ESL Poll

Want to guage everyone's position, would be helpful to know who voted what and your reasoning

Against, but I'm curious to see how everything unfolds. I also don't think it would kill Football like some drama queens are claiming.

Against.

My reasoning?

For me, football is about competition and every explanation I have heard, this sounds less competitive.

Its dressed up as more competitive as you have to play more classically "big" teams but digging deeper there's various flaws to that because inclusion isnt decided upon merit.

Founding teams who cant be relegated is an absolute red flag.

Not allowing the various teams who put together 1 great season, a chance (due to limited spots available) to play in the highest competition, another red flag.

Things like Lyon's Benzema embarrassing Man Utd, teenage Shevchenko abusing Barca, Monaco's Mbappe bursting onto the scene, Porto winning it all, Ajax getting thisclose to the final after turning over Madrid and Juve along the way...and so many others over the years. No longer possible.

If teams like PSG, Bayern, Dortmund, Sevilla, Porto and co are not in. Another red flag when you consider who else (Arsenal, Milan, Spurs, looking at you) are in.

against. cant speak for others but disgusted that gazidis / singer has sold out 122 years of domestic history followed by 7 CL ; this club deserves better and we have made an irreversible mistake and enemies both domestically and european fronts overnight.

our football has to take it stand - from both business and sporting level on merits - even if it was meant as a purpose to make club successful from business point of view, the business integrity matters. over 13 years of deprivation has hurt fans but i didnt support milan since 1998 just to see this day being sold out without being given even a serious and kind consideration to our own fans, other clubs domestically and on european front. and the fact that this is not even open competition for everyone and the chosen ones - who dictates everything and not let anyone or any club win by sporting merit ...

should this ESL fail, imagine the repercussions waiting for the club a serious one ... but ultimately fans will pay big time -

time to check out bundesliga or eredivise or a possible dutch belgian merge

I'm against it, but at the same time I think it could be interesting since it's different. However, for this to be a success it would need some alterations and have to have a lot of things go in its favour, and the reality is it might not even get off the ground yet. So I guess I'll just wait and see.

I’m for it.

Current stuff is pretty boring overall. I’m all for a disruption of the status quo.

Also makes sense to innovate when there’s a huge looking financial crisis.

dont like that the founding teams have a guaranteed place every year. Diminishes the top 4 race in the leagues too. Now only winning the league means anything, and half of the teams involved in this wont be in with a realistic shot of winning the super league either

Which means most of us will face the reality of our season being over halfway through

morem importantly not a fan of how big it'll widen the gaps in the leagues, though in some leagues like Spain it'll hardly make a diff.

Against.

I’m for reform but this feels too radical. If anything we should be moving away from the economics instead of towards even more buying power.

Why can’t we focus more on regulating massive transfer fees, figuring out what the fuck VAR is and the other issues that are apparent in the sport

Also, a bit of irony in UEFA and FIFA feeling betrayed and bamboozled. They are Ja Rule in this story

Politics and money

Against.

Every argument "for" fails with the closed system for founders.

Want to shake up football and play more games between top teams? sure, that's exciting, but do it openly, based on merit and sporting results.

Gathering top teams and closing the door is ridiculous.

More money to higher ups? Nobody other than daughter of higher up will vote for.

UEFA is against it, Boris Johnson is against it, Ozil is against it. That means im for it.

Against.

It destroys my "purpose" of following the sport and my "belonging" with Liverpool FC.

Those "for" have probably never played a sport in their lives.

Three daughters of money bosses here? Pm me.

Harmonica are you lost? This isnt a Messi thread.

I'm on the fence.

It would be interesting to see this new concept for sure however I'd be equally okay if this idea were to be disbanded tomorrow

Also I'm not going to take a stand because there is too much hypocrisy on both sides.

Collblanc wrote:Harmonica are you lost? This isnt a Messi thread.

I think his brain will short-circuit soon.

He spent more than a decade believing it was Florentino + UEFA vs Barça, now he's finding out it was Florentino + Barça vs UEFA all along.

Against .

I think it's also overrated this charm about seeing many Real-United every year.

I don't care about it. I don't feel necessarily this international vision.

For me football consists on winning the league of your country (I hope to get this dream this year) , and Europe is a sort of beautiful adventure .

The match against Real Madrid is an event. Not the ordinary thing.

Before pandemia I also went at the stadiums, been in Rome, Bologna etc to watch Inter.

This is just a TV show. Moreover it's clear how clubs don't care about their fans, because most of fans dislike Superleague , clubs look at posers, occasional consumers that watch the Real-Liverpool on tv without a particular emotional interest. Bye fans, welcome posers. The americanization of this sport.

100% against.

Not entertaining an exclusive rich man club in any shape or form. This is what's wrong with the world: the rich are rich but they want to get richer, at the expense of the poor. Why innovate, be pragmatic with expenditure, invest in youth systems etc. when you can just set up ESL with a few signatures and boom you're rich overnight? This is what "top" CEOs do these days.

ESL will have adverse effects on football in medium term and will be catastrophic in the long term. Who is going to invest in grassroots football? Who is going to watch the lower leagues? Every small club that is nurturing young players and feeding the bigger clubs will run out of business, and with it football dies. It is what capitalism does best: increase revenue in the short term at the expense of its own long-term survival.

Instead I would do the exact opposite to make football more competitive: salary caps, transfer caps, limit on loaned players, fair distribution of TV rights, fan-owned clubs. The most beautiful thing about football isn't some oil rich club playing fullbacks in midfield because he's got such a stacked squad compared to the competition that he could even play me there and still trash the opposition, getting rave reviews of how "genius" the said coach is for such "revolutionary" tactical choices. No, it is the upsets that made us football fans, like when Greece won the Euros or Leicester won EPL. The close matches which went to the end, the late winners is why we love football. Not City winning 5-0 against West Brom.

Against.

I absolutely hate the concept of closed leagues. Also its pretty clear this whole scheme is to make rich clubs richer. Football on the grassroots level and smaller teams will suffer in the long term. Its pretty clear that the whole thing's ultimate goal is to increase shareholder profits of club owners.

And to all of the enlightened non-drama queens, care to explain why you think this won't kill football? When people say football will die its obvious that the sport will exist (and make more money and gain more "fans") its just that football as we know it will be dead. There's gonna be no Atalanta making the CL quarters, Porto/Monaco final, Leicester winning the league with the super league. This will morph football into a sport like the NBA, NFL.

Against. I would rather FIFA and UEFA make reforms and alter the format of their competitions but ESL is too radical.

Corruption was and is always there and as much as there is a lot UEFA can be criticised for, this rich mans club thing is just ridiculous and not a move in the right direction. It's great for the couple CEOs who actually made the decision. But I dont see how this a change for the better for fans. Only for casuals maybe.

Against.

I'm not on the side of FIFA, UEFA, the FA, or any of these crappy institutions, but I can't get behind a system that promises to centralise wealth and power in a small group of clubs.

If football has become boring, it's because the wealth is concentrated at the top and the spread of talent has become thinner as a result. The best players are immediately hoovered up by the elite clubs. These are the things the sport need to address. Yet, the ESL promises to double down on this instead. Spending unsustainably? Doesn't matter, they're going to have even more money. A promising player comes through else where? He'll be in the ESL in no time.

That's the sad thing about it all for me. Monaco 2016/17, or Ajax 2018/19 - teams made out of bright young players who made surprisingly deep runs in Europe and were really exciting to watch, will no longer have the opportunity to do that again, because they're not invited. A rising club like Atalanta will no longer have the chance to compete with the best because the best have decided Atalanta aren't prestigious enough or big enough to compete with them. Nor will they get the chance to become big enough because guess where all the money is? With the founding members of the ESL.

So the status quo remains, in the end. Once the novelty of a new competition wears off, you'll be left with the same clubs competing at the top domestically and continentally, only now the new clubs, or the next tier of clubs (your Sevillas, Romas, Napolis, etc.) have an even smaller chance of disrupting that.

I mean ffs, the PL has West Ham and Leicester competing for a Champions League place and deserve it more than certain clubs purely on merit. Trading this away for a guaranteed top six every season goes against everything I love about football.

Imagine being so afraid of competition you just crush it instead. That's not what sport is about.

Just wanted to add:

I know for a fact Arsenal will not be competitive in this. They will turn up, collect their money and call it a day.

I think it'll be the same for the majority of the founding members. Only a small few are going to be fussed about competing for the trophy itself.

Once the chance of winning it goes away, you're going to get a lot of dead rubber games, with tired players, playing for clubs who really aren't interested in being competitive.

Against. So far the only fans I've seen defend this are Real ones ,which only confirms what we have known for a long time: a substantial portion of their fan base has trash cans for a heart .

/s

Against

I am not very curious to see how it goes because the game remains the same with a slight increase in quality. The sum of intrinsic talent in Superleague will be superior to anything we've ever seen
To the cost of hundreds european clubs will suffer financially, domestic leagues will exist strictly for youth development. A lot of decent careers will be wasted on the bench as there is no competitive of financial motivation for a B+ player to sign for Roma as example. So no guarantees for football in general only for a dozen clubs already rich. If football was all about showtime for me i'd probably be excited, but far from it i feel robbed of the charm of football.