Wayne Rooney's DC

[canarydan23 4,060]

14 minutes ago, 1902 said:

This feels like it ignores some of the realities of the football pyramid. It isn't that THESE big teams are a block to progress, it's the existence of clubs that have higher incomes than others that are the issue.

Getting rid of the current crop will just turn the next group down into the dominant force, that's unless we have a franchise and draft model like they have in a lot of US sports. 

Given that there will be a new set of clubs with vested interests, this doesn't guarantee reform.

You don't need a franchise or draft model, though I wouldn't be opposed to getting rid of club academies, and levying a stipend on professional clubs to fund a national network of regional Academys similar to US College football, it may even end up self-funding with a TV deal and matches played on say a Friday night, and having a draft out of that when they graduate. You could even ensure they leave the system with academic or vocational qualifications.

But anyway, that's a pipe dream.

All you'd need is a salary cap to prevent the dominance you describe. If Man Utd, Man City, Chelsea, Arsenal, Tottenham and Liverpool f**k off, for sure Leicester would probably dominate. But then the players causing the dominance would ask for more cash and before you know it, bang, salary cap reached, Maddison and Tielemans have to drop down the league if they want to carry on earning £100k a week. Or attract the attention of one of the Super League teams.

A salary cap is a non-starter whilst the Big 6 enjoy the fruits of one of the most unequal "sports" on the planet they are never going to condone something like that, something that makes it fair, something that makes elite football a sport once more. But I suspect outside of those, you'd get a consensus. Even the sugardaddys at clubs like Leicester and Wolves must find the idea that their wage spend cannot spiral out of control, and they'll have to invest in other things with their billions to gain an advantage (elite training facilities, crowd expansion and cheap tickets to gain an atmospheric advantage in your home games, etc).

Almost every sport has a salary cap now, even football in England below the Championship has caught up. It needs to happen in the top two leagues but it categorically won't whilst the Big 6 are still in play. I wish they'd just **** off and let football be a sport again please.

[dylanisabaddog 4,916]

4 hours ago, BroadstairsR said:

The Sky punditry on Saturday were discussing WBA and came to the conclusion that; "Not being good enough for the PL and too good for the Championship," they needed their own league. Rings a bell?

They, of course, then extrapolated and included Norwich City, then Fulham, then ...... to the point that the Premier League was almost half denuded, and they were virtually suggesting a super league.

Perhaps there is something in this, although not the version put forward recently by the big boys of Europe, a more English version, perhaps.

A  PL of just ten teams, giving them time to fit in their European campaigns and the domestic cups, with just two relegation spots and then two leagues of twenty (Chumps Div. 1[dubbed the Yo-Yo League?] and Chumps Div. 2,) with three promotions/relegations and play-offs as before.

This might not be acceptable to many and may not work, but something has to give.   

I was in favour of the European Super League when it was proposed and remain of that opinion. It is nonsense that clubs like us and Fulham & WBA can't be promoted and compete without spending £150m. Getting rid of the big 6 would go a long way to solving that

Edited September 16, 2021 by dylanisabaddog

[TheGunnShow 5,940]

The problem with any European Super League means in the long run, wealth would simply be concentrated amongst a small number of elite clubs to an even greater extent than it is now, and it would be concentrated at a European level instead of at a national one. And I think it was cooked up to save the likes of Real Madrid, Barcelona etc. as they'd fudged their finances so much. 

I'd say the German ownership model may be a better place to start. But a ESL is carcinogenic to the game.

[1902 1,167]

53 minutes ago, canarydan23 said:

You don't need a franchise or draft model, though I wouldn't be opposed to getting rid of club academies, and levying a stipend on professional clubs to fund a national network of regional Academys similar to US College football, it may even end up self-funding with a TV deal and matches played on say a Friday night, and having a draft out of that when they graduate. You could even ensure they leave the system with academic or vocational qualifications.

But anyway, that's a pipe dream.

All you'd need is a salary cap to prevent the dominance you describe. If Man Utd, Man City, Chelsea, Arsenal, Tottenham and Liverpool f**k off, for sure Leicester would probably dominate. But then the players causing the dominance would ask for more cash and before you know it, bang, salary cap reached, Maddison and Tielemans have to drop down the league if they want to carry on earning £100k a week. Or attract the attention of one of the Super League teams.

A salary cap is a non-starter whilst the Big 6 enjoy the fruits of one of the most unequal "sports" on the planet they are never going to condone something like that, something that makes it fair, something that makes elite football a sport once more. But I suspect outside of those, you'd get a consensus. Even the sugardaddys at clubs like Leicester and Wolves must find the idea that their wage spend cannot spiral out of control, and they'll have to invest in other things with their billions to gain an advantage (elite training facilities, crowd expansion and cheap tickets to gain an atmospheric advantage in your home games, etc).

Almost every sport has a salary cap now, even football in England below the Championship has caught up. It needs to happen in the top two leagues but it categorically won't whilst the Big 6 are still in play. I wish they'd just **** off and let football be a sport again please.

They couldn't even agree a salary cap for league one because the clubs with marginally bigger incomes saw it as a clear competitive disadvantage. Why would you assume that this would be agreed in a reformed Premier League.

Also a salary cap just guarantees three movement of players abroad, reducing the quality of the league and potentially exacerbating the impact of fans simply spending their money on the super League. Maybe not in this generation but the future. 

I share the resentment of the big clubs dominance, but them leaving doesn't actually solve the issues. 

[TheGunnShow 5,940]

1 minute ago, 1902 said:

They couldn't even agree a salary cap for league one because the clubs with marginally bigger incomes saw it as a clear competitive disadvantage. Why would you assume that this would be agreed in a reformed Premier League.

Also a salary cap just guarantees three movement of players abroad, reducing the quality of the league and potentially exacerbating the impact of fans simply spending their money on the super League. Maybe not in this generation but the future. 

I share the resentment of the big clubs dominance, but them leaving doesn't actually solve the issues. 

Key bit in bold. All that happens with a ESL is that you get a new set of dominators for similar reasons, just the discrepancies are not as extreme.

[Son Ova Gunn 165]

Agreed that a super league solves nothing, you would still have teams like Villa or whoever has a new sugar daddy that year spending considerably more than others. Also the big teams wealth will increase meaning they will fill up their reserves with players like Cantwell and Aarons, at least at the moment £30m spending is on first team players.

[sgncfc 1,227]

Given that it's been proven time and again that on field success is directly related to the level of wages paid, I think the Superleague is already in action within the PL. In reality, Man Utd, Man City and Chelsea are now some way ahead of anyone else in terms of the wages they pay. Then come Liverpool, clinging on by their fingertips to those 3, with Spurs and Leicester some way behind. Arsenal have fallen off the pace and are now back in the middle pack with Everton, Wolves, Villa, Leeds and West Ham with Newcastle, Palace, Southampton and Brighton behind them.

At the very bottom come Burnley, Brentford, Watford and Norwich, the last 3 replaced by whoever is promoted.

All of these figures are in the public domain in the published accounts.

The likelihood is that the Champions will be one of City, United or Chelsea every season; and most seasons the relegated teams will be 3 of those bottom 4. Beyond that, there isn't much movement.

It's actually pretty similar in every other country - unfortunately England has lost what was once the unique nature of our domestic football, namely the ability to comfortably move up the leagues. The wage gap between the Championship and League One is increasing every year too, making even that transition almost impossible.

If a genuine ESL was to take away the top 2 or 3 teams in every country it would allow the rest to go back to having competitive leagues - unfortunately all the TV money would go with them and they would all be running 60 man first team squads.

The only real answer is to limit total wageroll, not to a percentage of turnover but to an agreed flat amount per club, and severely punish clubs who cheat, just like rugby has done and Spain are doing. If we could also limit squad and academy numbers that would help maintain a more level playing field.

[canarydan23 4,060]

2 hours ago, 1902 said:

They couldn't even agree a salary cap for league one because the clubs with marginally bigger incomes saw it as a clear competitive disadvantage. Why would you assume that this would be agreed in a reformed Premier League.

Also a salary cap just guarantees three movement of players abroad, reducing the quality of the league and potentially exacerbating the impact of fans simply spending their money on the super League. Maybe not in this generation but the future. 

I share the resentment of the big clubs dominance, but them leaving doesn't actually solve the issues. 

They couldn't agree it because the players were too greedy and it was deemed unenforceable, largely because it was hurried through.

Look, these arguments existed in Rugby prior to 1999, they existed in the NFL prior to 1994 but the salary cap inevitably came in because it had to. Formula 1 is very slowly moving the way of budgetary constraints. And in all cases, the doomsday scenarios painted never came to fruition and the sports largely improved. Look at where not having it is leading. Real Madrid and Barcelona with a combined debt of over 2 billion Euros. It might take a while, but some form of salary limits in football is inexorable.

If the ESL broke away, the salary cap would have to be bought in gradually to avoid the threat of legal action that happened by the Football League's ill-thought out imposition of it and in that period the remaining "big" clubs would dominate. Though having said that, and bearing in mind it is a simplistic way of doing it as you need to consider results etc, the top 5 for the EPL for the past few years without the big 6 would have been very varied. 14 different teams would have featured in the top 5 and only Leicester twice finished the highest out of the everyone-bar-the-big-six category. So it's entirely possible that sans Big 6, even without the salary cap, four different clubs' fans would get to see their team lift the Premier League, three of them for the first time in over 30 years.

With a salary cap, over 20 years, you'd probably witness a dozen different teams crowned champions. Good coaching and hard work would be more important than bank balances, which is what I thought sport was meant to be.

And I don't buy the reducing the quality of the league argument at all. Competition is more important. I read a recent poll of greatest Premier League seasons ever and the 1997/98 season won it. Why? Because it was so competitive and exciting. The gap between 1st and 18th was the same as the gap has been between 1st and 6th in recent seasons. Fans want to be entertained. Competitiveness is a much more important factor in entertainment than quality.

And of course revenue would fall, there is no doubt about that. But so what? What fan going into the gate is concerned about how much money is in football? The fall in money coming into the Premier League would be offset by the drop in wages and the ending of the unedifying prospect of clubs paying the equivalent of some nation's sovereign debt on a single football player.

The plastics could continue to be be glued to the TV screen to watch their "quality". The actual sports fans would get football back. What we have now is not football in the true sense of the word. It's a corporate entertainment industry built around football.

[1902 1,167]

20 minutes ago, canarydan23 said:

They couldn't agree it because the players were too greedy and it was deemed unenforceable, largely because it was hurried through.

Look, these arguments existed in Rugby prior to 1999, they existed in the NFL prior to 1994 but the salary cap inevitably came in because it had to. Formula 1 is very slowly moving the way of budgetary constraints. And in all cases, the doomsday scenarios painted never came to fruition and the sports largely improved. Look at where not having it is leading. Real Madrid and Barcelona with a combined debt of over 2 billion Euros. It might take a while, but some form of salary limits in football is inexorable.

If the ESL broke away, the salary cap would have to be bought in gradually to avoid the threat of legal action that happened by the Football League's ill-thought out imposition of it and in that period the remaining "big" clubs would dominate. Though having said that, and bearing in mind it is a simplistic way of doing it as you need to consider results etc, the top 5 for the EPL for the past few years without the big 6 would have been very varied. 14 different teams would have featured in the top 5 and only Leicester twice finished the highest out of the everyone-bar-the-big-six category. So it's entirely possible that sans Big 6, even without the salary cap, four different clubs' fans would get to see their team lift the Premier League, three of them for the first time in over 30 years.

With a salary cap, over 20 years, you'd probably witness a dozen different teams crowned champions. Good coaching and hard work would be more important than bank balances, which is what I thought sport was meant to be.

And I don't buy the reducing the quality of the league argument at all. Competition is more important. I read a recent poll of greatest Premier League seasons ever and the 1997/98 season won it. Why? Because it was so competitive and exciting. The gap between 1st and 18th was the same as the gap has been between 1st and 6th in recent seasons. Fans want to be entertained. Competitiveness is a much more important factor in entertainment than quality.

And of course revenue would fall, there is no doubt about that. But so what? What fan going into the gate is concerned about how much money is in football? The fall in money coming into the Premier League would be offset by the drop in wages and the ending of the unedifying prospect of clubs paying the equivalent of some nation's sovereign debt on a single football player.

The plastics could continue to be be glued to the TV screen to watch their "quality". The actual sports fans would get football back. What we have now is not football in the true sense of the word. It's a corporate entertainment industry built around football.

NFL is a franchise system. Rugby has one single rich competitor in the French League, and that has caused ridiculously Draconian rules by some Unions on international calls to try to keep their leagues competitive. If anything it highlights the risks.

Football culture has changed since 1997, all entertainment has. Just because people are nostalgic for it, doesn't mean it's viable now.

County cricket is competitive, more so than the 90s, it's also struggling with attendance. There is sod all evidence that competition is what people want not quality. Otherwise we would all be watching non league every week. 

[canarydan23 4,060]

2 minutes ago, 1902 said:

Just because people are nostalgic for it, doesn't mean it's viable now.

You think the current state of football is viable?!

[Google Bot 3,275]

3 minutes ago, canarydan23 said:

You think the current state of football is viable?!

The EPL has just gone through multiple pandemics and we come out of it with record breaking transfers and wage demands.  

I don't think it's viable, but clearly it is - but that's more down to external riches than 'football' itself being ran viably.

Football as a whole though, it can't be viable... surely?

Edited September 16, 2021 by Google Bot

[canarydan23 4,060]

11 minutes ago, Google Bot said:

The EPL has just gone through multiple pandemics and we come out of it with record breaking transfers and wage demands.  

I don't think it's viable, but clearly it is - but that's more down to external riches than 'football' itself being ran viably.

Football as a whole though, it can't be viable... surely?

It's an arms race, sustainable only by billionaires willing to underwrite eye-watering losses. It's a house of cards. If it stops being fashionable for the uber-rich to own football clubs then the whole thing will collapse. And the arms race effects everyone, it encourages/forces teams further down the pyramid to spend beyond their means. And as the Premier League riches continue to mount, it encourages/forces other teams in Europe to spend beyond their means to remain competitive in continental competition.

And people say a salary cap could never be agreed upon. Well, see how quickly they'd scramble for one if the European Super League was established and TV revenues suddenly halved. It wouldn't matter if you were Everton or West Ham fancying their chances at dominating the new look Premier League, with the Sky/BT/Amazon/global TV money tap turned down from a gush to barely more than a trickle, they'd be begging the authorities to do something to curb player wages.

[Google Bot 3,275]

6 minutes ago, canarydan23 said:

It's an arms race, sustainable only by billionaires willing to underwrite eye-watering losses. It's a house of cards. If it stops being fashionable for the uber-rich to own football clubs then the whole thing will collapse.

What throws me is when pundits claim that we're not trying, and they're giving us absolutely no vote of confidence or credit for how we're ran.  I may be incredibly biased but we're one of the few clubs doing things right yet blasted and laughed at for it.   Wenger was slated with the same brush also.

So where has that all gone wrong when experts and fans themselves are all singing from the same page and being so actively excited when clubs spend money they don't have?!

The Govt claim to have an interest, but as long as they see a portion in tax they're golden with it really.  That's probably why football continued despite everyone being in lockdown -  Nice cut of High wages all going into the tax system/health service.

I don't know if anyone has made a list of the state of clubs if the money men pulled out of each, but I know just with Chelsea that the club 'owes' Abramovich something like a billion pounds?  That's just staggering and can't even imagine if they had to become accountable and self sustainable how that could ever be re-paid?

Like you say, surely the bubble has to burst - or can that kind of money be easily written off?  I can't even get my head around how it exists at this point in fact... If it was written off who loses out? Who doesn't get paid?  Or is it almost a fictitious number that appears on a computer system somewhere?

Doing my own head in now lol.

[1902 1,167]

1 hour ago, canarydan23 said:

You think the current state of football is viable?!

That's not the question. The question is whether the alternative that you are proposing is viable and whether football can return to its previous state.

There will be many more Burys in future, and I would like to see a solution. I just don't feel your answer will solve the problem. For example I share the point of some on here that would like to see similar ownership models to Germany.

[canarydan23 4,060]

1 hour ago, 1902 said:

That's not the question. The question is whether the alternative that you are proposing is viable and whether football can return to its previous state.

There will be many more Burys in future, and I would like to see a solution. I just don't feel your answer will solve the problem. For example I share the point of some on here that would like to see similar ownership models to Germany.

You think that's more viable than a salary cap?!

[Virtual reality 707]

10 hours ago, 1902 said:

It's a good point. I mean we are a whole 3 points from safety with only 34 games to play. 

Whereas one division lower, West Brom have a commanding not even alphabetical lead over Bournemouth, their only real rival for the second promotion slot now that Coventry's goal difference has collapsed. All that needs to take place is that zero things change for the next 37 championship games and the inevitable will happen.

 

It’s a nonsense point. By the same reasoning  Last season both West Brom and Fulham were doing better than us then. Realistically all 3 teams are now yo-yo teams who have and may continue to swap places in divisions 

[Virtual reality 707]

10 hours ago, canarydan23 said:

No it isn't. 

Yes it is. We’re all yo-yo teams who have and will probably continue to swap places between divisions. 

[sgncfc 1,227]

For most of the top half at least of the PL the German model has already been discounted because the money involved in reaching that model is simply too big.

Clubs can only get there if their current owners become truly beneficent and gift a majority of shares - I would suggest that is unlikely unless there was some kind of agreement between the FA and HMRC to give a favourable tax treatment.

When you have a 36 year old Ronaldo earning a basic £510,000 a week on a two year contract no one can claim that football is viable in the long term. It is so much more than "obscene"; there really isn't a word to describe it. Yet that deal has received universal praise from everyone in the game or the media with the MOTD team claiming that "he's worth every penny." Messi earns even more at PSG, the teary farewell from his one true love of Barcelona being necessary because they could only afford to pay him £400,000 a week, so he couldn't possibly stay.

Even at the Norwich level, we have players earning completely stupid amounts of money for being actually not very good at their jobs, in terms of what they are supposed to be doing. 

It will have to change at some point. Norwich will be in a good place when it does, hopefully.

[BroadstairsR 2,163]

2 minutes ago, Virtual reality said:

Yes it is. We’re all yo-yo teams who have and will probably continue to swap places between divisions. 

I don't mind us being a yo-yo side, I just wish that the string was a lot longer and that we managed to survive a season or two longer.

[Virtual reality 707]

.

Edited September 16, 2021 by Virtual reality

[Virtual reality 707]

5 minutes ago, BroadstairsR said:

I don't mind us being a yo-yo side, I just wish that the string was a lot longer and that we managed to survive a season or two longer.

You never know, After our hard start we may kick on now and move up the table, I’m still confident we will put up a decent fight. I just wouldn’t say that we were more successful than Fulham and West Brom as some posters in this thread believe. Last season they were here and we were in the championship and there’s a realistic chance we will be swapping places again next season. That’s the life of a yo-yo club. West Brom have also been in the PL far more frequently than we have in recent history 

[Virtual reality 707]

9 hours ago, canarydan23 said:

Let me introduce you to the football league pyramid system. At the top of it, is the Premier League, below that, the Championship, then League One, then League Two. After that comes the National League. Below that it starts to become more regionalised with the National League South and National League North. It continues right the way down to grassroots.

Norwich currently sit in the Premier League.

Fulham and West Brom currently sit in the Championship.

There's your answer.

Such a simplistic answer. By the same logic before kick off last week we were more successful than Arsenal….

[1902 1,167]

35 minutes ago, Virtual reality said:

It’s a nonsense point. By the same reasoning  Last season both West Brom and Fulham were doing better than us then. Realistically all 3 teams are now yo-yo teams who have and may continue to swap places in divisions 

They were. That's how the football pyramid works. Also, it's not even October yet.

[1902 1,167]

41 minutes ago, canarydan23 said:

You think that's more viable than a salary cap?!

Yes. I suppose that's all there is to it, you believe in the idea of a salary cap because you think it's the only way to get the ridiculous spending under control. I think it doesn't function when there are other markets for players to go to and would require involvement from too many parties that don't benefit from it. 

Im not sure either of us know what would work, but it's getting a bit circular now.

[Virtual reality 707]

13 minutes ago, 1902 said:

They were. That's how the football pyramid works. Also, it's not even October yet.

We were more successful than Arsenal this time last week then…

[1902 1,167]

Just now, Virtual reality said:

We were more successful than Arsenal this time last week then…

My point is the pyramid works when everyone has played each other twice. Then we restart. That's how seasons work. So no.

[chicken 2,624]

5 hours ago, canarydan23 said:

I genuinely don't know what the uproar regarding the Super League was all about. I welcomed it and the more I thought about it the more desperate I became for it to happen.

Forgive the harsh terminology, but teams like Man Utd, Man City, Chelsea etc have become a cancer on the sport. Their impact permeates down through the leagues, causes teams to adopt sh*t or bust strategies which leads us to situations with teams like Bury, who won't be the last club to vanish from our midst. They are an impassable obstacle toward any reform that the game needs and whilst they are here, nothing will change regardless of the number of clubs that go to the wall.

Cut them off. Let them have their own little plaything. It'll be all over the tele for those fans that are desperate to watch the "big teams". In the mean time, the rest of us can work at forming a fair league, an actual sport rather than fodder for the TV industry. One where wages are restricted and the savings passed on at the gates to stadiums. One where teams who start to dominate for 2 or 3 seasons have trouble keeping hold of the stars who have got them there. One where VAR is actually implemented sensibly.

It's a dream and it came so close to happening.

That's like hoping you have one of your feet blown off because one shoe is better than two.

There isn't a simple solution to the PL and much of the same issues are seen around Europe. The main problem is that letting these teams galivant off to play in a Super League is the impact it would have in terms of confidence in the leagues that would be left to pick up the pieces.

The one thing their proposals, both for a rescue package AND for the super league revealed is exactly where their owners views are.
1) They don't care about fans in grounds anymore, and there is large reason to believe they haven't for some time. It's more important to have fans buying TV packages and watching them on screens around the world. It pays more.
2) They have no confidence in the leagues ability to continue to make good money from TV deals. This much was hugely obvious. More than a heavy hint of suggestion that within years, most of the big clubs will be selling their own TV rights individually so that the money isn't split up in a deal. We know that they already fight for the "big" games when teams in the top 6-8 teams play each other due to the international demand for those teams.

So basically, if they go, the TV money will dry up. If the model is set for individual clubs promoting their own streaming service you suddenly have tens of English clubs competing with other clubs around the world. Sky blankets regions, it can engulf them, making their advertising reach immense, same with BT now. Individual streaming channels won't have that same reach. Even clubs trying to pull together won't make a drastic difference if regions of the world are not knowledgeable of the cities they are attached to already.

[canarydan23 4,060]

2 hours ago, Virtual reality said:

Such a simplistic answer. By the same logic before kick off last week we were more successful than Arsenal….

Nope.

[canarydan23 4,060]

1 hour ago, 1902 said:

Yes. I suppose that's all there is to it, you believe in the idea of a salary cap because you think it's the only way to get the ridiculous spending under control. I think it doesn't function when there are other markets for players to go to and would require involvement from too many parties that don't benefit from it. 

Im not sure either of us know what would work, but it's getting a bit circular now.

The German model would require dozens and dozens of self-serving individuals to forgo, collectively, billions and billions of pounds worth of shares to fans groups. Then there is the issue of said fans taking their share of the billions and billions of pounds worth of debt. It worked in Germany because football wasn't anything like as ****ed as it is in England today.

You said it yourself, your owned favoured solution falls down for the same reasons you think a salary cap won't work; it would require involvement of too many parties that won't benefit.

And a carefully implemented salary cap can be imposed on clubs by the sport's ruling authority, as demonstrated in other sports. So it wouldn't require involvement of many parties at all. Unlike a strategy that involves wandering up to Sheikh Mansour with your plate out and your best Oliver Twist impression. 

[TeemuVanBasten 3,327]

12 hours ago, canarydan23 said:

I genuinely don't know what the uproar regarding the Super League was all about. I welcomed it and the more I thought about it the more desperate I became for it to happen.

Forgive the harsh terminology, but teams like Man Utd, Man City, Chelsea etc have become a cancer on the sport. Their impact permeates down through the leagues, causes teams to adopt sh*t or bust strategies which leads us to situations with teams like Bury, who won't be the last club to vanish from our midst. They are an impassable obstacle toward any reform that the game needs and whilst they are here, nothing will change regardless of the number of clubs that go to the wall.

Cut them off. Let them have their own little plaything. It'll be all over the tele for those fans that are desperate to watch the "big teams". In the mean time, the rest of us can work at forming a fair league, an actual sport rather than fodder for the TV industry. One where wages are restricted and the savings passed on at the gates to stadiums. One where teams who start to dominate for 2 or 3 seasons have trouble keeping hold of the stars who have got them there. One where VAR is actually implemented sensibly.

It's a dream and it came so close to happening.

 

Your utopia won't happen.

What you describe is basically the SPL. 

The big 4/5 just replaced by the next biggest 4/5, it is all relative.

When Rangers or Celtic have a top talent they lose them to clubs like Crystal Palace.

That doesn't mean that Aberdeen become title challengers.