Boring Boring Football

[Brian Taylor]

Got to say I agree with you for the most part.When you consider that a Russian team whose name I cant even pronounce and never heard of is now buying up the likes of Etto and the like and can basically buy whoever they like and pay them more in a week that im likely to earn in a lifetime then from a moral point of view its most definately wrong. The likes of people like Shankley,Revie,Saunders,Clough who built teams from sheer know how and from the ground up is long gone to be replaced by chequebook power and not much else.

I recently read a book about Revie's Leeds and it was fascinating to read about how he took  a side at the bottom of Division 2 in 1961 to the brink of the League and Cup double four years later, and needless to say his success had absolutely nothing to do with money. Leeds were just lucky enough to appoint a genius (albeit a flawed one) as their manager and in those days that's pretty much all it took and what a great game football was in England for that reason. A game where supporters could always live in hope.


 

Agree totally..and it was fun!

[Californian Villain]

I've been utterly bored by football this season, too. It's nothing to do with Saturday's result, I've been like this from the kick off of the first match.

It is all just so predictable and unexciting.

I haven't watched MOTD once this season. In fact, I generally turn it over if it comes on.

It's not to do with Villa so much as the sport as a whole.

This is pretty much how I've felt for the last few years, but his year I actually canceled my cable TV....for the last 6-7 years I've been able to watch any ELP match I wanted live (provided I could get out of bed!) and I've watched a ton, but now it's gone I've not missed it, seriously. I'm even reading the sports pages less, the sport as a whole just seems so.....boring. 

[Deano58]

Which is why I welcome the new UEFA legislation thats on the cards in a couple of seasons. A club will only be allowed to spend what it earns,I suppose its to stop bankruptcy happening. Not sure i would agree with 'when the league was more competitive' either. You would have to go way back to the 70's early 80's when 'lesser' clubs the like of Derby, ourselves,Ipswich,Forest all had good teams but none of them could sustain it. Its only ever been Liverpool Manure,Chelsea,Arsenal and now more recently Man City in the last 30 years that have ever been in with a chance of winning the title.
Saying that,it is no doubt a real pisser to see the England team littered with ex-Villa players.

I would be careful what you wish for here. Platini's Fiancial Fair Play Regulations are simply designed to protect the status quo and keep clubs like Villa out of the Champions League. A simple illustration of the point is that if Platini was serious about a level playing field, income from the Champions league would be excluded from any calculations concerning profitability because it immediately means that those clubs in the CL when the rules are implemented would immediately be £40m a year better off than those who aren't. Similarly, income would have to be adjusted to take account of the greater sposorship and advertsining opportunities offered by participating. that, of course isn't on offer.

So how do you get into that select group. Well, you could find a very wealthy benefactor who is prepared to inject hundreds of millions to enable you to get to a point where you stand a chance of breaking into the privileged club. Sadly, however, that's now been outlawed because you would have to have the sort of fanbase that can only be gained from success over 10-20 years to sustain that sort of operation but you've only got 3 years (if you start today) to do it and break even.   

On the other hand, you could develop your youth team and hope against hope that you can build enough of a nucleus of Champions League standard players without their being poached by the clubs already in the Champions League I guess. But then again, you would have to compete for recruitment with all the richest clubs and the resources they plough into identifying (and poaching) youngsters.

No. Platini's regulations are to keep the likes of Villa, Man City and other similar sized clubs well away from the top table

[Matt Collins]

Agreed. Campaigned for and won by the existing elite and designed to pull up the trap door

[5ft811st2 Durham]

Which is why I welcome the new UEFA legislation thats on the cards in a couple of seasons. A club will only be allowed to spend what it earns,I suppose its to stop bankruptcy happening. Not sure i would agree with 'when the league was more competitive' either. You would have to go way back to the 70's early 80's when 'lesser' clubs the like of Derby, ourselves,Ipswich,Forest all had good teams but none of them could sustain it. Its only ever been Liverpool Manure,Chelsea,Arsenal and now more recently Man City in the last 30 years that have ever been in with a chance of winning the title.
Saying that,it is no doubt a real pisser to see the England team littered with ex-Villa players.

I would be careful what you wish for here. Platini's Fiancial Fair Play Regulations are simply designed to protect the status quo and keep clubs like Villa out of the Champions League. A simple illustration of the point is that if Platini was serious about a level playing field, income from the Champions league would be excluded from any calculations concerning profitability because it immediately means that those clubs in the CL when the rules are implemented would immediately be £40m a year better off than those who aren't. Similarly, income would have to be adjusted to take account of the greater sposorship and advertsining opportunities offered by participating. that, of course isn't on offer.

So how do you get into that select group. Well, you could find a very wealthy benefactor who is prepared to inject hundreds of millions to enable you to get to a point where you stand a chance of breaking into the privileged club. Sadly, however, that's now been outlawed because you would have to have the sort of fanbase that can only be gained from success over 10-20 years to sustain that sort of operation but you've only got 3 years (if you start today) to do it and break even.   

On the other hand, you could develop your youth team and hope against hope that you can build enough of a nucleus of Champions League standard players without their being poached by the clubs already in the Champions League I guess. But then again, you would have to compete for recruitment with all the richest clubs and the resources they plough into identifying (and poaching) youngsters.

No. Platini's regulations are to keep the likes of Villa, Man City and other similar sized clubs well away from the top table

Totally agree.  I can see no distinction between a billionaire benefactor ploughing money into a club and multinational companies doing it under the guise of sponsership. Each gives the beneficiary a totally unfair and undeserved competative advantage.

[john e]

Got to say I agree with you for the most part.When you consider that a Russian team whose name I cant even pronounce and never heard of is now buying up the likes of Etto and the like and can basically buy whoever they like and pay them more in a week that im likely to earn in a lifetime then from a moral point of view its most definately wrong. The likes of people like Shankley,Revie,Saunders,Clough who built teams from sheer know how and from the ground up is long gone to be replaced by chequebook power and not much else.

I recently read a book about Revie's Leeds and it was fascinating to read about how he took  a side at the bottom of Division 2 in 1961 to the brink of the League and Cup double four years later, and needless to say his success had absolutely nothing to do with money. Leeds were just lucky enough to appoint a genius (albeit a flawed one) as their manager and in those days that's pretty much all it took and what a great game football was in England for that reason. A game where supporters could always live in hope.


 

Agree totally..and it was fun!

these posts sum up for me what i find is the single and biggest change in football over the years

[timeoutbigbar]

I don't agree with what city are doing, but other teams have done it on a lesser scale in the past.  Still don't believe anyone who says they'd be complaining if we were top of the league tonight and had the players they had.

[Ross]

I don't agree with what city are doing, but other teams have done it on a lesser scale in the past.  Still don't believe anyone who says they'd be complaining if we were top of the league tonight and had the players they had.

I'm not sure you are right.  I know a few old skool Man City fans who are very uneasy about it all.  Their club has changed beyond recognition and doesn't feel like Man City to many of them. Not everyone is interested in Champions League glory, some just want to go somewhere familiar with their mates once a fortnight and enjoy a match.

[dave.woodhall]

I don't agree with what city are doing, but other teams have done it on a lesser scale in the past.  Still don't believe anyone who says they'd be complaining if we were top of the league tonight and had the players they had.

I honestly don't think I'd enjoy it. When your owners can buy any player in the world, what does winning prove?

[Nigel Macdougall]

Those of us who have lived through and witnessed the years of "real football" just have to count ourselves lucky,the days of Ron Saunders and his kind will never be repeated. I still go now out of some misguided loyalty,I suppose,but with a sense of sorrow, feeling the young fans of today will never know what our experience of the game was like ?

[Vanilla]

I don't agree with what city are doing, but other teams have done it on a lesser scale in the past.  Still don't believe anyone who says they'd be complaining if we were top of the league tonight and had the players they had.

I honestly don't think I'd enjoy it. When your owners can buy any player in the world, what does winning prove?

A bit like saving up for your Panini stickers when at school. Desperately needing certain players and doing secret deals and swaps in the playground as though they were contraband. Taking weeks on end to complete it, and still needing that last one or two.

Then there was always some kid whose parents bought about 100 packets of stickers in one go and he would complete it over a weekend.

[PeterWithesShin]

I don't agree with what city are doing, but other teams have done it on a lesser scale in the past.  Still don't believe anyone who says they'd be complaining if we were top of the league tonight and had the players they had.

I honestly don't think I'd enjoy it. When your owners can buy any player in the world, what does winning prove?

It's a tough one. Part of me thinks i'd hate it, but then I think of another 20-30 following the Villa and never moving much either up or down from 8-12th and hoping for a cup run and that just depresses me.

[Salsa Party Animal]

I would like to follow Barcelona method if I were to run football club. Man City, Real Madrid and co is not correct way

[KevinGage]

I'm sure it's genuine when a number of our lot say they wouldn't enjoy it -or it's somehow devalued if you just spend, spend, spend as per Citeh.


I get it.  But as far as I'm concerned, if that was Villa, I think I could live with it.  In 50 years time, If our trophy haul was vastly increased there won't be a suffix saying 'they spent their way back into contention.'

The back into is key.  We already have a storied history, so we wouldn't be a nothing club who suddenly got lucky.

For the good of the game though, I'd be quite happy with any new rulings passed that prevented us -or any other club- going that route.  AFL seems to have a decent balance.  Appalling game to watch, and I don't really get the point of finishing top of the league over a season and then losing to a side finshed 7th- who are then crowned Champions.   No relegation is a non starter for me too.

But there does seem to still be a crucial sporting aspect to the whole thing -that good management and clever draft picks can build a formidable side up over a number of years.  There isn't the same high turnover of star players (lesser players might have quite a worrying time of it though)  and the richest side (Collingwood)  isn't automatically the best.  There does seem to be a degree of rotation as to who wins the biggest prize of all too - meaning that fans of pretty much all the sides in the comp may envisage a day when their lot may win the thing.

Anything that replicates the better elements of this and the Bundesliga would get my vote. But unless the big 4 fack off and agree to play each other on Grand Slam Super Spunkday every week (here's hoping) I fail to see how we could bring any degree of fairness and equality back to the sport.  It would be like turkeys voting for Christmas.

[nick harper]

I would like to follow Barcelona method if I were to run football club. Man City, Real Madrid and co is not correct way

But they benefit from being able to negotiate their own tv deal and therefore generate  millions more in revenue than all other teams in the league bar Real Madrid. So although their ownership model may be more attractive, they do not play on anything like on a level playing field.