Net spending cap?
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Before i answer, how would it work? Wouldn’t enforcing detailed audits and sanctions for FFP breaches work better?
Great idea.
We could also give a name with a snappy acronym, something around fair play in the financial arena, I'm sure we can think of something that fits.
And then UEFA, FIFA and the PL can have all sorts of sanctions they could apply to those who break the rules - up to an including a £5,000 fine maybe.
I think you have it nailed, mate
Just because the footballing bodies are corrupt and inept isn't a reason not to discuss football regulations.
Let's say the league comes together and says each club cannot spend more than £100m net, would it hamper clubs with deep pockets?
There's a blanket figure set by whoever and it cannot be amortised.
So if a club wanted to buy players worth £200m they'd have to sell £100m worth players.
Existing mandates look at clubs on an individual basis, my suggestion would stop big clubs making more than one big signing unless they sell players.
Tell me how clubs can get around that? Probably some will but it won't be easy.
I think the best model for a league (leagues) with such disparity in financial resources is a luxury tax. Above a certain payroll/transfer threshold, teams get taxed additional money that gets redistributed to teams below a certain threshold.
Nothing will stop City and Chelsea from spending. So let's make them pay more to help strengthen the finances of small clubs like Southampton or, well, us (not serious about us).
I just don't see a hard salary cap working given the multinational disposition of the sport.
Nothing will stop City and Chelsea from spending. So let's make them pay more to help strengthen the finances of small clubs like Southampton or, well, us (not serious about us).
I just don't see a hard salary cap working given the multinational disposition of the sport.
Yeah, a salary cap has always been impossible to enforce and manage. There's so many loopholes and ways around it.
The problem seems to be with the scrutiny and enforcement of the existing regulations. It could take City up to 8 years to be caught and punished by which time the fans have already had their good times and the the players and manager may well have left. The fact City were unable to be caught by UEFA says more to do with their own incompetence than anything else.
For FFP ever to have been a success it needed huge amount of financial resources, mandatory compliance, regular auditing and clear and significant punishments that would act as a deterrent. Compulsory relegation, bans on European football, something sports-washing regimes would actually take seriously. It needed an organisation that can act and respond to breaches within a 12 month time frame of them occurring.
You get the impression the FFP office at UEFA is a windowless basement, staffed by one over-worked, mid-level accountant doing his very best but faced with a completely mammoth, impossible task.
The problem seems to be with the scrutiny and enforcement of the existing regulations. It could take City up to 8 years to be caught and punished by which time the fans have already had their good times and the the players and manager may well have left. The fact City were unable to be caught by UEFA says more to do with their own incompetence than anything else.
For FFP ever to have been a success it needed huge amount of financial resources, mandatory compliance, regular auditing and clear and significant punishments that would act as a deterrent. Compulsory relegation, bans on European football, something sports-washing regimes would actually take seriously. It needed an organisation that can act and respond to breaches within a 12 month time frame of them occurring.
You get the impression the FFP office at UEFA is a windowless basement, staffed by one over-worked, mid-level accountant doing his very best but faced with a completely mammoth, impossible task.
I think UEFA's new rules are similar to a spending cap - they're going to demand a ratio of footballing spend (player costs, broadly wages plus amortisation) to turnover. I think this is a sensible measure - a cap on transfer spending (net or gross) would just lead to more situations of players being encouraged to run down their contracts and move on free transfers which, ultimately, would shaft the teams lower down the pyramid because they'd be deprived of meaningful transfer income. The system of wages + amortisation broadly avoids this - the cost of a transfer deal is not dissimilar whether or not there is a fee as players moving on a free tend to attract higher wages / agent fees. The net spend thing would also see more situations like Mbappe holding his club to ransom for crazy money because he'd cost more to replace if he left on a free.
Any changes to FFP need to be careful not to upset the equilibrium of the transfer market to protect smaller clubs. Evolution, not revolution.
But the key thing, obviously, is that the rules need to be enforced and the authorities need to be brave enough (and empowered) to call bullshit when they smell it. Because any rules can be manipulated (I expect PSG to announce a huge new sponsorship programme any day now so they can "afford" Messi / Mbappe / Neymar) and that's what needs to be called out. The authorities should be able to tell clubs their revenues are clearly bollocks and the onus should then be on the clubs to prove they are legitimate (whereas at present it's the other way round). It would be a lot easier for UEFA to shoot down bogus valuations than to do their own assessments.
Any changes to FFP need to be careful not to upset the equilibrium of the transfer market to protect smaller clubs. Evolution, not revolution.
But the key thing, obviously, is that the rules need to be enforced and the authorities need to be brave enough (and empowered) to call bullshit when they smell it. Because any rules can be manipulated (I expect PSG to announce a huge new sponsorship programme any day now so they can "afford" Messi / Mbappe / Neymar) and that's what needs to be called out. The authorities should be able to tell clubs their revenues are clearly bollocks and the onus should then be on the clubs to prove they are legitimate (whereas at present it's the other way round). It would be a lot easier for UEFA to shoot down bogus valuations than to do their own assessments.
Why must a spending cap be tied to an individual club's revenues rather than a universal cap be applied for each league based on overall league revenues? Would that not promote greater parity? What factors, caused by the international relationships between leagues, makes this less workable?
If a club is well run, whether in driving revenue or keeping costs down, why shouldn’t they have the benefit of that? If you take that away, what onus is there to be efficient? If clubs all had the same spending caps, the surplus money generated by the big clubs would go to their shareholders. Is that a good thing?
And isn’t part of what drives footballing rivalries the differences between clubs. If they all had the same budget, that all disappears. Some fans of small clubs take great pride in making a little of a long way, and why not. That’s why Leicester winning the PL was such a great story.
To say nothing of a universal cap being an issue with competition law.
And if Barca can generate huge revenues / debt, why shouldn’t we fleece them for €160m for Coutinho, even if they still haven’t paid us everything they owe ,obvs.
To play devil's advocate, why shouldn't each club have a realistic chance at winning a title/trophy/qualifying for Europe in any given season or over a period of time? Why shouldn't all clubs be enhanced through a system that promotes their fundamental equality and financial stability.
This is the fundamental difference, I suppose, between North American and global professional sports. Ironically, professional sports is probably the arena in which North Americans most fully embrace socialistic tendencies.
I can't see how having differential resources enhances rivalries between sides. If anything, equivalency should strengthen the rivalry as it would no longer be one-sided. We've looked down (and pissed down) on Everton from a great height for some time. Not that I wish anything positive for Everton, but you're telling me the rivalry is superior now compared to the 80s when we were both strong sides? How would the Bundesliga or Ligue 1 suffer if teams other than Bayern and PSG had a meaningful chance at glory?
I don't feel especially strong either way on the issue - I follow North American sports pretty casually these days, while football is where my focus lies - but I don't think there is anything innately superior about the inequities inherent to the footballing pyramid.
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Wouldn't the spending cap force clubs to spend more on youth development, stadium facilities, scouting network from the excess profits made? There would be less of a reason to put ticket prices up as well/
It would also encourage more competition which is better for all the leagues, it means big clubs cannot sign 2-3 marquee players with out selling someone significant, which inturn stops football inflation.
If we had a cap, from when Pep took over, how successful would he have been?
Australian sports, including football works on wage caps with no-one paying transfer fees. It’s different, obviously, but I don’t see how tge game couldn’t come up with sone sort of model based on controlling teams spending.
Would a salary cap work if it was monitored on the combined tax returns for the squad of 25 - I know it’d be retrospective and I do t know how you factor in bonus payments - but I think there needs to be some sort of cap that prohibits top teams offering stupid salaries - it shouldn’t be linked to revenue because that encourages teams to “do a city”. I’m all for a cap that’s universally applied to the Premier League - it would be up to each team who they spend their wages budget on.
It would have to be a sort of average of teams squad salaries in the league to challenge the top teams and give the “smaller” teams scope to attract top talent.
Like the A-League you could build in a couple of slots outside the cap for homegrown or English talent and/or a “marquee” player.
It’s not as if the players are going to be on pennies - teams could still blow a large proportion of their wages on high profile players and fill the rest of the squads with lower paid players - could work in exemptions for U21’s as well.
Equally, I’d be happy if there was a flat amount that each team could spend on transfer fees - say a flat £150m - you don’t have to spend but you can’t spend more.
It could be a net spend transfer cap or it could just be gross spend.
I’m sure they could work - it might encourage owners to lower ticket prices or invest in better facilities (I know, I know…. Wishful thinking). It might attract more owners keen on making a fortune by being able to leverage more profit out of the business.
Something has to be done though.
Would a salary cap work if it was monitored on the combined tax returns for the squad of 25 - I know it’d be retrospective and I do t know how you factor in bonus payments - but I think there needs to be some sort of cap that prohibits top teams offering stupid salaries - it shouldn’t be linked to revenue because that encourages teams to “do a city”. I’m all for a cap that’s universally applied to the Premier League - it would be up to each team who they spend their wages budget on.
It would have to be a sort of average of teams squad salaries in the league to challenge the top teams and give the “smaller” teams scope to attract top talent.
Like the A-League you could build in a couple of slots outside the cap for homegrown or English talent and/or a “marquee” player.
It’s not as if the players are going to be on pennies - teams could still blow a large proportion of their wages on high profile players and fill the rest of the squads with lower paid players - could work in exemptions for U21’s as well.
Equally, I’d be happy if there was a flat amount that each team could spend on transfer fees - say a flat £150m - you don’t have to spend but you can’t spend more.
It could be a net spend transfer cap or it could just be gross spend.
I’m sure they could work - it might encourage owners to lower ticket prices or invest in better facilities (I know, I know…. Wishful thinking). It might attract more owners keen on making a fortune by being able to leverage more profit out of the business.
Something has to be done though.
Totally agree that it can happen. It needs to incorporate both wages and transfer fees together and can't be so draconian as to set any one league at such a competitive disadvantage to the rest of Europe -- but a model could exist. And the Premier League is the perfect league to do it because even our relegation-threatened teams are financially better off than even most of the leading sides of every other league.
It doesn't need to be as complex as the Byzantine mess than is the NBA's collective bargaining agreement but something akin to MLB's "soft" cap that permits rich team to overspend if they're willing to pay a "luxury tax" to be shared among teams below a certain threshold.
I'd have no problem if City's spending helped Southampton buy the players that we eventually use to win the league over City.
Seeing that FSG aren't selling, we need to keep that net transfer spend to £50m.
The only way you get around a net transfer cap from what I can see is like when say a Club over pays for a player and then is remunerated some how. However, it's going to be difficult to do, and IMHO, there should be demotion from the league if it were to happen.
You can't have a wage cap in a relegation/promotion model... Teams have to have a guaranteed level of stability in order to be willing to waive their ability to maintain the status their supporters expect with the financial advantages their support gives them. Or in the extreme case, their rich owners who want to buy titles. That's why the Super League included a wage cap I believe...
Then feed more money into the divisions below so that the gap isn’t as great.
Sorry - I just don’t believe you “can’t” have a wage cap in a promotion/relegation model - it might not be preferable for somewhere but no system is going to please everyone.
I think we’re at a crossroads for the game - there either has to be a change in direction or we start praising City for being ahead of their time and just forget about FFP and let it revert to an arms race were some teams can spend whatever they want without ever going bankrupt.
All the biggest clubs would be signing on to a risk that doesn't make sense... The risk that their asset could lose 90% of its value if the playing field was completely level is a large pill to swallow.
No one has suggested the field be "completely level", only that elements of balance and cost certainty be introduced.
FSG absolutely thought Financial Fair Play would achieve this - and it doesn't- which is part of why they're open to selling. There is too much risk in unconstrained spending for perhaps everyone except City and PSG.
Barca has spun the roulette wheel because it can't keep up with the spending of *checks notes* Everton, for example.
I think it's false to state unequivocally that the big clubs would be against this. We would likely support a thoughtfully designed proposal and I think Spurs and Arsenal would as well. (In before "Spurs and Arsenal aren't big clubs" comment...)
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