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Man City banned from Champions League for two Years

Discussion in 'Watford' started by duggie2000, Feb 14, 2020.

  1. duggie2000

    duggie2000 Well-Known Member

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    The authorities finally caught up with them for poaching Watfords best young players
    Not the only ones of course but the investigation started over the transfer of Jadon Sancho
     
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  2. yorkshirehornet

    yorkshirehornet Well-Known Member

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    They deserve it...
     
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  3. colognehornet

    colognehornet Well-Known Member

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    The owners of this club represent everything which is rotten in modern football, and deserve everything which is meted out to them - and more. This may result in Pep going at the end of the year (if this wasn't on the cards anyway) - a thoroughly decent man who never should have been involved with this shower. Things are not currently rosy at Barcelona when it comes to manager popularity and if they don't win anything this year then the job will be open for him there - back to a 'real' club with footballing owners (ie. the fans). Methinks some of the players may be making the same journey in his wake.
     
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  4. duggie2000

    duggie2000 Well-Known Member

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    Fingers crossed
     
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  5. colognehornet

    colognehornet Well-Known Member

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    Aren't all of their present titles tainted as a result of this decision <laugh> Like Liverpool are the real defending champions and we are the rightfull cup holders !
     
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  6. duggie2000

    duggie2000 Well-Known Member

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    That would be poetic justice
    Imagine the Gallagher brothers total meltdown
     
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  7. Markthehorn

    Markthehorn Well-Known Member

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    Not sure it's directly because they nicked young players like Chelsea did but probably have done naughty thing too many..

    Seems they have even been prepared for it but didn't expect such a ban.

    https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...ed-from-champions-league-two-seasons-ffp-uefa

    Probably get the ban reduced anyway ..always seems to happen eg. Chelsea.

    Their fans seem to hate the Champions league so won't miss it.
     
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    Last edited: Feb 14, 2020
  8. andytoprankin

    andytoprankin Well-Known Member

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    <laugh> Yes! They give gold medals to those silver medalists cheated at the Olympics. They get the chance to receive it at a podium, too. I propose we all head back to Wembley to lift the cup.
    :1980_boogie_down:
     
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  9. oldfrenchhorn

    oldfrenchhorn Well-Known Member
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    As we have seen in other sports, Saracens, football has become distorted through the volume of money going to the largest clubs, while the rest are left to fight for the crumbs. Second tier rugby union is in crisis as their funding from on high is slashed. Bury FC have gone bust, but with a more even distribution of money coming into the game might not have done. There is a very good thoughtful article about just how these riches are shared especially from Uefa, and you can either say everything is fine and doesn't bother me, or you can look further down the road and watch football structures split even more, which will mean less clubs. Some small towns especially in England have their local team at the very heart of the community, so lose the club and that town suffers as well.

    https://www.independent.co.uk/sport...l-man-utd-barcelona-real-madrid-a9334826.html
     
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  10. colognehornet

    colognehornet Well-Known Member

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    Interesting text Frenchie. It should be noted about the German 50+1 system. This applies to all clubs apart from a couple of exceptions ie. clubs which always had a corporate background such as Bayer Leverkusen. Germany is simply not open to millionaire takeovers of clubs - Bayern Munich belongs to Bayern Munich it is as simple as that, but the club has over 100,000 members which introduces another uneven playing field. However, Bundesliga crowds are the biggest in Europe and the match day experience is far superior to anything found in the Premiership - although the overall quality on the pitch is probably not as good. The tendency in Spain is towards the fan ownership model with big clubs such as Barcelona and Real Madrid being, effectively, fan owned. So really the Pozzo's went to England because all other avenues were becoming closed. England is the easiest country for a multi millionaire to come in, buy a club, and use it as their 'plaything'. We need a new definition of exactly what a 'club' is (more similar to the German model). Football clubs in Germany are seen as a 'Kulturgut' ie. a cultural asset of the town where they are located (you cannot just buy them at will) - if you have a match day ticket then you get free public transport to and from matches (at least within the region) as if it were a cultural event such as going to the theatre. The move towards combined leagues such as Belgian/Dutch, or Scandinavian etc. is a desparate attempt to rebalance the strength of the big five leagues and draw great clubs such as Ajax, Anderlecht, Celtic or Benfica back into the elite of European football - but this is at the expense of smaller clubs in those countries, who would slide backwards.
     
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  11. oldfrenchhorn

    oldfrenchhorn Well-Known Member
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    I think it is well known that the Pozzo's went to England because of firstly the money that was in the top flight there unlike Spain and Italy. Another thing that I believe was behind it was the stricter controls over a town's involvement as seen over the complex situation when they wanted to update the stadium at Udinese.
    We talk a lot about the top teams, indeed the top six teams in the EPL, but it didn't used to be like that. There was far more chance of you following a successful side such as Blackpool, Bolton or Blackburn in the past as their success on the field was due more to the playing ability of the team, rather than the riches of some investment scheme to provide the highest return possible. They had their ups and downs, but the route back up is now very much harder because of the way that finances are so unevenly spread.
    In France we only have the two fully professional leagues, but most of those are owned by the towns that they play in with large supporter groups involved. This is becoming imbalanced though as the larger clubs are taking the route of allowing outside investors to come in. To my mind there is a conflict of interest when the owner of Paris SG is also the owner of the largest pay per view sports channel. Of course he wants to see his club on TV more than others, so has invested heavily in the club, and investigations are underway to see if it really is all above board.
    I do think you have to be very blinkered to believe that all is well just because your team is riding a wave currently. WFC are probably very lucky that history shows the Pozzo family are actually interested in football, and not only the balance sheet at the end of the season.
     
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  12. colognehornet

    colognehornet Well-Known Member

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    Unfortunately you can't go back to the days when we started to support our local team Frenchie - the youth of today can watch TV football 7 days of the week. We were confined to match of the day on Saturday night (for those that had a TV) - todays 'fans' see the Ronaldo's and the Messi's of this World at any time of choosing and are less interested in trotting down to watch their local team. Most places in Europe did not suffer from the demographical changes which the UK suffered in the past - many of those towns in the north became depopulated during the 80s, and their fan base suffered as a result. Yesterday's fan lived within walking distance of his local stadium - I would suggest that most of us did, but where are we now ? If that is true for us how much more is that the case for old ex industrial towns such as Oldham ? Football in the UK. has also failed to attract the new immigrant populations of many old ex working class areas. If football really was a creation of the industrial working class in England then it's worth while looking at the implications for football of the disappearance of that class.
     
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  13. oldfrenchhorn

    oldfrenchhorn Well-Known Member
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    I agree that we cannot put the clock back, and don't want to. What I do want to see though is football spreading the money around in a much fairer way. This would give those small town clubs a chance to provide a better product, how I hate that term applied to football, and give the young players a better chance of creating a career out of the game. Not only would this be good for the clubs at the bottom end of the gravy train, it might also encourage people to take an interest and actually go to games. The star players would still be stars, but if they were paid a few hundred thousand a year less, would they stop playing? Maybe the way things are going we might finish up watching the Chinese Super League highlights before too long.
     
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  14. duggie2000

    duggie2000 Well-Known Member

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    Update on the cheats
    If the PL investigation uncovers as much as they think it could Man City could get a Luton style points deduction or even straight relegation to league two
     
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  15. andytoprankin

    andytoprankin Well-Known Member

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    That sound you can hear is the country licking its lips... :emoticon-0116-evilg
     
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  16. yorkshirehornet

    yorkshirehornet Well-Known Member

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    May it be so.. The PL is such a poor model for the national game.. All cheats should pay the price.. Look what happened to Rangers And Saracens..
     
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  17. colognehornet

    colognehornet Well-Known Member

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    Basically the PL is just as much at fault as Man City are Yorkie. City were operating in a national structure which largely ignores financial irregularities. So the question is whether City will be replaced in the Champions League or whether the Premier League allocation will be cut to 3 clubs as a result. If, as a result of this, the fifth placed Premiership club slides into the champions League automatically whereas champions from other countries have to qualify then you can expect eruptions in places like Amsterdam and Bruges.
     
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  18. superhorns

    superhorns Well-Known Member

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    The football interest around the world is mainly concentrated on the Premier league apart from the two main Spanish sides. It is broadcast weekly to 188 countries worldwide. The 'Premflix idea to provide an individual EPL club streaming service may, or may not, be trialled in Singapore. Experts suggest it may work in the Far East but no other sports streaming service has ever made a profit. It is also agreed the present Sky / BT Sports set up will continue for a long time as everybody benefits from such a guaranteed lucrative arrangement. The EPL is so popular because it has the best players and strong teams way down the table. None of this will change in the foreseeable future. The match day experience at Watford is excellent, thanks to the Pozzos and Murdoch's cash.
     
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  19. colognehornet

    colognehornet Well-Known Member

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    What does this have to do with whether the Premier League keeps 4 places in the Champions League SH ?
     
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  20. superhorns

    superhorns Well-Known Member

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    Nothing, it just explains why the EPL is vastly better than other top leagues in Wurope.
     
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  21. superhorns

    superhorns Well-Known Member

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    Just watching excellent open game on Sky, Villa v Spurs
     
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