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Premier probe fall in attendances.

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Whats to probe, no entertainment, no goals, over hyped product and prices that prevent the true fan from attending leading to a muted atmosphere which fails to inspire team so less exciting games...

Lower the prices, get real fans back in to get the aatmosphere back, leave the glory fans to their glory clubs and start rewarding attacking teams with bonus points for more than 2 goals in a game - it works well in rugby.  Teams like Blackburn and negative hughes deserve no fans and no points for their turgid approach to the game..

 

OTBC  

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[quote]Whats to probe, no entertainment, no goals, over hyped product and prices that prevent the true fan from attending leading to a muted atmosphere which fails to inspire team so less exciting games... ...[/quote]

Simple, it''s because we''re not there

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Yeah, it is pretty boring and dead expensive yet the saddest thing is that it is where we all want to be - daft in the extreme, isn''t it?!

It is certainly true that defences seem to be winning out this season - Liverpool have played 4, scoring just 1 and letting in 0, for God''s sake!  If you look at the Premiership table, there are only a handful of sides who have an average of 2 or better goals per game so far this season, and imo that signals pretty poor entertainment value for the inflated entrance prices.

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Why do Blackburn (and others) play such negative football? Because they can''t afford to compete with the top teams (it would cost millions and millions to get a squad that can compete in Europe) and getting relegated would equal financial suicide; they are only aiming for mid table obscurity. Dull as it is, I can understand it in the present day. Before Hughes went there, they looked relegation certainties...

Salary caps for players and transfer caps would help level the playing field, and make for a much more competitive (and therefore entertaining) league. I would also like to see rules in place about having quotas for local players in the squad, to encourage investment in academies. I agree with what you say about controlling ticket prices, and I like the idea of an extra point for scoring more than 2 goals (though this might not be needed if we do the above).

Also we need controls on agents, and controls generally about profiteering from the game (rules do exist but have been ignored over recent years). Its probably too late, but I would like to see TV money spread fairer over the leagues (this would effectively mean though the reversal of the breakaway Premier league so would probably never happen).

They also need to improve the attitude of the players on the pitch. Arguing with the referee should induce a yellow card, and diving should be treated like other offences, punishable by video evidence after the game. A straight red for swearing at the ref is a step in the right direction (sorry Hucks!).

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Players earn mega wages now and couldn''t care about how the club is doing. If they get relegated they move clubs (Helveg). The FA needs to investigate why they require so much money for 90mins work and two hours training every day. reduce the amount they get paid and bring back passion and care into football.

Look at the cricket for this, they earn compared to footballers very small amounts yet they showed passion and took pride to wear the england shirt.

This is what is required in football.

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For me an obvious answer to the ''attitude problems'' of some players - put a mic on the ref like they do in rugby. On the commentary there you can actually hear what the ref is saying, and what the players are saying to him. Would players still swear so much if they knew this. And perhaps some of the ref''s decisions would be clearer if we could hear his comments live...

As for entertainment, the Prem is starting to go the way of the SPL where you can almost write the final league table at the start of the season.

In many ways, I''d rather get relegated and fight for promotion again than be Blackburn and know that if we play turgid football for a year we will finish mid-table and get... another year of turgid football! Better to be a yo-yo club... much more exciting!

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For once I entirely agree with you Ronbol (so good they named you twice)   The players wages are ludicrous and with the freedom to move around thy hold all the aces. 

This leaves clubs impotent when it comes to discipline (drugs cheats, abusive behaviour) or planning (as player leave when they want - savage/damo) and so they pander to the players demands asif they are gods instead of treating them like employees in other trades (who else gets a day off with pay when under performing?)

Is it all our, the fans, fault ultimately because we accept what happens and are happy to take the victories almost no matter what?

OTBC 

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The simple answer is that Premier League tickets are overpriced.  You take Chelsea, if you wanted to take two adults and two children to a home game it''s a minimum of £100 just to get into the "Family Centre".  This is the only area of the ground with discounted rates for children.  If you wanted to take a family into another part of the ground it could cost anywhere between £180 - £240.  That''s serious money for an 90 minutes of "Entertainment" and you have not yet paid for any travel or food costs.  A nice family Saturday afternoon visit to Chelsea could well end up costing you £300.  Some people just can''t or don''t want to pay that kind of money.

Clubs have not been treating fans as fans.  They almost look upon them as consumers and they try and maximise profit from their market share.  A good example is replica shirt sales, how many of us would normally pay £40-£50 for a T-Shirt?  Not many!  It''s not just one T-Shirt either!  Chelsea have home, away, 3rd, Goalkeeper and "Champions League" replica shirts for sale in an attempt to empty their fans wallets of their hard earned cash.  Fans in turn must now start acting as consumers and enforce their powers as accordingly. 

"We" (football fans around the Country) have to say "No! I''m not paying for this anymore.  It''s not good value for money".  It''s the only way things are going to change.  If attendances do not pick up or continue to fall, clubs will have no choice but to drop prices.

Without getting into this in too much detail, I like the idea put forward by FIFA that clubs in the future will need a certain quota of "home grown" talent but I can''t help thinking that it will break European Employment Laws.

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I''m not entirely certain of what they do in Major League Soccer (t''is what the fools in america call football) but I know they don''t do transfer fees. They just swap players like kids swapping footy stickers. How successful that is I''m again not sure but perhaps one of you may have a better understanding.

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It is not just prem league clubs though - SS posted it cost £22 to see forest last night in a poor league 1 game...  profiteering is rife throughout fooball, and the clubs charging those sort of fees lack the intelligence to cover their costs by getting heads into the ground by lowering icket prices.

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/mb606/F2241581?thread=1060265&skip=0&show=20

Loads of good (and bad points) at the link above. 

 

I am becoming more and more disillusioned to be honest.

Champions League is overkill on a grand nature.  All 16 games on live every fortnight. 

League games on Friday nights, two on a saturday and three on a sunday and then a Monday night game.  Plus Carling Cup games on sky this week.

 

When Sky first started the Super Sunday and Monday night football was great.  A treat to sit down and watch a live game.  Now I end up watching five minutes of every live game going just to make sure I am not missing anything, safe in the knowledge that there will be another one along in a minute.

No game is ever a big game anymore and deserving of TV coverage.  Liverpool Man United the other day - nil nil at 12 noon on a Sunday!

 

Sky should have it capped - a Sunday and a Monday Premier, maybe a Sat and a Fri night Football League game.  One Spanish game on a Sunday night.  That is five a week.  BBC don''t have 5 live games a year.

They have got them selves in a pickle because to go back now would cause loads of problem -  not showing a Champions League game live...disgraceful.

 

Oh yeah and cut the ticket prices as well - but then we fill our ground so we shouldn''t. GCSE Economics taught me that one.

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[quote]I''m not entirely certain of what they do in Major League Soccer (t''is what the fools in america call football) but I know they don''t do transfer fees. They just swap players like kids swapping footy s...[/quote]

In MLS the players are ''owned'' by the league, not the individual clubs. It''s a bit like the central contracts thing in cricket - where the core squad of England internationals are contracted to (and paid by) the ECB.

Can''t go any deeper than that, I don''t know if clubs rent players over a season, or if they have to commit to longer term deals.

I''ve felt for a couple of years that UEFA should introduce a transfer cap across Europe. By setting a maximum value for all players clubs would negotiate as to the RELATIVE value of a Michael Owen, or a Robbie Savage. Ronaldo would still command top dollar, but you''d never see Real Madrid agreeing that Jonothan Woodgate was anywhere near as valuable. Lower league clubs couldn''t be held to ransom for knackered ex-Prem players either.
To safeguard small clubs, like Crewe, a percentage of ALL transfers during a players career could automatically be directed to the club who developed him (as is written into Deano''s contract with us, only passed on to whichever club he moved to next)

Introduce a maximum squad size of, say, 30 senior pros (over 18''s for example), which clubs can supplement from their youth squads if necessary.
This would mean managers having to run a squad like an international team, with cover in every position, and room for a third ''keeper and half-a-dozen extra (for luck!). You wouldn''t have Spurs, with their 20 midfielders, or Chelsea, with roughly a whole team out on loan to other clubs, so big clubs couldn''t just buy a player when he wasn''t really needed - they would have to sell somebody to make room.

When it comes to quotas of home-grown players, it shouldn,t be a problem.Clubs could own as many foreign players as they liked, with the caveat that at least three out of eleven on the pitch were home-grown. This doesn''t restrict freedom of player movement, or impose a squad quota, it would be down to each club to ensure they had sufficient back-up in the squad (through youth teamers if necessary) to keep 3 English on the pitch at all times - that shouldn''t prove too restrictive, even for Arsenal

These changes would lead to more players plying their trade outside of the top divisions (most Champions League sides would have to cut playing staff AND increase the numbers of ''home'' players), thus improving the standard of football in lower leagues.

Clubs could also have an overall salary cap applied - based on (for example) a percentage of UK turnover - to stop clubs like Man U abusing their world-wide marketing opportunities. Players wage demands would also be indirectly affected - the best could still command top dollar, but not as many. Clubs would have a maximum budget for wages and would have to split it between the squad AND try to keep all the megastars happy, not easy! If a club wanted a bigger budget, they would have to try and increase the fan base, locally, to get a higher turnover figure. Surely this would lead to an increase in attractive football games? Bolton & Blackburn would have to change their style to attract more fans, but then relegation shouldn''t be feared as much, because (as I argued above) the quality in the lower division would be improving and their would be less of a gap both financially & competitively, with teams having a realistic chance of keeping their squad together. TV money would still make a difference, but less markedly so than at present.

This is a lot to absorb in one go and I''ve probably gone on too long already, so I''ll sit back and let people pick holes. That''s the best way to refine the ideas and make them more realistic, after all.

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Agree with much of what you say here FBM - and I think it should be part of the solution.  Isnt there plans for a salary cap to be implemented from next season, albeit a little larger than the one you suggest,  being based on a clubs tunrover rather than any sort of levelling mechanism.

It is an example of football looking after its key players again - it takes a sensible solution to a problem but then turns it into a bigger problem to suit the ''big'' voices in european football -  it will keeps big clubs big and actually make it harder for clubs to grow into a G14 size club (what arrogance there to, for the large clubs to mimic a world organisation for self promotion purposes only.

OTBC

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Nice post FBM!! there ar''nt to many bits to squabble over here. Just submit it in it''s entirety to the FA and see how they would mess it about.  You would see great opposition from the top six who are doing nicely at the present.  In two years time though there will have to be some drastic changes made in the financing of players and and clubs in the English British leagues. Celebrity overkill cannot last for too much longer, thank the Lord.

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