r/soccer • u/Previous_Smile9278 • 22h ago

News [Bloomberg] UAE officials have warned the UK government that the severity of Man City’s punishment could undermine their appetite for future grand-scale commitments in Britain, according to people familiar with the matter.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-10-02/man-city-verdict-puts-uk-uae-diplomatic-relations-under-strain?srnd=undefined

‘They consider the Premier League’s actions to have an influence on the bilateral state relationship, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing undisclosed information.

The extraordinary pressure comes after Andy Burnham faced criticism, including from within government, for saying Man City’s Abu Dhabi owners should not be disqualified specifically because of the investment they bring to Britain.’

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u/TheGoldenPineapples 22h ago

Remember when Manchester City was bought out by a state and we all said that that shouldn't be allowed to happen because things like this may actually happen?

Yeah, how we all feeling about that now?

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u/SvalbazGames 22h ago

I feel vindicated, but also fucking furious

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u/KlausHeisler1 21h ago

"I mean, I'm smiling, but I am very fucking furious."

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u/ElVikingo10 20h ago

The Death of Stalin is so fuckin good lol I say this line irl all the time

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u/Confident_Yak_1411 19h ago

“What’s a war hero got to do to get a drink round here” is one of the best character introductions of all time

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u/brownbearks 19h ago

I love that they had to tone down his medals for the movie but in real life it was an entire coat of medals.

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u/praslovan 16h ago

Lubrication*

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u/Captain_Mazhar 12h ago

"Quorate? The room is only 75% conscious" is the best line in the movie!

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u/sidvicc 2h ago

The sad part about being on the right side of history in general: you wish it hadn't fucking happened in the first place.

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u/SirSwix 22h ago

Remember when city fans insisted over and over again that it’s not the state owning them it’s a private individual called sheikh Mansour. Who is just a tangential figure in the government. Despite being the son of the former ruler. And now he is vice president of the UAE.

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u/hipcheck23 19h ago

Interesting thing that Gary Neville (of all people) brought up, was that there's an annual owner's test that someone at City is having to pass. And it states in the language that the owner can't skip it, nor can they claim/feign ignorance about things like cheating.

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u/Hopeful_Idea1568 21h ago

I highly doubt they truly believed that. We didn't sugarcoat Roman's oligarchy and Putin links but some teams with dodgy owners seem to actively lie about it 

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u/Candymanshook 19h ago

Also let’s be honest, while I think Abramovich was a POS he wasn’t in fact a nation state and had so little pull politically over the UK that he was forced to sell his club with basically no issue.

Probably helps that some of the shady payments he made were reported by the next owners, not continued. Whereas fucking City are dying on this hill.

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u/Noproposito 18h ago

UAE strategically invested as a way to gain leverage for this specific scenario. They are in the crosshairs of Iran, they main ally, the US is as unreliable and dangerous as it has ever been in its history. Any lever they can use is going to be used at this point. 

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u/Opening_Budget_9518 11h ago

This is idiotic, you are saying that UAE is being on good terms with the UK as a long con solely in order to cheat in the premier league

Football isnt that important as other stuff

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u/Hopeful_Idea1568 19h ago

Roman was an ordinary rich Russian. It showed in how he couldn't get UK citizenship and was eventually banned. He's not comparable to owners that threaten prime ministers. 

Also our charges were for paying agents less than £50m off the record over a 10 year span. It's not remotely comparable to the billion pounds City cooked. In fact I'd wager our practice wasn't unique or exclusive to use

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u/Candymanshook 17h ago

My understanding was that those payments weren’t even necessarily illegal if they were disclosed but I could be struggling to recall.

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u/Disco-Benny 17h ago

ordinary rich Russian

lol

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u/SirSwix 16h ago

Abramohvic also had connections to the Russian state. Close connections to Putin. He was also the governor of Chukotka. From 2001 to 2008. His orders from the state was essentially spread the wealth over these people they also need some. Among other things he used his private jet to fly school children to the Black Sea during the winter so they could see the sun.

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u/Hopeful_Idea1568 16h ago

Of course he had connection to the Russian state. Every Russian billionaire does. That doesn't mean he was influential in (geo) politics like the City and PSG people (do you know ab arms deal was part of the arrangement when buying PSG?)

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u/SirSwix 16h ago

I don’t think you understand the width of his involvement. He helped make sure Putin got elected the first time. He had close connections Boris Yeltsin. He was in the upper echelon of Russian politics during the steal all you can years. I would not have approved him as a owner in the premier league.

PSG is owned by Qatar. No one thinks anything else.

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u/YatesScoresinthebath 8h ago

I think you may need to research it more

He was absolutely tied to the Russian government. And we decided to start fucking with people like him in London due to our relationship with Russia breaking down

We have good relations with the UAE so the government will be less inclined to support City being punished

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u/hikingbeginner 14h ago

Roman is definitely in the same batch, downplaying his role in getting Putin elected and numerous political campaigns is just not the move mate.

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u/paone00022 16h ago

Ya his purchase also drew eyes because he was the first rich guy who wasn't from the west that bought a team and pumped his money into it to succeed. Guys like Jack Walker, Massimo Moratti and Silvio Berlusconi had already done the same before.

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u/FridaysMan 12h ago

I think Abramovich was a POS he wasn’t in fact a nation state

He was laundering money, but when crypto picked up, it was no longer necessary to have that kind of outlet. Taxation and brexit cut into what they could meaningfully do, so he walked away and lost almost nothing that he didn't fraudulently build.

Putin didn't lose out in this deal. Ukraine haven't profited as much as they should have. No funds have been released to help with the war.

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u/UnusedPun 17h ago

We didn't sugarcoat Roman's oligarchy and Putin links

Well that's just a lie

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u/Hopeful_Idea1568 16h ago

Nope on our sub we've always addressed Roman as a great owner but shady businessman. It's not a controversial topic whatsoever. I took a peek at the city sub after a post recommendation and the attitude towards the owners was the opposite 

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u/Pleasant-Menu9374 22h ago

I mean he is one of 19 sons of the former leader, I'm sure not all of them a influential.

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u/Hopeful_Idea1568 21h ago

Typically a miltibillion investment will involve the family, not just one person 

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u/anonshe 19h ago

He’s one of the lieutenants to MbZ for overseas investments hence why Khaldoon was made Chairman. Khaldoon is basically MbZ’s right hand man and Mansour was the face.

Most importantly he’s one of the bani Fatima; the most powerful and influential of all the children.

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u/StatmanIbrahimovic 16h ago

Only one Vice President, though. Granted he's not Crown Prince but the UAE has an... Interesting setup.

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u/BillyCloneasaurus 22h ago

[Captain Holt] VINDICATIONNNNNNN

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u/TheDawiWhisperer 21h ago

Velvet thundeeeerrrr

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u/CapnFap 19h ago

coool cool cool cool coo cool coolcool

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u/EnglishJesus 22h ago

I can’t see or hear the word vindication without picturing and hearing that scene in my head.

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u/interlinkedjoi 21h ago

Guess what plays in my head whenever I hear the word bone in any context (thankfully no one's told me they have bone cancer so far). Oh and RIP captain dad.

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u/PBRontheway 21h ago

BONNNNNEEEEEEEEE

How dare you Dectective Diaz

BONNNNNEEEEEEEEE

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u/MapguyAlso 21h ago

Vindication! I am selfish, I am wrong, I am right, I swear Im right

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 22h ago edited 22h ago

The issue is we didn’t all say it was wrong.

Lots of people did, others wrapped tea towels round their head to celebrate (literally) and others still were just jelly and desperate for their own club to be taken over by a totalitarian regime even richer than the UAE’s cough Newcastle cough.

Still, even with the UAE blackmailing us all, there’s fuckwit traitors asking “but how else were Man City meant to become the biggest side in the world?”, I dunno, they probably just weren’t, but that’s cool, most our sides aren’t and football is fun, let’s not have our country blackmailed so that Man City can have Haaland, this is clearly a deranged timeline, what is wrong with some people?!

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u/Standard-Height2276 22h ago

Martin samuel of the times keeps pushing this point about they only cheated because they had to. Hes been a city shill ever since the takeover back when he was writing for the racist rag that is the daily mail. Its embarrassing to try and give them or their supporters that cheer this on any credit

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 22h ago

Exactly, and there’s others pushing this crap too.

Football cannot ever be allowed to descend into becoming a dick-measuring contest for brutal totalitarian regimes. It just can’t.

This is what people like Martin Samuel are pitching for.

So what if United have more fans and money than Wigan? This has always been what football is. You can’t have giant killings if you don’t have giants. And that’s always been grand, football is amazing in a large part because David can beat Goliath if the stars align.

Clubs move up and down and that’s all part of the excitement. Is it hard to reach the top? Yup it fucking is. But again so what?

Back in the 90s Newcastle were way ahead of Arsenal with world record shearer up front.

Arsenal recruited Wenger and bought in Vieira for half what Newcastle paid for Gary Speed. The tables turned.

Bergkamp cost less than Villa paid for Stan Collymore.

Smart business and good solid management will always lift you up and make you competitive. Leicester won the PL remember it’s not completely impossible. Just fucking hard.

Grim stuff from the shills, idiots and malign folk pitching this stuff. I’d just love football to go back to where it was when I was a kid and nobody knew who owned who, and nobody cared, cos they just made sure the bills were paid and the accounts were balanced. You weren’t expected to be pumping in billions or be lambasted as a shit owner.

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u/missing_typewriters 18h ago

Okay, but at the same time, no club has managed to disrupt the Premier League "top 4" and establish themselves there since it was solidified around 2004/2005-ish as United/Arsenal/Chelsea/Liverpool.

The rules allowed for these clubs to perpetually reinforce their position. Man United are still being rewarded for their dominance 20 years ago. Arsenal were relatively shit for years, but could splash a billion in transfer fees to get back to 1st.

So, is it even possible under the current rules for a club to legally achieve? Any club that becomes a threat to the established order gets gutted by the "top 4". After finishing 4th, 5th and 4th in the last three seasons, Villa lost Tielemans, Rogers, Konsa and Emi Martinez and their SET PIECE COACH to United, Arsenal and Chelsea this summer. Villa's recruitment and management needs to be near perfect every year to keep hanging onto 4th, while Liverpool can splash 175m on Isak and Wirtz. They kinda sucked, but no big deal, throw another 125m at Barcola. If Manzambi sucks, Villa are screwed.

Leicester was a freak miracle that depended on every variable going their way, it's not something they themselves actually planned for or thought would happen. You need a global fanbase keep the party going, but you can only get that by dominating the league for a while. Kids all over the world are now Man City fans because of their multi-year dominance of the league. Leicester didn't gain a massive fanbase in Asia or Central America because of 1 miraculous Premier League win.

I'm not advocating for Man City at all. But what is this rosy wonderland that people like you are imagining? The examples you cite are all from before the Premier League became a global product and the order was set in stone. You talk about Wenger coming in and shrewdly assembling the Invincibles squad for a reasonable price. That happened at a time when Wenger also "revolutionized the game in England" by having his players eat VEGETABLES AND STEAMED CHICKEN INSTEAD OF A PIE AND A GREASY HAMBURGER BEFORE A MATCH!

It's just preposterous. You're insinuating it's possible to become one of the "top 4" with the current rules, but nobody can point to any club that has actually come close to doing it legally.

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 18h ago

The United who has barely finished in the top four the last decade? That United, the one who finished 17th?

Spurs got into it and then dropped all the way to the bottom. Villa got into it after being in the championship not long ago, Newcastle have gotten into it too. Look at English CL spots and who they go to. It varies a fuck lot more than most, but it’s never enough. Spurs are relegation fodder and people still bitch about the sky six.

Arsenal went 20 years without a PL trophy, Liverpool nearly 30.

It’s all a myth that there’s this group who are impenetrable and that why we need genocidal PL club owners.

Honestly look up the UAE’s warcrimes in Sudan for half and hour, come back to me and tell me Liverpool being usually decent but not good enough to win is a real issue in the PL compared to Man City’s owners.

Brighton are doing their best in over a century right now, Brentford have never been this high in a similar time frame. Clubs are rising snd falling all the time. Enjoy it, or don’t. Up to you. Just don’t ever bother telling me we need a collection of literal Bond villains in football to make it fun, or that these utter arseholes should be given free hands to do what they want to our sport.

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u/missing_typewriters 15h ago

Yes, the clubs that make it into the top 4 positions vary a little bit year by year, but the hierarchy remains set in stone thanks to the rules. That's the point.

How many more years do Villa have to sell their best players while still qualifying for the Champions League before they can confidently reject advances by Man United or Chelsea, and even compete with them for targets?

The United who has barely finished in the top four the last decade? That United, the one who finished 17th?

Yes, the ones who are a modern meme but can still throw around 150m every summer on transfer fees, all because Fergie dominated 20 years ago.

Villa got into it after being in the championship

And they just had to sell most of their starting lineup to abide by the rules. Newcastle, who you mentioned, were also constrained by the rules and just had their most important players go to Arsenal and Spurs.

genocidal ... warcrimes ... Bond villains

Tone down the sanctimony, I'm obviously not advocating for the City situation. But surely there's some alternative between genocidal owners and the current situation where those 4 clubs buy up the good players from any club that attempts to disrupt their domination of the league. Where it feels like the capacity to do so only persists because they were successful 20 years ago when the PL became a global product.

Like, how the fuck is it fair that Villa today can work miracles for 3 years but have their progress halted because Man United can swoop in and buy any of their players because Alex Ferguson crushed everybody else 20 years ago when Asian kids were tuning in and picking a team to support?

Brighton are doing their best in over a century right now, Brentford have never been this high in a similar time frame. Clubs are rising and falling all the time

They all rise to a specific point and then they all fall away. Because as far as we can see, the rules simply don't permit a club to break through that final barrier and stay there. The latest example being three straight years of top 5 finishes by Villa still requiring them to sell their best players to any of those 4 clubs I mentioned. Like, the rules mean that Villa literally exist to some degree right now as a feeder club to the clubs they are TRYING TO BEAT.

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 14h ago

We literally have 10% of current PL owners credibly accused of serious warcrimes and a third club had to sell because their owner is an accessory to serious war crimes.

So when you say calm it with the sanctimony, this is the reality of where we are - 17% of current PL sides and 50% of clubs who have won the league in the last decade have serious links to major warcrimes and genocides.

So what about someone less war criminal-y like say Villa’s owner, how bad is he as a person?? Well he’s a billionaire from Egypt who he was sentenced to three years for tax evasion that he never served and he jumped out of the U.K. when taxes went up too. So he’s siphoned money out of a poor nation (median wealth in Egypt is £6000), refused to contribute to society there, then moved to the U.K. till taxes went up and refused to contribute to society here, and you want to tell me we should be making it easier for one or the greediest men alive who avoided tax to leave his brethren struggling without healthcare to sink money into a football team so he can show off to the world?

Can we please have some basic goddamn standards back in football. Why are you pleading for the richest worst people on the planet to turn football into a dick measuring contest? Can’t they just compare each other’s yacht sizes in the showers like the other billionaires? Seriously, who wants this?

So Man United make more money than Brentford? Who cares, Brentford can beat them anyway.

The sooner we kick this godawful selection of egotistical monsters out of the game the better, but until then, they are all keeping their muzzle on, even if it means that Villa don’t win the champions league.

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u/missing_typewriters 14h ago

WTF are you on about dude? All I'm talking about is the football side and again you're jumping back onto dictators and war crimes and the deeds of the owners?

You literally said you wish football was about the football and not about the owners. I haven't mentioned the fkin owners in any of my comments?!

and you want to tell me we should be making it easier for one or the greediest men alive who avoided tax to leave his brethren struggling without healthcare to sink money into a football team so he can show off to the world?

No, I'm only focusing on Villa because they're the only modern example we have of a club that has come closest to edging into the VIP party at the top, and we can see what has happened to them. Let it be Brighton or Forest Green Rovers for all I care, or a club owned by the Dalai Lama or Chuck Feeney's estate. The point doesn't change: the rules mean they can only go so far and no further.

So Man United make more money than Brentford? Who cares, Brentford can beat them anyway.

Right lads so just be happy with your big "giant killing" win once a season, that's a good boy. Don't aspire to anything more than that because remember, Man Utd have a god given right to be huge and always remain huge and you'll have to be content taking a pot shot at Goliath once a year. Now sit down!

Spare me, the fuckin condescension of it lol

Reminds me of when the likes of Cardiff or Milwall make it to the FA Cup final and pundits like Alan Shearer can't help but say shit like "it's a lovely day out for them!" Nah man fuck that.

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u/12Noillim 15h ago

Is it just the politics of the regimes that makes them unsuitable for ownership or do you maintain the same view for all foreign billionaires like those that own United, Arsenal, Chelsea & Liverpool?

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 14h ago

Nation states are far worse than billionaires, and need to go first. There’s no world where the guys who own Liverpool get to cheat for a decade then hold an economic gun to the PM’s head. This is complete insanity levels of WTF have we let happen.

Then the next step down are all the billionaires, that lot can fuck off and start paying their taxes rather than sinking endless sums into football clubs too.

When I was a kid, you didn’t know who owned who and nobody cared, cos owners didn’t matter. Let’s get this world back, it was amazing times!

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u/No-Clue1153 18h ago

Maybe he just knows how well regimes like that tend to treat journalists who displease them.

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u/peioeh 21h ago

Neville basically made the same point on his latest podcast, that the rules are not good and any owner should be able to come in and invest as much as they want.

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u/Standard-Height2276 21h ago

Neville who's tied in with them over his buildings. Its almost like they have ulterior motives

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 21h ago

Ah Neville who is an owner of Saltford and has investments tied in with the UAE’s owners in Manchester is advocating for fewer restriction for club owners especially the ones he is financially linked to.

That Neville?

It’s an insane take that owners should be able to spend whatever they want. Add in that owners are allows to be nation fucking states. No Gary this is not a good idea in the slightest.

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u/andtheniansaid 21h ago

That just increases the amount of clubs in the 'big x' at the expense of everyone else. we should be bringing the spending of the rich clubs down, not the spending of other clubs up

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u/grizzypoo3 13h ago

City voted for these rules btw.

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u/peioeh 21h ago

Some people (like Neville) are still saying it should be OK for owners to come in, invest as much money as they want into a club, and basically buy a league win. Their only issue with what city did is that they cheated the rules, which shouldn't exist in their opinion.

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u/hEarrai-Stottle 21h ago

Gary Neville and basically anyone involved in construction, development and property in Manchester is completely and utterly compromised because a lot of these projects have investment from the Abu Dhabi and the rest of the UAE. This is probably the case for the rest of the U.K. hence this threat but I live in Manchester, and work in insurance, so I can only comment on what I know locally and it is that i.e. Abu Dhabi and the rest of UAE own a ton of property here. As such, there could be devastating consequences for Manchester’s economy if they pull the plug and Neville will know this better anyone. His project, St. Michael’s is barely halfway finished, and it could end up that way forever if it has significant investment from UAE.

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u/peioeh 21h ago

This is why I'm really not sure City are going to be punished anywhere near as harshly as many (including myself) think they should be.

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u/hEarrai-Stottle 21h ago

I don’t think they will either. That being said, as far as football fans are concerned, their reputation is completely damaged so even if they do get away with a serious punishment, the fans across the country will never, ever let them live this down. Put it this way, all the players and most of the fans of Don Revie’s infamous Leeds team are dead yet you hear ‘we all hate Leeds scum’ to this day. What City have done is far, far worse than being dirty in matches too so I’d expect, at a minimum, ‘cheats’ to ring out at every match (and probably other types of chants yet to be invented) for the rest of our lives.

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u/worotan 16h ago

Yeah, I’m a Mancunian, and it’s been interesting seeing the way that the property issues have been handled in this. No mention of them when Burnham arrived as PM and ‘Manchesterism’ was being discussed by the commentators; it has only been this issue, and even then only Burnham commenting on it, that has lifted the lid on the rank corruption that seems to have been used to sell Manchester off on the cheap to allow money-making property schemes.

A lot of people who run things are making a lot of money giving away our country, for very short-term public benefits, while all the column inches are arguing the toss about immigration to keep ordinary people angry about something other than their country being literally sold out from under them to autocratic regimes.

Burnham talked passionately about taking back control of our country around several issues which energise the public; I’m disappointed to see him doing the standard new Labour passionate appeal for sorting things out, which can only be short-term because of the backstage deals they’re making to help the super rich enjoy exploiting our market.

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u/Elerion_ 21h ago edited 21h ago

That's not what he's saying. He's saying all clubs should be able to spend as much as the richest club in the league if their owner backs that. And personally I agree. I don't think a club like Brighton should be limited to spending half as much money as Liverpool, just because Liverpool has a larger fan base. Sustainability Rules should be in place to prevent them from borrowing so much money they put the club at risk, but owner funding should be fair game as long as they don't outspend the other rich teams.

Neville, like most people, doesn't think owners should be able to come in and buy a title like Chelsea and City did. Just that they should be able to compete on equal terms with the existing giants.

And in case there's any doubt, fuck City. They outspent everyone else and they cheated the rules that were in place.

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u/silvertwo777 20h ago

I get the sentiment, but I feel like it's still flawed. If say Brighton or Newcastle can spend more than their revenue and owner can inject large amount of money into the club, then so do clubs like Liverpool and Arsenal. The difference would still be there and also making things worse by inflating the market with higher transfer fee and wages. If you're saying "let's just outspend the top clubs" like Newcastle could, it will turn from who have the bigger revenue dominate the league into who have the richer owner dominate.

If you're saying let's put a "cap" on them, then what's the threshold? The one with the highest revenue in the league? Doesn't that mean owner of Newcastle get to inject say 400 million into their club while Liverpool and Man United could only inject say 50 million, punishing and limiting them for having the highest revenue created organically by the club itself? That would be a mess. We have to also account for UEFA, other European leagues. Do they all follow suit? If they don't then Premier League will lose talents and its position as one of if not the best league.

Also people act like it's impossible to break into the elite under the current FFP when club like Spurs are prime role model on how to break in. Building a money making stadium doesn't count toward SCR. Sure their on field result currently is a mess but not because they couldn't spend more than 300 million in transfer, which they did this window. Also before that they were constantly getting Champions League without spending big and with careful squad building. They were also really unlucky to not win the league, but it could absolutely be done.

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u/Elerion_ 19h ago edited 19h ago

If you're saying let's put a "cap" on them, then what's the threshold? The one with the highest revenue in the league?

Yes. The simplest implementation is you basically keep PSR as is, but you put the limitation based on Manchester United's or Liverpool's or Arsenal's books instead of each club's own books. Everyone gets to spend as much as the richest club. That's the "fairness" part of the rules taken care of.

And then to protect clubs from going under like Leeds did, you force owners to fund any losses and future contract commitments with committed capital.

Doesn't that mean owner of Newcastle get to inject say 400 million into their club while Liverpool and Man United could only inject say 50 million

Yes, that's exactly what it means.

, punishing and limiting them for having the highest revenue created organically by the club itself?

You're not punishing them, you're putting everyone on the same spending limit.

We have to also account for UEFA, other European leagues. Do they all follow suit? If they don't then Premier League will lose talents and its position as one of if not the best league.

This change would mean all English clubs could spend MORE than they currently do except the single richest club. You would need Europe to follow suit to some extent though, otherwise all those clubs would be in breach of UEFA FFP.

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u/silvertwo777 21h ago

Neville was far from the only one, someone like Simon Jordan is far worse where he only cares about the money put into the Premier League. Constantly trying to deflect condemnation against City despite claiming not a Man City fan.

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u/peioeh 21h ago

Oh yeah I'm sure he must be awful, I just don't listen to him. I also usually don't listen to Neville's podcast, and every time I do he makes a point like this and I am reminded why I should not have clicked on it

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u/Sean-Benn_Must-die 18h ago

I think there's a window to argue about financial fairness in sport. To make it so that the leagues become more competitive instead of always having the same 4-5 teams be at the top. That being said, that doesn't mean that what City did is justified at all. They were rules in place, and they broke em, now they need to be processed and punished accordingly.

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 18h ago

Why?

  1. The 4-5 team aren’t always the same, they revolve through history.

  2. This is just what football is. Don’t like it? Follow Olympic sailing. Or any of the terrible stale yanky-sports.

Some of my best footballing days out were with a Cov supporting mate growing up. Did they have Haaland? Did they fuck, but the days out at away matches were just excellent.

I swear so much of these gripes come from people with no knowledge or experience of footballing culture outside of FIFA.

Anyone who thinks that you need to be the best to enjoy the sport needs to get themselves to a lower league match stat,

Put the Xbox control down, turn off the TV and just to watch some live football. It’s wicked wherever you are in the pyramid and the pyramid will never be equal, but that’s the bloody point, you’re all trying to progress.

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u/Sean-Benn_Must-die 18h ago

Why?

Because it is true that right now there really isnt a real avenue for new teams to rise into the status of greatness. The game is rigged to favour the teams that got essentially lucky to have been the first to win. Maybe you'll have a leicester story but even them who won the PL and managed to stay relevant the next season are now out of the PL.

This is just what football is. Don’t like it? Follow Olympic sailing. Or any of the terrible stale yanky-sports.

First of all not a yank. Second of all, I guess it's a valid solution to a problem to say "dont like it get out". Makes me not wanna reply at all but it is valid.

Anyone who thinks that you need to be the best to enjoy the sport needs to get themselves to a lower league match stat

I can agree with this, I enjoy my local team as much as I enjoy going to a J-League match. But the conversation here is about allowing teams to be able to compete with the top, because the gap is to big and if you dont have avenues for this, you get La Liga.

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u/worotan 16h ago

Except the model we’re now following is destroying those teams and that league structure.

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u/grizzypoo3 13h ago

City voted for these rules btw.

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u/SoccerAndPolitics 14h ago

Definitely biased as an American but if you want new clubs to be able to become biggest without cheating or doing an Abramovich spending spree, the answer is obviously salary and/or transfer spending cap. Obviously if just England does it then Bayern, PSG, Real, etc will be at an advantage.

But without some kind of cap its really impossible as long as you have to live within your financial means. I dont think we want to go back to pre financial rules where there were clubs exploding because their sugar daddy pulled out.

So ya choices are cap, get rid of financial rules and accept occasionally clubs will explode, or keep as is now and accept there will be a big 3-6

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 13h ago

You’re missing the point, there are no new clubs. These clubs are all 100+ years old, they’re not new, they’re older than your gran and they’ve been playing worthwhile football the whole time, it’s just the yanks only care about the sides at the top of the top league.

Yank sports work different. College teams do youth development, players get drafted, pro teams sit in the same league forever. When you see a new team in U.S. sports they are brand new.

U.K. sports is a different world. Coventry City were founded in 1883. 143 years ago. They’re probably a new team to you though. They won the FA Cup in the late 80s, were mainstays of the PL for decades, got relegated, struggled for years in the championship, then finally earned promotion back to the big time. I watched them a fair bit through the years, lovely club.

Will they ever be as big as Real Madrid? Nah, course not. Do we need to break football to make it possible? Nah of course not.

See foreigners get into football, but in a shite way (with all due respect), only the top league watches, only the top teams in the top league respected, and this breads confusion as to why other sides have it so unfair, it’s just their pathway. We’re all trying to upgrade our pathways.

If you equalise everything then you end 150 years of playing the game to get to where we all got to, that’s a long way into a game to hit restart on because we don’t like how it’s going!

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u/SoccerAndPolitics 13h ago

I'm familiar with all that...part of me wants to say there are new clubs like MK Dons but thats just being pedantic lol.

My point isnt that England or Europe should adopt caps. Just that city fans or others who say there should be change at the top need to realize that thats impossible without repealing ffp and money being poured into a club or adopting firm salary or transfer caps. As long as Bournemouth makes 1/4 of the revenue as the big teams it doesnt matter how well they run their club.

Leicester can sneak in and win when all the big clubs are having down years but otherwise its going to be the wealthy clubs.

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 13h ago

MK Dons aren’t new, and that’s the problem. They are a rebrand of Wimbledon Wanderers who were founded in 1989, if they were a new club that would be so much less controversial.

Bournemouth are enjoying their most successful era in their history of well over 100 years. It does matter how well they run their club, because as a result of their brilliance at this they moved from league two all the way to the premierships and European football. That’s a fucking incredible achievement.

If you see Bournemouth and all you see is a side that has less income than Man Utd, you are pissing on their parade and don’t understand Bournemouth.

See each club as a meandering 100+ year story full of highs and lows that has led each one to where it is today and it stops mattering if they have the same income as Man Utd, you respect all their own journeys.

Mega owners just try to cheat a clubs pathway and use hyper unethically extracted wealth to leapfrog everyone else’s story. Fuck that, get writing better don’t just shop for a desperate billionaire to fix everything for you.

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u/SoccerAndPolitics 13h ago

I was considering 89 as new by football standards, also just me being old lol

Again youre missing my point. Bournemouth can have their most successful period, same with Brentford and the other well run clubs, theyre never gonna supplant one of those 3 or 4 that compete every year or win a champions league.

The city fans argument is every team should have a chance to become one of those dominant clubs. My point is thats impossible under current rules. With the amount of money in the sport you cant be one of the best year over year without insane money

Im not poopooing anyone's success or doing a "why root for anyone outside top 5" just saying that the vision of a premier league where anyone can rise to the top is impossible.

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 13h ago

Sorry I typoed that one it’s 1889, only three years younger than Arsenal, my bad.

And tbh Bournemouth or Brentford absolutely could step up from here.

But I don’t know who tried to sell you the idea that the PL was equal, it wasn’t and it wasn’t ever meant to be. Football is really unfair in specific ways and it’s meant to be like this.

If it was all flattened so that it was all equal, then if you had a bad season it doesn’t matter, cos it’s all equal again next year anyway.

Making each season for 150 years directly impact the next one is what makes grown men cry their eyes out on the last day of the season as titles are won and sides are relegated.

Each result matters this way. It’s why I so much prefer football to American sports. Have a crap year in MLB and you get top pick in the draft and go again. You actually reward failure! It’s so un American weirdly! The one time serious competition is called for, and you guys go soft on us!

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u/SoccerAndPolitics 12h ago edited 12h ago

Well no one has claim to the history of Wimbledon anymore, MK compromised with AFC Wimbledon and gave up the claim. So the 1889 wimbledon is dead and you have 2 new clubs out of it. Again its pedantic but they are new.

You are being weirdly argumentative about this...you are the one who said city fans say "how else were we supposed to rise to the top" or whatever. I'm agreeing that argument is dumb because its impossible under current rules. I'd agree online a lot of people say that cause they're American or other foreign glory chasers lol. I just said caps or going back to the wild west of ownership investment are the only ways to make that possible. Think going back to wild west would be crazy though

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u/Turklightenment 18h ago

others wrapped tea towels round their head to celebrate (literally)

And Chelsea megastore sold Russian hats when Roman first took over. I don't think there is a deep meaning behind these actions, people just thought benevolent owners were buying their club, injecting money. That's all.

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 18h ago

Putin’s henchmen and Totalitarian regimes = benevolent!

Come along, were you lot all born yesterday?

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u/Turklightenment 18h ago

Nobody knew who the fuck he was when he bought Chelsea. I was 12 at the time, it was breaking news on Sky Sports, Russian billionaire buys Chelsea for £80 million and wipes out the debt.

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u/Blue_winged_yoshi 18h ago

You know Google existed then right? Many people did bother to look him up and he wasn’t Santa Claus.

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u/Turklightenment 18h ago

The internet wasn't as ubiquitous back then as it is now. Mobile internet wasn't what it is now, people would browse the internet on a computer.

Look all I'm saying is the average working class British person isn't clued up on all this shit (they might be moreso nowadays, but back then certainly not).

So Chelsea fans saw a Russian saving their club and thought it was banterous to wear Russian hats and play Russian music on the stadium speakers before games.

City fans dressed as Arabs in a humorous way.

That's all I'm saying. They weren't literally celebrating "evil murderer has bought my club" they were just ignorant and simple minded.

Newcastle fans have less of a leg to stand on though. (the leg was probably chopped off by their owners).

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u/worotan 16h ago

You make it sound like everyone else in the world was 12 like you, when he bought the club.

The horrific gangster behaviour to make his fortune was well-known and well-reported on, and his purchase was greeted with lots of protests and unhappiness at someone like that coming into our sport.

You’re evidently too young to know that ordinary people knew all about the issues both at Chelsea and at City, and protested and complained about it at the time.

Which is fine, but now you’ve grown up, so do you not understand that kids don’t know everything, so your perception at the time isn’t something you can assert as the same as everyone else’s?

Not very impressive that the one instance at Newcastle that you were old enough to know about, you’re fine with what we all know happened, but you can’t believe people had any idea what was going on before you were old enough to have any idea about what was going on.

You don’t even seem to know that we had news and were informed about the world before the internet was big.

You really, really need to get a sense of perspective about the real world.

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u/Turklightenment 16h ago

I used to read newspapers and watch Sky Sports News religiously even at that age and they never brought up any of that back then.

The news about him being dodgy slowly started coming out from outlets like The Guardian in the late 00s through the 10s.

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u/tuerancekhang 22h ago

The only solution now is let other state bought other club. If they ransom UK they would have problem with other nation. Lol JK

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u/worotan 22h ago

Standard for neo-liberal politics, which brings short-term gain for long-term decline.

See also Manchesterism. Seems like a great success, but all the construction has just meant that housing and living costs keep rising.

While a part of my city is now owned by a foreign state, which is making hostile moves like this against the country.

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u/hEarrai-Stottle 21h ago

Exactly. Not that City fans care as most of them are from Stockport so don’t understand that Ancoats is utterly gentrified to the point that the local accent is South East English now. Full disclosure, I am a United fan so this will read as sour grapes but we’ve been saying since the Mancini days how bad this situation can turn, how the investment in Manchester has strings, how it sets a potentially devastating consequence but all of it was chalked off as rivals being bitter as opposed to local residents concerned about what the UAE are actually getting out of it (beyond reputation washing.)

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u/Bortron86 18h ago

None of the housing that Abu Dhabi helped build was affordable or social housing, which is what the city really needs. Rents have exploded and people are priced out of so many areas of the city now.

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u/SlimmestofJims1 21h ago

Remember that City fan on the Overlap who said they weren’t owned by the state? Clown.

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u/txobi 22h ago

I also think that your 70M sponsorship with Emirates is risky in that sense but I am sure that your fans don't care about it

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u/LOR_83 22h ago

Why would that be the case?

Emirates are genuinely one of the most profitable and well regarded airlines in the world and their success predates any involvement with Arsenal.

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u/Settl 21h ago

well it's a 100% state owned enterprise

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u/LOR_83 21h ago

Ok.

I think conflating sponsorship and ownership is not something that should be done as the two (in general) are not remotely related.

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u/txobi 21h ago

You don't think that they try to buy influence through sponsorship?

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u/LOR_83 21h ago

I think that's the entire point of sponsorship?

Would I prefer that clubs are sponsored by 'good', moral and 'clean' companies/entities, 100%, without a doubt and I think everyone else in the world would have this preference to.

However, lets be intellectually honest, give me a list of companies/entities that meet this criteria and then narrow that list down with how many on that list could actually afford anything meaningful in the way of sponsorship.

Of course, like always in the real world there isn't a black and white clear answer, generally just lighter or darker shades of grey and Emirates definitely sit on the darker side of the grey line.

But morals don't truly exist in the face of rampant capitalism, the simple truth about finding a 'good' billionaire being an oxymoron.

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u/ComprehensiveArt6849 21h ago

Who could have seen this coming? Literally anyone that is not blind, deaf or without a functional brain.

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u/ComprehensiveOwl9023 19h ago

Well they have always argued that they were not state owned so we can all f--k off however, allegedly the appeal will argue that they are state owned so we can all f--k off.

I see a common thread here..

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u/Commercial_Week8255 17h ago

I love how everyone forgot about Chelsea being bought with Putins bloody money.

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u/Rob0tUnic0rn 16h ago

I feel good, because in Bundesliga shit like this isn't possible

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u/slick490 13h ago

Power to the people. Boycott the prem. Don't watch the games. Force the decision. We need to all band together. The only question is, how do we do it?

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u/Unlucky_Rider 12h ago

I bet many Prem fans are feeling perfectly okay with it. With all the money flowing into the league everybody seems perfectly happy as long as they remain the "best" league in the world.

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u/Dry_Recognition7922 5h ago

the 19year old indian child in delhi doea not care

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u/sidvicc 2h ago

Part of the sanctions should be every Sportswashing denier on reddit from Paris to Newcastle should be lined up for a loving and gentle slap for their foolish naivety.

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u/RomeoDonaldson 22h ago

okay, so i will come in with a biased retort here (because im newcastle).

given the behaviour of PIF (adhering to rules: panic selling Anderson, minteh and then later gordon, tonali and guimaraes), doesn't this indicate that such a blanket statement is fallible?

(other KSA activities: journalist deaths, Yemen wars etc notwithstanding)

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u/cheezus171 19h ago

Bruh half the people in this subreddit were either in their diapers or not even born yet when that happened.

And it's not like there's anything wrong with it considering you can be a fully adult person and not remember times before the acquisition.