Proposed new CL format

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It'll probably be ok for the younger generation of fans but if this new bloated CL format compromises the PL and English football structure in general, I'd probably just check out of football at that point.

I'd rather us and all the other top 6 clubs just rejected European football completely. We survived the Heysel ban and we could survive on our own without it again.
 
The fat cats trying to make an extra buck while sacrificing the integrity and soul of the game. So they'll definitely do it then. :pochrolleyes:
 
Only way this will happen is if all six teams are gifted a place by UEFA. And why not from UEFA's pov? They want the big, competitive, rich teams who guarentee increased sponsorship and tv revenue. That revenue then gets owned by UEFA.

The Premier League therefore dies and the CL is king. Shame for football. Especially if you are not one of tje big six. After loads of clubs have gone bust it could become interesting again though the big CL teams will sign all the best players,
 
Sorry if i'm being stupid, but if it's four leagues of 8 teams, that means at least 14 fixtures for each team. And then what, the league winners / runners-up go into further play offs?

This wouldn't relpace the CL. This would replace all domestic leagues.
 
Just reading that is a chore in itself, sounds like a real mess. Hopefully it won’t come to anything, as usual it’s no doubt driven by TV companies and sponsors, rather than any footballing reasons.
 
Only way this will happen is if all six teams are gifted a place by UEFA. And why not from UEFA's pov? They want the big, competitive, rich teams who guarentee increased sponsorship and tv revenue. That revenue then gets owned by UEFA.

The Premier League therefore dies and the CL is king. Shame for football. Especially if you are not one of tje big six. After loads of clubs have gone bust it could become interesting again though the big CL teams will sign all the best players,

From all I have read on the subject the EPL are against it and its been largely driven out of Italy (Milan & Juve). I would be surprised if this is a UEFA policy rather than a few of the clubs putting proposals to UEFA.

sounds very similar to UEFA Under Pressure to Reform the Champions League to Increase Number of Qualifying Teams to 40
 
It was always coming wasn't it. For me the final bit that made it inevitable was the latest change to make more group participants guarenteed rather than through quals.

UEFA actually made a great decision, for once, when they years and years ago split the quals into champions and non-champions to allow more champions into the Champions League, but they've undone that and then some with a further revision.

26 out of 32 slots in the groups nailed on makes it a pipedream for so many fine clubs around Europe to make it in. The non-champions qual route which was made to avoid it being a gimme for the 4th team from England, Spain etc go make it, will now have Porto, Dinamo Kiev, Basel, and Olympiakos as the most likely (going solely on coefficients) final 4 battling for two slots. Not exactly that tough, tough road to the CL it was intended.

The football romantic in me very much wants to return to the format, with a competition just for champions. It's never gonna happen though is it. We're way beyond that point.

It's not going to be a popular opinion, but I'm actually slightly in favor of it; depending on the final format. The fact is that we've moved ourselves into a situation where footballing wealth and the talent that goes with it has been pooled into very few leagues and clubs. Like it or not, our very own beloved club has been a part of this development.

A completely new format is the only logical step. Right now, it's basically that already, while keeping a small light burning for the good old days, with endless quals, and a few teams making it to make a vast sum of money while having no sporting chance.

The only saving grace would be the re-introduction of a very limited number of foreign players, which let's be honest will not happen either. When the PL teams and handful across other leagues can scoop up the best in the world, then the Anderlech's, Red Star's, and Malmo's of this world will not see glory again. Yes, there's the outliers, Mourinho's Porto and Ajax for instance but too little and not often enough for me.

That's the missing piece for me in a lot of the football romance and resistence to the money driven machine that football's become. A lot of it is tied to days where teams were forced to play players of their own nationality, sprinkled with some exotic stardust. It gave everyone a fighting chance. Without that we've got to move on imho.
 
Anything based on 'European Pedigree' makes me feel sick.
It puts selection in the head of the money men and we should all oppose it.
They ain't talking about Forest here, they are talking about saving United or Liverpool when they have shit seasons.
 
It's just another way to get the teams that generate the most advertising revenue in the CL full time , the champions League has long been corrupt just look at some of the decisions that go for the global product teams the latest being Liverpool's bs penalty that the ref didn't hesitate to give after 6 seconds of the biggest game of his life. Look how hard they tried to overturn one of the Ajax goals against madrid.
 
Up until now its been UEFA fighting against the European Club Association* (ECA) -(*read Juventus mainly) against this type of idea. I think with the Platini thing they have lost a lot of the high ground and they may be bullied into this type of competition.

If its a closed league... if I were the PL I would be tempted to kick out any team that wants to join this league, it will distort and demean their competition. It may cause pain in the short term but its better than a long term death of the competition due to 3 or 4 clubs having loads of resource vs the rest / other competition taking precedence.

We will also see how the lack of away fans effect viewing figures in the foreign markets.
 
Anything based on 'European Pedigree' makes me feel sick.
It puts selection in the head of the money men and we should all oppose it.
They ain't talking about Forest here, they are talking about saving United or Liverpool when they have shit seasons.
Of course they are. But once, after a shot year, AC Milan proposed that wild cards should be issued to all previous winners who hadn't qualified. This list includes, of course, forest, villa and Steaua Bucharest.

Of course, we don't want the likes of two times winners Nottingham Forest getting money that could go the likes of PSG, do we?
 
Of course they are. But once, after a shot year, AC Milan proposed that wild cards should be issued to all previous winners who hadn't qualified. This list includes, of course, forest, villa and Steaua Bucharest.

Of course, we don't want the likes of two times winners Nottingham Forest getting money that could go the likes of PSG, do we?
Personally I only ever want qualification to be based on merit. Forest aren't entitled to benefit now from something they achieved in the 70s. Neither is any other club from an arbitrary period of time.
 
With the EPL very strongly opposed it's not likely to go ahead, without the EPL clubs it's just a four team cup RM / Barca / Juve / Bayern (add PSG maybe) .... one in each group of eight and the TV audiences for the other games would be one man and a dog. Provided the EPL stick together which means the "old" top four don't break away, there isn't much UEFA can do .... football relies on TV money it simply won't get that in a pony non-competitive cup competition, the viewing figures are terrible now they will just get worse.
 
Personally I only ever want qualification to be based on merit. Forest aren't entitled to benefit now from something they achieved in the 70s. Neither is any other club from an arbitrary period of time.
I completely agree. My point is, if they are going to use "European Pedigree" as a selection criteria, there are clubs with greater european pedigree than PSG, Citeh, us, Woolwich, that wont be considered for our new champions league utopia cos money
 
Let's face it this is purely for the teams outside of the EPL who can't compete with their financial muscle, the likes of Roma, Inter and AC who have fallen out of their regular CL spots lately and Bayern who can see the writing on the wall for them too.
 
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