Nowadays most of ‘em sheep are Chelski supporters, for some strange reason. Abramovich seems to have bought (with repayments) half of Asia too. Arsenal play the beautiful game at it’s best while Man Utd just grind it out without the need to pass to each other 420 times. Liverpool..give ‘em a year or two and we’ll be going ‘Liverpool who?’ ..Must be a L thing like:- Leeds?!

& please just settle all this crap and have the 39th games in Aus (technically:- Oceania). Asia doesnt wan’t any of it, nor the States. Stuff you lot then! AUSSIE AUSSIE AUSSIE

I’m all for it. Wouldnt mind checkin out Old Trafford sometime in the future though

Now I know there are MANY (many many) reasons to be against it, and I completely understand why anyone would want to go against it – but just for fun sake I’m going FOR

Still, it’s a workable solution.

r u mental. the only people who do that r creeps who support winning teams only( like most, not all i admit, manchester utd fans).

get ur facts right. i’m mauritian n half the populace here r lfc(the other half manu). chelsea n even arsenal get little support even though we’re africans….

u’ll never walk alone………..

Grrrr!

Here’s what it should have been (nearly)…

A good portion of this thread seems to have become about who is and is not a real fan of their club and whether foreign based fans should have an opportunity to see their team play a competitive league game close to where they live. I can see that argument from both sides really, and I don’t really want to re-hash it again. For me though, there are two main problems with this particular proposal:

1. It unbalances the symmetry of the league where each team plays each other team home & away. This is the way the English league has worked for 116 years. It’s fair and equitable in it’s sporting purity. After each team has played 38 games, the one with the most points can justifiably claim to be the best team in that league. That is one of the factors which, over the years, has made it a great competition – one with an attraction to sports fans around the world.

Suppose that over the other 38 games Man United collected 85 pts and Arsenal collected 84, both beat Fulham home and away in those 38 games, but both draw/lose to Spurs. Then imagine United are drawn to play Spurs in Miami and Arsenal to play Fulham in Cape Town. If the games go the same way as before, Arsenal leapfrog United.

Can Arsenal fans be proud of having won the league that year?

2. The SOLE motivation is to increase market share and make more money.

In #58, BD Conwell said “I can remember people opposing shirt sponsorship, Pay per View TV, and the whole concept of the Premier League itself but then, with all progress, a lot of people have to be dragged kicking and screaming through every change.”

Well I would argue with any of those changes actually being “progress”.
Sure, they’ve all brought extra money into the English game, but they have also all favoured the more high-profile clubs for one reason or another.

The real watershed was the breakaway of the Premier League from the Football League, forced through by the then “Big 5″ (Arsenal, Everton, Liverpool, Manchester United and Spurs) and sanctioned by the FA (supposedly the guardian of All English football – international, professional, amateur & schools – due to petty political rivalry with the League). Prior to that, the TV money was more equitably shared between all clubs in the 92 club league as well as helping to fund “grassroots” football. Not only did the TV money get shared around, a percentage of gate money was paid to the away team, and a further percentage to the League for distribution down the football ‘pyramid’.

This is the structure which allowed English teams to dominate European competitions in the 70’s and early 80’s when the likes of Nottingham Forest and Aston Villa won European Cups, and the likes of Derby County won the league.

The league structure built competitiveness into the English game and allowed well-managed, well-coached teams to become successful. For all the progress since then, only 4 teams have ever won the Premier League, and only 4 teams have a chance of winning it in the foreseeable future.

So BD, yes, some of us did oppose the formation of the Premier League, some of us did argue that it would be bad for the game as a whole.

And some of us think that this proposal is another step in the same direction which will lead to still further concentration of riches at the top clubs and still further undermining of the league as a competition. Do you think that would be progress?

Finally, I’ve already heard ’suits’ from the EPL and some clubs claim that part of the motivation for this proposal is to ‘grow the game’ and give fans in other parts of the world ‘access’ to live Premier League games. Expect this to be the party line as the marketing campaign for this move goes forward – “We’ve got so many fans worldwide, we just want to give a little something back”, etc.

Do you really think they really care about ‘the game’? Do they care about kids in Asia or Africa developing their skills and enjoying the game? Do they care about the existing teams in the places this travelling show will visit? Do they really care at all about ‘the fans’?

Or do they just want to take more money off you?