Top Clubs Consider Overseas League Games

Clockender

Clockender

is back...but for how long?
27 November 2001
East Lower, Block 13
Arsenal FC
Top Clubs Consider Overseas Games


Top clubs consider overseas games

The English Premier League is considering playing some matches overseas, BBC Sport has learned.
At a meeting in London on Thursday, all 20 clubs agreed to explore a proposal to extend the season to 39 games.
Those 10 extra games would be played at venues around the world, with cities bidding for the right to stage them.
It is understood the additional fixtures could be determined by a draw but that the top-five teams could be seeded to avoid playing each other.

It is unlikely any decision will be taken before the Premier League's annual summer meeting in June, but any changes could come into effect for the 2010/11 season.

Points from those extra games would count towards the final league table.

Should the proposal get the go-ahead, cities in Asia, Middle East and North America are likely to show a strong interest in hosting the extra games.

It is believed each venue would host two matches over a weekend.

BBC sports editor Mihir Bose says the Premier League's decision to explore such a move is a "logical" one.

"The growth of the Premier League has been impressive in the last 15 years thanks to the sale of television rights in this country," he said.

"But now the market in the United Kingdom is becoming saturated and it is the overseas market which is now the big target area."

The Premier League's income from the sale of overseas TV rights has already increased from £178m in 2001 to £625m for the current deal that runs until 2010.

Broadcaster NowTV paid around £100m for the rights to Hong Kong alone.

Premier League games are broadcast to over 600m homes in 202 countries worldwide, while an estimated 1bn people watched the Premier League game between Manchester United and Arsenal in November 2007.

A number of top-flight clubs already play matches around the world as they seek to capitalise on the huge global interest in the English game.

Manchester United have millions of fans in China
Man Utd make regular visits to Asia and are proving a big hit in China

Manchester United are regular visitors to Asia, Middle East and America while other clubs are beginning to follow their lead.

"This is a chance for the Premier League to showcase its product around the world," added Bose.

"Some fans may feel aggrieved, but their concerns will be outweighed by the financial advantages for the clubs.

"The clubs will see this as a chance to make more money so they can invest in new facilities and better players."

However, a spokesman for the Football Supporters Federation suggested there would be a huge backlash to the Premier League's plan.

"I'm fairly confident in predicting that the overwhelming majority of football supporters will be totally opposed to this proposal," Malcolm Clarke told the BBC.

"This is yet another case of the PL threatening the tradition of our game simply to follow money.

What I want to do is put a challenge to the Premier League to abandon this completely if the majority of supporters turn out to be against it

Malcolm Clarke
Football Supporters' Federation

"The idea that teams can play a league game in a place where their supporters won't be able to go and watch them will be totally opposed by the vast majority of supporters.

"What I want to do is put a challenge to the Premier League to abandon this completely if the majority of supporters turn out to be against it."

There is likely to be a big scramble for the right to host the extra games.

"It will be like cities bidding for the Olympic Games or the World Cup," explained Bose.

The Premier League's proposal mirrors moves in other sports, notably American Football.

Miami Dolphins and New York Giants met at Wembley in October, the first competitive NFL game outside the Americas.

Just another example of top flight football now being primarily a business and not a sport. A 39 game season, presumably you would play 1 team 3 times over the season. Fucking disgusting IMO and un-balances the league entirely. How is the average fan who goes home and away going fund a weekend trip to Beijing for their home game against Blackburn? What a joke.
 
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Re: Top Clubs Consider Overseas Games

What a crap Idea!!

our players are tired enough and play to many games already.

The Premier league gets more than enough money anyway!
 
Re: Top Clubs Consider Overseas Games

PLEASE NO! What is wrong with the fucking FA and Premier League?!
 
Re: Top Clubs Consider Overseas Games

It'll be a sad day for English football if it happens.
 
Wasn't that the point of pre-season?
How would it work having an extra game each? Say the top five are seeded so they don't play each other. United & Arsenal level on points -just an example - with one side "drawn" to play Man City or Tottenham & the other to play a team like Derby...
The only thing I'd consider is the Community Shield abroad (preferably just before the selected country's World Cup qualifier, so we can f*** up the pitch and ruin their chances!), but it's still favouring (or hampering) the top 2 teams...
 
Agreed - the trouble is football has been heading this way since the mid-80's. The only difference is that's it's 20 clubs involved now instead of the 'big 5' as they were known then. In that way, I consider this a positive.

However, there are at least 2 or 3 people on here I know who go to matches regularly and we have now been told exactly where we stand. We are taken for granted while our clubs go and look for better 'revenue streams'.

C*nts.
 
Talksport having a great debate about this right now.

Major problems:
Top teams seeded but then they have a random draw.
So with the games counting towards the premiership standings how is it fair if Man Unt get Derby and Arsenal get an Aston villa or Newcastle etc.
For either Derby or Arsenal it would be a possible 3 points lost to teams around them.

Wouldn't it be much more interesting for a fan to go to Stamford bridge or Old Trafford to go see their beloved club at home than see their team play at a neutral venue with some random lower premierleague club.

All these countries have more rights to the premiership then ppl do in england. I live in america and have Setanta and Fox soccer channels and i see every single premiership game i want so they cannot say they are trying to give the league more exposure.

Fans of any of the teams playing abroad should boycott the following game played on home sole make them play the following games in empty stadiums.
 
Cant wait to watch boro vs fulham in hongkong.........maybe then boro can actually fill a stadium!

Ridiculous idea that is purely for money and nothing else.

The game is falling apart. With the level refereeing being crap and the continued reluctance to keep the game "fair" by using video and punishing divers retrospectively aswell as the increased loss of hometown ownership to businessmen looking to make a buck and nothing else and now the possiblity of the league being decided by a draw instead of who is actually the best all integrite is lost.........

R.I.P Football 1871 - 2011
 
embraceuk1 said:
Talksport having a great debate about this right now.

Major problems:
Top teams seeded but then they have a random draw.
So with the games counting towards the premiership standings how is it fair if Man Unt get Derby and Arsenal get an Aston villa or Newcastle etc.
For either Derby or Arsenal it would be a possible 3 points lost to teams around them.

Wouldn't it be much more interesting for a fan to go to Stamford bridge or Old Trafford to go see their beloved club at home than see their team play at a neutral venue with some random lower premierleague club.

All these countries have more rights to the premiership then ppl do in england. I live in america and have Setanta and Fox soccer channels and i see every single premiership game i want so they cannot say they are trying to give the league more exposure.

Fans of any of the teams playing abroad should boycott the following game played on home sole make them play the following games in empty stadiums.
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yeah but mate, this is for the people that dont have setanta, if some random guy goes to a game, and loves it, he might be inclinend to purchase both channels... know what i mean...
 
Well as long as a few random fans are happy it must be a great idea lol

Nevermind about the fans who have supported there clubs for years in England or the lower league teams who are just going to be at a further disadvantage from the premierleague clubs financially.
 
Just bring it to central Florida go watch your team then go to Disney...Im for it I`ll watch Derby and Birmingham City even if I had to sleep in the caravan (that mean home on wheels )

Dont throw eggs all at once lads..Im desperate for a trip back
 
As much as I hate the idea, dont blame the FA when every club themselves are in favour of the idea.
 
RuneEdge said:
As much as I hate the idea, dont blame the FA when every club themselves are in favour of the idea.
Click to expand...

No wonder, they stand to make £5 million each. If they are gonna do it why not donate a % of cash to the lower leagues? Clubs like Luton and Bournemouth are in administration, they are the lifeblood of our game in this country. Give them some of the cash. If that happened I could begin to understand why they are considering it. But lining their already huge pockets with another £5m to me is just pure greed and at the expense of the real fans. :x

If the yanks want to watch the Premier League then they know where we are...get on a fecking plane.
 
It's not the FA's fault - The Premier League controls what the Premier League does. (And the FA could never manage such an audacious scheme anyway!)

As Clockender said, if this wealth was going to be shared then that would sugar the pill a little, but it's not - it's purely about greed.

I can't believe UEFA/FIFA will allow this to happen but the sad fact is, if they can get their noses in the trough then there is no limit to where this will end.
 
Chase for cash threatens to rob game of its founding principle


By Sam Wallace, Football Correspondent
Friday, 8 February 2008



Eighty thousand Saudi Arabians sitting desolate through a 0-0 draw between Middlesbrough and Derby. A stadium full of Taiwanese all wondering why Wigan are playing five in midfield against Blackburn Rovers. Lots of Koreans politely applauding as Dean Ashton misses the only chance of a game that cost them a week's wages to attend.


The Premier League goes global and suddenly every Kuala Lumpur native who thought it was all about Cristiano Ronaldo and Didier Drogba is dealt a hard truth. Shanghai? Get ready for Chris Baird. Sydney? Graeme Murty's coming your way. When the exotic worldwide highlights goal-fest becomes the 90-minute reality does the Premier League really think it will conquer the world? Do Birmingham City expect to break America? Are the people of Tokyo about to fall under the irresistible spell of Trotters-mania?


Here is one thing you can be sure of: the Premier League's plan to play league games all over the world will be opposed on the spurious grounds that it betrays the honest English football fan, or whoever that is these days. Already there is a collection of self-appointed fans' group worthies claiming to speak on behalf of every English supporter. One even came up with the brilliant suggestion of putting it to a vote, although he failed to identify who exactly would qualify as the democratic franchise.
This is the reality. If 20 Premier League chairmen, chief executives and club owners want this to happen then – guess what? – it probably will. As for some kind of fan revolution, let us just say that it can go into the same file as the opposition to the Glazer takeover of Manchester United and the grumblings about the launch of the Premier League back in 1992. Doomed to failure. What is far more important here is that the principle of the league itself is protected – and that is comfortably the biggest thing English football stands to lose.


The plan is this: one extra game played in January; top four seeded to avoid playing one another; ties drawn like a cup competition. The reality could work as follows. Manchester United draw Spurs in Singapore and only get a point. Arsenal draw Derby in Seattle, win the game and, in May, take the title by a point. After the final game Sir Alex Ferguson tries to bring himself to say that the best team won it over 39 games – but he cannot, because this league is not a league any more.
That is what English football stands to lose: that old principle that a league season constitutes two games against each opponent (home and away) and the best team wins it. As long as that exists then, whatever happens, there is a connection right back through English football from the present day, to the first league championship in 1888 and what it constitutes to be champions of England. Lose it, and the Premier League blows the most valuable asset it has.


So, if this scheme really is on the cards, let the clubs be brave and take the plunge: take 10 games from the regular 38-game season and play them overseas. Clubs lose one home game every other year, promoted teams inherit the status of the club they replace. It may wound those among us who recoil at the prospect of, say, Liverpool playing home games in Bangkok but it is probably a bit late to start complaining about foreign influence in football now.
If the Premier League's ruling strata have any sense, they will stop entertaining this fudge that, under these new rules, every club must have the same number of home games and instead make them sacrifice one every other season. The rulers of American football's NFL managed it when they sent the Miami Dolphins and the New York Giants to play the first ever regular season game outside America – in London in October. But this is where the problem lies: the NFL has a strong central command, the Premier League dances to whatever tune the clubs demand.
To keep the season to a 38-game maximum would require the preposterous Premier League chairman Sir Dave Richards and his sidekick Richard Scudamore to stand up to the clubs. Can they do it? Richards is fine when it comes to walking out of Football Association meetings in a huff, but not so great when it comes to standing up to the clubs who form his power base. He left Sheffield Wednesday, where he was chairman, just before they began a slide into debt and mediocrity from which they have not yet recovered. Let's hope he is not about to do the same to the Premier League.


You know that things have got really bad when the first person to endorse the plan publicly is Birmingham City's diminutive co-owner David Gold whose family, let us not forget, made their money from a pornography empire. "The idea is very worthy of consideration," he cooed. "I find this amazingly exciting." Of course he does, because there is money involved and unfortunately any number of fans' protests or amusing banners are not going to change the minds of powerful people for whom money is their guiding principle.


Moving games abroad is not what most supporters want, but then they do not run the English game and they never will unless it becomes so unprofitable that it is returned to them by default. The best we can all hope for is that the Premier League is brave enough to go one step further and make the overseas match part of a 38-game season so at least we can still take the competition seriously – if not that absurd crew of owners, chairmen and chief executives.
 
T Butcher fan said:
Chase for cash threatens to rob game of its founding principle


By Sam Wallace, Football Correspondent
Friday, 8 February 2008



Eighty thousand Saudi Arabians sitting desolate through a 0-0 draw between Middlesbrough and Derby. A stadium full of Taiwanese all wondering why Wigan are playing five in midfield against Blackburn Rovers. Lots of Koreans politely applauding as Dean Ashton misses the only chance of a game that cost them a week's wages to attend.


The Premier League goes global and suddenly every Kuala Lumpur native who thought it was all about Cristiano Ronaldo and Didier Drogba is dealt a hard truth. Shanghai? Get ready for Chris Baird. Sydney? Graeme Murty's coming your way. When the exotic worldwide highlights goal-fest becomes the 90-minute reality does the Premier League really think it will conquer the world? Do Birmingham City expect to break America? Are the people of Tokyo about to fall under the irresistible spell of Trotters-mania?


Here is one thing you can be sure of: the Premier League's plan to play league games all over the world will be opposed on the spurious grounds that it betrays the honest English football fan, or whoever that is these days. Already there is a collection of self-appointed fans' group worthies claiming to speak on behalf of every English supporter. One even came up with the brilliant suggestion of putting it to a vote, although he failed to identify who exactly would qualify as the democratic franchise.
This is the reality. If 20 Premier League chairmen, chief executives and club owners want this to happen then – guess what? – it probably will. As for some kind of fan revolution, let us just say that it can go into the same file as the opposition to the Glazer takeover of Manchester United and the grumblings about the launch of the Premier League back in 1992. Doomed to failure. What is far more important here is that the principle of the league itself is protected – and that is comfortably the biggest thing English football stands to lose.


The plan is this: one extra game played in January; top four seeded to avoid playing one another; ties drawn like a cup competition. The reality could work as follows. Manchester United draw Spurs in Singapore and only get a point. Arsenal draw Derby in Seattle, win the game and, in May, take the title by a point. After the final game Sir Alex Ferguson tries to bring himself to say that the best team won it over 39 games – but he cannot, because this league is not a league any more.
That is what English football stands to lose: that old principle that a league season constitutes two games against each opponent (home and away) and the best team wins it. As long as that exists then, whatever happens, there is a connection right back through English football from the present day, to the first league championship in 1888 and what it constitutes to be champions of England. Lose it, and the Premier League blows the most valuable asset it has.


So, if this scheme really is on the cards, let the clubs be brave and take the plunge: take 10 games from the regular 38-game season and play them overseas. Clubs lose one home game every other year, promoted teams inherit the status of the club they replace. It may wound those among us who recoil at the prospect of, say, Liverpool playing home games in Bangkok but it is probably a bit late to start complaining about foreign influence in football now.
If the Premier League's ruling strata have any sense, they will stop entertaining this fudge that, under these new rules, every club must have the same number of home games and instead make them sacrifice one every other season. The rulers of American football's NFL managed it when they sent the Miami Dolphins and the New York Giants to play the first ever regular season game outside America – in London in October. But this is where the problem lies: the NFL has a strong central command, the Premier League dances to whatever tune the clubs demand.
To keep the season to a 38-game maximum would require the preposterous Premier League chairman Sir Dave Richards and his sidekick Richard Scudamore to stand up to the clubs. Can they do it? Richards is fine when it comes to walking out of Football Association meetings in a huff, but not so great when it comes to standing up to the clubs who form his power base. He left Sheffield Wednesday, where he was chairman, just before they began a slide into debt and mediocrity from which they have not yet recovered. Let's hope he is not about to do the same to the Premier League.


You know that things have got really bad when the first person to endorse the plan publicly is Birmingham City's diminutive co-owner David Gold whose family, let us not forget, made their money from a pornography empire. "The idea is very worthy of consideration," he cooed. "I find this amazingly exciting." Of course he does, because there is money involved and unfortunately any number of fans' protests or amusing banners are not going to change the minds of powerful people for whom money is their guiding principle.


Moving games abroad is not what most supporters want, but then they do not run the English game and they never will unless it becomes so unprofitable that it is returned to them by default. The best we can all hope for is that the Premier League is brave enough to go one step further and make the overseas match part of a 38-game season so at least we can still take the competition seriously – if not that absurd crew of owners, chairmen and chief executives.
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this guy was making sense to me until he brought up how gold made his money, wtf does that have to do with anything...


this might appease some people

"the best we can all hope for is that the Premier League is brave enough to go one step further and make the overseas match part of a 38-game season so at least we can still take the competition seriously "

i personally would love to see this(im biased of course), BUT you just not going to get the same atmosphere as you would in england. And I think a huge part of the football experience is the atmosphere. So to try and re-create that somewhere else is going to be pretty hard. Now if the owners would fly in 10,000 supporters... (which quite honestly could happen here in america, as the pound is crushing the dollar) It might win some new fans. Seems most of you hate this idea. I have seen many people say its runing the game.. can someone articulate? I just dont see how this will ruin the game, and I want to understand why you guys think it will...
 
Clockender said:
No wonder, they stand to make £5 million each. If they are gonna do it why not donate a % of cash to the lower leagues? Clubs like Luton and Bournemouth are in administration, they are the lifeblood of our game in this country. Give them some of the cash. If that happened I could begin to understand why they are considering it. But lining their already huge pockets with another £5m to me is just pure greed and at the expense of the real fans. :x

If the yanks want to watch the Premier League then they know where we are...get on a fecking plane.
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salary cap starting to make sense.. and wealth distribution... we have that here in all of our sports.. BUT say goodbye to the big 4.... it basically would make every team on an even par... Not sure how many supporters of the big 4 would like that... this is more about your owners wanting to make money then the yanks demand for football... The clubs in the prem outside the top 4 have to find more increasing ways to bring in revenue streams in order to buy top talent to compete... seems like this is all one double edged sword..
 
It's not the same - American teams are safe in the knowledge that they can't get relegated. There's no safety net here. Also, young players come through the club system, there is no centralised pool and therefore no draft system to try and even things out.

Don't get me wrong, I think the US model is excellent, the trouble is it has come 100 years too late for us. We have 92 clubs to appease.

In England (and probably most leagues around Europe) because of the way football has gone over the last 15 years, the only way to break into the hierarchy, if you're not already part of it, is to spend a lot of money. That's why there is unanimous support from all 20 Premiership clubs. They're all desperate for cash.
 
gomito#10 said:
I have seen many people say its runing the game.. can someone articulate? I just dont see how this will ruin the game, and I want to understand why you guys think it will...
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a) Matches would be taking place in countries which already have their own domestic league. What message does that give to Saudi, Thai, Australian footballers? And what message does that give to it's fans?

b) You play each of the 19 Premiership teams home and away. The team with the best record wins. That's called winning the league. Adding some other game, in some other continent is an absolute mockery of the league system.
 
T Butcher fan said:
It's not the same - American teams are safe in the knowledge that they can't get relegated. There's no safety net here. Also, young players come through the club system, there is no centralised pool and therefore no draft system to try and even things out.

Don't get me wrong, I think the US model is excellent, the trouble is it has come 100 years too late for us. We have 92 clubs to appease.

In England (and probably most leagues around Europe) because of the way football has gone over the last 15 years, the only way to break into the hierarchy, if you're not already part of it, is to spend a lot of money. That's why there is unanimous support from all 20 Premiership clubs. They're all desperate for cash.
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yes relegation is a huge difference. I think its a double edge sword, these clubs they are not in the top 8 need to make money, and this seems an avenue for that.
 
gomito#10 said:
yes relegation is a huge difference. I think its a double edge sword, these clubs they are not in the top 8 need to make money, and this seems an avenue for that.
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Having more money will just inflate the player prices in the game and then we are back to square one looking for more revenue streams and so the process starts again.

This proposal is:

1) Making our league a laughing stock
2) Ruled by greed
3) If it happens it will be a sad day for English football
 
Clockender said:
Having more money will just inflate the player prices in the game and then we are back to square one looking for more revenue streams and so the process starts again.

This proposal is:

1) Making our league a laughing stock
2) Ruled by greed
3) If it happens it will be a sad day for English football
Click to expand...

well then it sounds like you need a salary/transfer cap, but like i said that will be a double edge sword, cause then any team will be able to compete if they have the funds to spend within the cap... so thus say goodbye to the same teams being in the top 4 year after year... but you wouldnt want that either would you? at least as an arsenal supporter... however a fulham supporter might feel different
 
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