Rival Watch

It should not be a surprise to anyone following European and English football that ESL is back. They now propose a so called competitive series of leagues which promotion and relegation and no guaranteed places.With 60-80 teams involved.

What is the driver for this? The dominance of the English premiership in global football. The Broadcasting income dwarfs anything any of the other leagues can command and it could be argued that globally only the matches between the really big clubs in the knockout stages of the CL can match live EPL matches in terms of audience . Basically we are seeing the premiership not only eclipsing the individual leagues but the CL itself. No wonder the likes of Barcelona Real Madrid Juventus are casting an envious eye and saying “We’ll have some of that!”.

The trouble for the proposed ESL is that they really need the premiership clubs to join. But why would they quit such a lucrative set up? And With 60+ teams, who globally would want to pay to watch Rennes v Storm Graz , with all due respect?

In fact the way it’s going even more money is and will be pumped into the English game. Witness Chelsea and in future Newcastle and possibly Utd (new oil money?)

 

@Schlem Boogerman

I know the tags don't work but

 

I do not think ESL will be successful anymore if the premiership can successful deal with financial doping with a strong hand like by relegating city and imposing say a 3 season transfer ban.There is no incentive for the english clubs to join anymore and also they have all signed new contracts which would enable strong legal action against them further more i feel the only ESL that can survive is a replacement of the champions league with better refereeing and a bigger share of the profits to participating clubs as well as a far better enforced FFP.

 

I can’t see UEFA voting for their own demise. The ESL is the means the likes of Real Madrid Juventus Barcelona are hoping to increase their revenues. The original idea of having only elite teams and no relegation was to keep global interest high with big team matches. However in countering the non competitive argument by increasing the number of participants to 60+ they immediately destroy their original argument against the CL. Which was too many uninteresting matches between unknown uninteresting teams from non glamorous European leagues. The ESL have had to propose the same types of matches to include competition. There is hardly any more attractive points in the ESL proposal for the viewing public.

 

Not been a bad day all round for us today. Will we take advantage of it though, fck knows.

 

It’s a guarantee we drop points.

 

I don't think it is.

True test of the manager this. After mid week, how we go about this will be a reflection of him.

I'm pretty confident we'll reverse it.

I take it this is on Sky or summat ffs?

 

I knew that would be Chief's response

On paper we should. Had we our full strength midfield out I'd be more confident.

Still think we could fck it up.

A couple of early goals (for us preferably) would be helpful.

 

Got to be confident!

If I can see a way round Casemiro being missing, then I'm pretty sure Ten Hag can.

He'll have realised he made a few selection and positional mistakes in the week and change things.

Could do with wan Bissaka being back.

 

Referees and VAR yet again cannot see the wood for the trees.

How a penalty wasn’t given for a blatant “save “ by Soucek in the WEH-CHE match is unbelievable. The guy dropped to the ground to his left and diverted the ball. Because he used the same hand to cushion his fall VAR saw that as acceptable and no foul. But why was he falling in the first place, with no one within 5 yards of him ? What was his intention?

The stupidity of VAR referees is becoming more apparent as the season progresses.

 

Terrible wasn’t it. Though West Ham had a perfectly good one ruled out as they had drawn the line not on the last defender.

I just hope we win today and make the most of everyone dropping points.

 

Don’t get me wrong. Really pleased that Chelsea as one of the key contenders have dropped 2 points. And that Spurs continue being Spursy.

Good for Utd who are themselves not exactly pulling up trees atm. We’ve had too many misses so the earlier we can nail that 4th place the better.

 

Apparently City fans are worried about Haaland’s fitness for their Arsenal clash. I think they play better without him without a true 9. Since they’ve played the target man their game has been less effective IMO. As long as they rediscover last seasons form.

 

City are still contenders no doubt but their problem has been two fold imo.

Selling off the likes of Jesus, Cancelo, Zhincenko, and possibly even Sterling. Most of those are good quality squad/first team players.

The second being Pep trying to be too clever and coming up with silly formations and players out of position.

If they'd done neither of those, then I don't believe Haaland playing or not playing would've made any difference.

 

The match absolutely crucial to Arsenal’s chances of the title. A swing of 6 points. A defeat and their morale will take a severe pounding which could be difficult to recover from. A win and they put daylight between them and City.

A draw better for Arsenal than City who surely must go for the 3 points. A draw is ideal for Utd (who are admittedly a very very very long shot)

 

I think we should all quietly hope for a draw.

Although I agree with the idea that should City win then Arsenal's house of cards will probably (predictably) topple.

It would put a fair bit of distance between them (City) and us though.

 

They still play each other twice in the league don't they?

Massive swing possible either way.

If we can finish above either one, that would be an incredible achievement.

 

In the next couple of weeks we've got Leicester at home. Tough game, but at home.

During that period Arsenal have City at home, Villa away, Leicester away, Everton at home, Bournemouth at home, before we even play another league game.

I can genuinely see Arsenal dropping points in all of those games, bar the Bournemouth one. We'll see where we are then I guess, as our next game is then Liverpool away.

 

Jesus is a big loss for them. Nketiah has turned to pants again.

Interesting to see how they respond if they lose to City. Will their "mental strength" in the words of Wenger be strong enough.

 

We have to thank Lee Mason for making the title challenge more interesting.

But having said how can he carry on with his job which is only as a VAR when either he is really stupid or like Arteta said he simply doesn’t understand his job? Agree with Arteta on the latter. What’s worse is the overall VAR is led by Neil Swarbrick who made that horrendous error with the soucek clear handball and penalty. How can he lead and guide others when he himself doesn’t seem to understand the job?

Lee mason has had many previous. Last season he made loads of senseless decisions as a pitch referee and as VAR . One that particularly comes to mind is that clear foul on DeGea against Burnley that Mason gave as a goal.