I’ll hold my hands up & say I didn’t pay much attention to these rules at first. I just thought it was a good thing that premier league clubs wouldn’t be able to spend recklessly. After doing a bit of digging they basically seem like a scam just to keep the status quo as it is. Villa having to sell their best player Douglas Luiz before 30th June to balance the books for last season even though they’ve got champions league revenue coming next season. And this with clubs having to sell academy players as it is ‘pure profit’ is awful. I was just reading about Newcastle selling Elliot Anderson to Forest & how it is financially beneficial to them to sell him for pure profit as he’s come through their academy than someone who hasn’t. How on earth can that be right & good for football? Surely the rules should encourage academy players staying with their local clubs? He’s a local lad from Whitley Bay & apparently the club didn’t want to sell him & he didn’t want to go. Just seems a ridiculous situation. He’s not the only one. Lots of other clubs are doing similar. Hopefully they’ll scrap these rules & get something better in place that encourages clubs to keep their academy players.
The Chelsea/Villa player "swap" is the worst offender. Villa buy Maatsen off Chelsea for 30 odd million. Chelsea buy some kid off Villa for 20 odd million. Both incoming fees go straight onto the books as pure profit, whereas both outgoing fees can be spread over the cost of the length of each players contracts. And knowing Chelsea, this kid will be on a 12 year contract. Football is just the worst.
Thing is, I dont really blame them. The rules / guidelines are clearly able to be manipulated bud. Its stupid. I agree though. Football is the worst.
And they are saying the prices are inflated deliberately to affect the Fair play rules The example I read was along lines of: Player X worth £2m, player Y £4m so £2m difference to pay. Sell player X for £20m & player Y for £22m still only £2m to pay over years but increases significantly ‘profit’.
Everyone knows my take on it. If I'm a billionaire and own a football club. I want to spend what I want on it. Bugger the competition, that's their problem.
How is that good for sport? And would you feel the same way if there was only one billionaire interested in football and he bought Wednesday, and then they won every competition going for the next thirty years?
I'd put personal prejudice to one side and accept the situation. Not invent rules that widen the gap and hinder the chance of bridging the gap financially.
The thing with that though, is that if you get bored and leave, then what happens? If you die and your relatives decide they don't want to own the club then what happens? There's a massive wage bill and the club starts into a massive downward spiral. Leeds and Portsmouth are prime examples of this. There has to be some kind of ruling or protection in place. I don't know what these are mind.
And Villa are rewarding their fans with a respectful £73 a ticket for Cat A matches this coming season. The working man's game.[/QUOTE][/QUOTE]