just to get around FFP rules, all of which are seemingly tied to their owners when you look into it. They're not the only ones, just the most obvious. There are fundamental issues with the system, and how clubs exploit technicalities within that need addressing, but likely never will be, because $$$
FFP is there only to keep the big clubs ahead of the game. If season after season my club earns more and can spend more(through being successful on the field), how can anyone ever catch up? For example if Liverpool generates way more money than Burnley, according to FFP, they can spend way more. This means Liverpool will be able to afford far better players can Burnley. This means since Liverpool has way better players than Burnley, Burnley won't be able to compete with Liverpool on the field. This means since Liverpool still succeeded than Burnley on the field, they will make more money that season. This means since they make more money, they will be able to buy far better players than what Burnley can buy in the next season (according to FFP). So you see, the cycle continues year after year forever. The big teams remains big and the small teams remains small. FFP was created just to keep the big teams big and keep the small teams small.
I’m not interested in long contacts, whether a clubs got a new owner, profits or any other excuse. They should make it simple. You are not allowed to spend more that 300 million in a season period. Then they would be no loopholes.
@@seadkolasinac7220 I prefer Tifo irl podcasts on these drab subjects (I'm aware that's part of the Athletic - they tell us often enough :P). They're more upbeat, and presenter Joe asks questions around the subject to the experts (mostly serious, some silly) to manage the flow, so it's not one guy after another monologuing for ages about very little. Mark Chapman suits Match of the Day better, cos it's all auto-cued. The zoom-style format just reminds me of work too, as does all the old men with airpods being overly serious.
Looking forward to the first time that both FA cup finalists try to lose the final to avoid European football FFP rules. They'll be shooting own goals and swapping keepers.
Those leagues should stop whining and improve their product... Broadcast deals follow eyeballs and right now there's no comparison whatsoever; the Premier League is leagues ahead, pun intended
You can explain it in a billion ways but there's a simple one to do it: the clubs claim lots of bogus income streams ("I have a sponsorship deal with my cousin, he pays me 50 million pounds a year to appear on my club shirt's sleeve!" or "I have this promising youngster, sold him for 20 million to Chelsea, take note of that"). UEFA validates these and then goes, "Off you go! You earn that much income and are able to spend X% of that amount"! A well-run club like Ajax or Benfica gets shafted compared to the Premier League giants because they can't possibly claim that size of turnover without selling heaps of players. FFP is a pure accounting creation with heaps of loopholes, without a hard salary cap or spending cap it will only worsen inequality in football instead of achieving its officially stated goals.
This hatred seems to cloud the fact Chelsea won the UEFA CL, FIFA Club WC, UEFA Super Cup in 2021 and banked a small fortune. Also they had a Transfer ban when they couldn't spend any money while other PL clubs were filling their boots. So please! do a proper tot up over the last 3 years and stop skewing everything to suit your agenda?
everyone is crying about ffp but go completely silent when they see how good we sell players, and the money we made from competitions. there will always be an agenda against us, we ruined the rich kids party back in 2003, and arsenal, united, and liverpool havent forgiven us since.
A few hundred grand because they counted our big loss due to getting out of the championship in the calculations (probably fairly we still made the loss)
Clubs like City are manufactured with oil money. Just give them all the trophies they pay for and let the rest be competitive and be on a level playing field. Clubs should just let city win 10- nil every game. And let them enjoy being top dogs because they have unlimited funds.
the real problem is that you have a 2nd division team dominating the premier league using oil money and deception. if the oil money went away the empty stadium couldn't support buying every decent available player.
@@InvaderZim742 the difference,the huge difference is that manchester united spent club revenue. the empty stadium spent laundered oil revenue. and chelsea spent russian oil money, now ffp is being changed because of chelsea skirting the rules.
@@chrisclassical7 cry me a river. Manchester United don't have a right to be the only ones who can spend money bevusdt because they were successful in the past. That creates just as uneven a playing field as a rich owner. There was a reason the same 2 clubs dominated in the 90's and early 2000's. How would any other club catch up if they united could always spend more. It's a perpetuating cycle. The only salty fans are united because other clubs can now compete for top players, and they are for more successful than united without even spending as much. Nothing but sour grapes from United fans. Self righteous asshats thinking their money is better than everyone else's despite trying to buy titles the same as the other clubs.
@@InvaderZim742 what would be wrong with city and chelsea doing what brighton are doing. liverpool used club money, they were/are successful. the sad reality is that over the last 10 years both city and chelsea have bent or skirted the rules in any way possible using sugar daddy oil money. chelsea were bankrupt when the russian bought them for 1 pound and swallowed their debts, city were and are a low support bottom of the table club that are only successful because their owners are cheating the system. the phrase lipstick on pigs comes to mind, take the money away and both chelsea and city would be in the bottom 3 at best.
@@chrisclassical7 nothing but salty tears because your club no longer competes despite out spending all others. I call that poor management, scouting and sour grapes. Maybe not city. But Chelsea has always had revenue in thr top 10 clubs in the world. They were 4th before Roman took over. But somehow they would suddenly be bottom 3? I don't think so mate. Wishful thinking from a bitter Manc.
i love watching other fans cry and claim we don’t have a plan because our owners found a way to speed up the rebuild lol “but they’re just splashing cash” 🤓🤓
@@taliamason7986 Yes you can lol by buying the players sooner it allows them to gel together and not take 5+ years for them to start playing the way the manager wants
@@theweekndxo7438 No it does the complete opposite and establishes major chemistry problems that take either a long time to fix or worse case scenario cannot be fixed. Just ask Atletico Madrid when they tried it back in the Summer window of 19-20 or AC-Milan in the Summer window of 16-17. Even Everton that same Summer. All of them dropped off at rapidly high rate in those seasons. Atletico Madrid barely at the skin of their teeth made the top 4 when in every other full season of Diego Simone's tenure they made it there with ease and most of the time were within touching distance of Barcelona and Real Madrid. Also the expectation was them to win the title. AC-Milan finished 7th when the bare minimum expectation was top 4.Everton were close to relegation when the expectation for them was Europa League football.
The joy and weird pride on display while talking about the business model PL is quite shocking to be honest. I thought The Athletic prides it self as quality sport journalism. You can come to the conclusion, that the PL found a brilliant way to take football business to another level, but you have lay out the total picture. How about the ticket prices ? What groups in society go to a football match ? Who buys these clubs ? Is english football part of english culture and tradition or is it sport entertainment ? The money that Chelsea used to buy Drogba etc comes for KGB funds. The international currency the KGB stored to operate. KGB higher ranks had access to it and fucked their ppl over. When Chelsea cheered for a Drogba goal, millions of poor people in Russia looked at their empty fridge. Well done England ! We done ! It s your choice to sell your culture to Saudi Arabia or some rich American billionaires, but keep it real. You re having a good time on other ppl‘s budget. The party could be over someday and the headache painful. Those football clubs are not yours anymore then. I respect everyones stand on this, but this Athletic video gone of the rails and is shocking. 3 journalist celebrating the wealth of the PL instead of explaining the reality, so everybody can be informed and make up their own mind
You want to talk about ticket prices, go see what La Liga clubs do when Madrid/Barca come to town with their flex pricing. Betis charged 90 euros for home tickets this year to get tourists money in. Their home fans priced out, ridiculous
The Premier League has 7 big teams right now. Manchester United is a global brand. Manchester City has endless money from its Abu Dhabi owners. Newcastle has endless money from its Saudi Arabia owners. Chelsea has a deep pocket owner. Liverpool and Arsenal are big brands with cash. Spurs have a state of the art stadium. The Premier League is just a great entertainment product. The stadiums, the players, the media coverage, the global English Language, the coaches (Pep, Klopp, Conte, Ten Hag... they recently had Mourinho, Ancelloti, Tuchel, Bielsa). How can any league compete with that? La Liga only has 2 teams. Ligue 1 and Bundesliga only have one team each. Serie A is kinda classy and cool but they got no money or stars to claim for public attention. Who can compete with the Premier League?
If you have an amortised value asset that has depreciated from 80 Mil to 20 Mil in 3 years, which you now sell for 100 Mil... Isn't that misrepresentation of the value of the asset? I can't get away with that accounting. Isn't the problem just that players don't act like assets?
I don’t get why other European clubs are whining when they’ve virtually monopolized their leagues so they’re guaranteed uefa money every single year. The attractiveness of the premier league lies in its clash of styles and unpredictability and sheer competitiveness
How does FFP work? IT DOESN’T. The rich clubs commit borderline fraud and financial trickery, and when that fails, they run to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland, who has never found anyone guilty of anything in my recollection.
Would ah club whae wis haemorrhaging let’s say 11 million a year be teetering on the brink , jist as ah for instance, excluding pandemic related events but ay
Please explain PSG player cost they must be in the - because they all on high wages. FFP must do something about PSG high wages. FFP doesn't work look what happened in pass brokelona sold Neymar for 200 million to PSG
There are conmen operating in the replies so please do not be fooled by them. They are operating through different accounts pretending to have made lots of money by using a financial adviser. Please do not be fooled. It is a scam.
The Saudi league as its ignoring ffp and spending obscene money..should be banned from euro league and champions league ...if they allowed in then its a joke and all other league should take legal action.
It’s unclear if Chelsea FC still owe Abramovich 1.5b? Does this give him a controlling interest in the club? When the war in Ukraine is over and sanctions are lifted will he be able to come back into the club as CEO?
It works the way the three red clubs chelsea and Tottenham have agreed with the premier league committee to stop any other clubs breaking through plenty brown envelopes and backhanders going on there the committee should be suspended and investigated for fraud 😉 👍
When you take things like Brexit and the general dislike for us on the continent into account... Yeah, we're getting banned from European competitions soon😂
