Dimitar Berbatov

[Marky Mark]

I can offer a pair of extra large cycling gloves...

[Snoop Doug]

I'm curious - what does Ian Munnery make of all this excitement

[mlocke]

I was just coming to start the transfer thread. Waiting till midnight to get all the news

Berba's off to UTD no doubt !!! ( i could look really silly in the morning)

Robinho at Man city????

Just think of all the cash they have now - Man city the new Chelski but with much more cash!!! Imagine how much they will have to pay for players

[Ian A4size]

[color=#8040FF][size=200]YAAAAAAWWWWWNNNNNN[/size][/color]

[mlocke]

Mr Munnery !!!!

Its very exciting

[Snoop Doug]

[quote="Ian MunneryA1size"][color=#8040FF][size=200]YAAAAAAWWWWWNNNNNN[/size][/color]

[mlocke]

[quote]Sean Hogan - Es verdade!

[huw williams]

Haven't seen live TV as exciting as that since the evacuation of Dunkirk. What? The evacuation of Dunkirk was a Hollywood movie? Damn I thought the editing was too good.

Anyway - what all this means of course is another nail in the coffin of the England team - more big-spending foreign owners means more money spent on big foreign imports and the already impotent national team left with even fewer players with experience of top-flite football to choose from.

So now we have a big three eh... Man U, Man C and Chelski. All no doubt outbidding each other for the world's best players over the next few seasons and driving the price of good players beyond the reach of any of the other clubs. And the result...? even less competition
Season ticket to pay for all this anyone?

Whoever is writing the business model for this sport needs shooting

[Andrew G]

Business model? Don't be daft Huw. Spend now worry later, it worked fine for Leeds, and all this investment is long term. From what your saying you seem to think the investors were a bunch of rich so-and-sos who just like playing God for a few minutes until they get bored and find a new toy.

England don't need assistance to be sh1t, they just are, and have been for the majority of history regardless of what (or how well) the domestic game was doing. Now they are just even worse as it's uber-rich twenty-somethings who understandably couldn't care less about anthing other than having a laugh and buying themselves new presents (and fighting/ABH/GBH obviosusly). If fairness would you if you'd been told you were wonderful everyday since you were 9 and earning over £1-3m a year by the time you're anywhere between 18 and 24?

World football is a farce these days. England is no different to Spain or Italy (Real, Barca, Milan etc, etc) and what they've done for years. The main problem is that all the teams tend to think they are on a similar footing so a club like West Ham spends way too much on players. The wage bill is ridiculous - Ljungberg was reportedly on between £65k and £85k a week! I haven't been to a match for years as they have bumped up the prices so much to try and cover this stupidity. The last match I saw was about 5 years ago and the cheapest ticket (the one I bought) was £35!!!!!! For West Ham!!!!! For 90 minutes of something where there is no guarantee of the standard of what you might see.

You still get some good matches but they tend to be fairly few and far apart, certainly any "big" games.

Right I'm off to go and tie the laces on my football and have a cup of bovril .

[Andrew G]

I know what you mean Sean, I just didn't phrase it very well. I meant that those leagues have been dominated by a small handful of super rich teams who have, shall we say certain advantages over the others. Real Madrid has been buying players for stupid sums for years without any real money of their own, it just gets given to them by the Government doesn't it - being the Royal club it couldn't be allowed to go bust. I recall they were being threatened with being made bankrupt a few years ago so the local government bought their training ground for some ludicrous sum and then leased it back to them for free for 100 years.

I've probably got some of that wrong but I think the gist is right. Although they are "owned by the fans" it's not like they have a whip round to finance the next EUR50m transfer.

[mrP(Boonen)VT]

[quote="Ian MunneryA1size"][color=#8040FF][size=200]YAAAAAAWWWWWNNNNNN[/size][/color]

[Elliot M]

[quote="marco"]As much as i dislike football (not a real top tier sport) some of you who are into it might be interested to know where the money has suddenly come from. and which team is likely to be kings of manchester very soon (note, not stockport)

http://www.arabianbusiness.com/529580-a ... city?ln=en

[Roy Green]

Does ACC need a new Mission Statement? Here it is, courtesy of Arabian Business ...

[size=150]"[/size] Al Fahim said: "We in Abu Dhabi United Company for Development and Investment are keen to develop ways to provide support and care for various sports activities to help build and develop a new generation of young State, which represents the real wealth and the future of this nation and the cornerstone for building the future of our civilisation. [size=200]"[/size]

[Roy Green]

BTW, as a schoolkid, I lived within walking distance of the Maine Road ground. Just thought y'all needed to know that.

[Andrew G]

Was that when (you reliably inform me) you had to walk 5 miles to school everyday over cobbled roads through 6 inches of snow - and that was in the summer .