UEFA Champions League

What’s stopping Money bags FC from funnelling wages indirectly?

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I don’t think a salary cap can be installed because of EU-regulations. Or something like that.

Eh, I don’t like that idea. Don’t see how risking having a group of say Madrid Barça Dortmund United and another of Sporting Astana CSKA and Olympiakos makes things any better…

I’m fine with the format. It’s called the Champions League for a reason. If you take away some of the more crap teams you wouldn’t have any games, I like to see how clubs from different leagues do against comparable opposition over a larger sample size. I wouldn’t mind something like four groups of 8 with the first 4 qualifying for the round of 16, but then you create the problem of how do you incentive 1st 2nd and 3rd place over 4th in the group, and you can’t do home and away. You could get rid of the round of 16 and do just the first two qualify from each group of 8, but again, I rather like the home and away format of the group…

I can’t really see a better format, it’s a good mix of little league play and then tournament. The proposed idea of two groups of 16 and 1st place goes to a final loses the history and the drama of the knockout periods for me, even if it has its upsides. The only thing I would say is go back to the UEFA coefficient to draw better groups instead of this champions nonsense where Shakhtar gets a no.1 seed and Barça no.

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I’d love it if they just went back to straight knockout. Even if they started with say 128 teams and seeded that mother fucker all the way to the last 16. Have guaranteed qualification for (most) league champions then ditch the Europa and pump all the money into the single competition.

The league part really doesn’t matter. That’s just branding and nobody calls the group stages the league stages anyway.

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In spanish we call it “liguilla” (literally: small league). :grimacing:

Yeah well something needs to be worked out because it’s getting really stupid. I mean I guess change will be forced if the TV ratings take a dip if it actually does get that boring to everyone.

@BigWeng_4LYFE how does the NFL and NBA prevent this?

I’m clearly missing a word after nobody there so. :slight_smile:

Yeah perhaps not the best idea. It was just an off the cuff thought. The main point I was trying to make was that the format needs a revamp. At the moment some of these group games are simply a formality for some teams and not much of a spectacle for the neutrals.

It definitely needs reform, it just don’t happen though (not substantially anyway). Don’t think we’re too far off from a European super league gaining serious traction.

But is the idea that Basel have a chance to win it? I want the best team to win it…the goal of the Champions League should be to find out who the best team in Europe is, not to find out if we can give the 40th best team a chance to win it…

@will24 what format would you go for? I struggle to think of a better one.

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I struggle as well to be honest. I’d favour what the clip above hints at, which is pretty much being more discriminatory towards other leagues. Giving leagues with better coefficients more places would make it more interesting, then maybe teams from leagues with lower coefficients face each other in the play offs to get a place (only offer a limited amount).

This I’m sure has many limitations, least of all the fact it would discriminate even more against smaller leagues whose clubs need the money more than the already stacked rich clubs.

On the balance of things the status quo seems good to be honest. I enjoy the tournament alot, plus the games from the round of 16 gets teally excitong. Besides, today we had Barça-Juve, tomorrow Liverpool and Spurs have tough games.

I still think the top European clubs will really push for a super league in the coming years. It seems the only potential way to significantly expand their revenues.

I really hope a Euro super league never happens and I kind of feel like it never will. I don’t think it’s feasible/profitable without getting the English teams and the big two from Spain involved and given the current tv deals all of those are signed up to they aren’t gonna walk away easily.

Also if it ever happened without UEFA/FIFA sanction there would potentially be a lot of players looking to get out of their clubs because otherwise they couldn’t play for their countries. So there may have to contracts renegotiated and all sorts before this could become a serious runner.

Ah I guess I should’ve listened to that thing before commenting above haha. That’s true, you could be more discriminatory towards other leagues, but that’s just going to widen the gap even more tbh…if the winners of the Belgian league don’t get the money from CL, they are going to become even less competitive. I would, though, give qualifying spots to 5th place in England, Spain, and maybe a 4th spot to Germany/Italy in favour of a spot to winners of Azerbaijan and Kazakstaan, etc.

Club football is beyond redemption

At this point you might aswell indulge the fuckery and give top clubs automatic CL spots regardless of where they finish in their league. Maybe implement a system where you get rid of draws and properly organise the competitions group fixtures

but then those UEFA voting blocs in Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan are worth keeping sweet…

Nothing’s going to change. People make altogether too much fuss about one of the elite teams of Europe shoeing someone else by 5 or 6. Giving them a route to European competition is more important than your boredom threshold

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@shamrockgooner me neither really. I think the top clubs will push for it though, more likely as a bargaining chip to get better tv rights from their leagues/UEFA. What’s more likely is playing some league games abroad (think Spain are looking at playing a weekend fixture list in Asia)

@AbouCuellar yeah I agree! One more from the best 3/4 leagues based on the coefficient surely wouldn’t hurt too much.

Absolutely. And I’m biased here because Shamrock Rovers qualifying for the Europa Group stages is probably the greatest football achievement I’m ever going to get to be a part of but I really do believe this statement.

The reality is in any case that regardless of how bored people are the CL is still growing in terms of sponsorship attracted and eyes watching the games.

Automatic CL spots would be a catastrophe honestly, can you imagine how boring the premier league would’ve been last season if there was no competition for CL spots? Same goes for a lot of leagues.

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