If city do it they will not match our achievement in 99, we didn't have the luxury of an arsenal side completely gifting us the title on a silver plater
Man City's inevitable Treble
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Pathetic.
To be fair, they haven't had a chance to get to work on the CGI yet.
So premier league wrapped up again. So which players will they bring in to improve their squad for next season? Their normally pro-active and announce signings early enough in summer.
I 100% agree that the Invincibles are overrated but Arsenal were a Denis Bergkamp penalty kick away from doing the Double in successive seasons with that 98 team (i'm certain they would have won the league if that had gone in). They weren't the most attractive attacking side but like Jose's first Chelsea side they were incredibly depressing to face because they were so psychically strong and defensively sound.
The 98 team got closer to retaining their title than the invincibles ever did and they pushed our treble team all the way. Things went south for them quickly after that as Petit, Overmars and Anelka all left, and the backline got even older but i thought they were an excellent side.
I'm Danish, and since Danish domestic football is so shit (and because most of the prominent Danish footballers have played in England), the Premier League is the unofficial 'other league' of my country. Also, we once conquered the place with longships, but I suppose that was probably before my time. Anyway, for these reasons, PL news is usually reported with almost as much enthusiasm as any country would treat their own league's football news.
And nobody is paying more than a passing, disinterested note to City's title win today. I had to scroll way, way down on the website of the Danish news site that is usually most eager to publish PL news. There's a lot of United, Liverpool and Arsenal fans here in Denmark, but nobody gives the remotest of fecks about City, so it's a minor sidenote on page eight of Danish news. I have personally never met a City fan in my country. I have met some Chelsea fans, admittedly.
While I'm prepared to believe that there could be some small decline in interest in the Prem here due to the fact that we no longer have Jesper Olsen, Jan Mølby, Peter Schmeichel, John Jensen and Daniel Agger playing in England, there's still Eriksen, the best Danish player of this generation; not to mention Thomas Frank doing amazingly well at Brentford, where several Danish players have also found success, even if they're not the biggest names ever.
All this to say that nobody is very impressed that City won the title. Outside of England, it's a sidenote that doesn't get enough clicks to warrant even the tabloids placing it higher up on their websites. It's just not something anybody cares much about, because it's not a club that carries any weight or prestige. It has been acknowledged here as a sign that what was once a great league is now usurped by soulless money from the Middle East.
And nobody is paying more than a passing, disinterested note to City's title win today. I had to scroll way, way down on the website of the Danish news site that is usually most eager to publish PL news. There's a lot of United, Liverpool and Arsenal fans here in Denmark, but nobody gives the remotest of fecks about City, so it's a minor sidenote on page eight of Danish news. I have personally never met a City fan in my country. I have met some Chelsea fans, admittedly.
While I'm prepared to believe that there could be some small decline in interest in the Prem here due to the fact that we no longer have Jesper Olsen, Jan Mølby, Peter Schmeichel, John Jensen and Daniel Agger playing in England, there's still Eriksen, the best Danish player of this generation; not to mention Thomas Frank doing amazingly well at Brentford, where several Danish players have also found success, even if they're not the biggest names ever.
All this to say that nobody is very impressed that City won the title. Outside of England, it's a sidenote that doesn't get enough clicks to warrant even the tabloids placing it higher up on their websites. It's just not something anybody cares much about, because it's not a club that carries any weight or prestige. It has been acknowledged here as a sign that what was once a great league is now usurped by soulless money from the Middle East.
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By far the strangest part of the City/FFP scandal is opposition fans desperately trying to pretend that the media are overlooking/ignoring the charges, which could not be further from the truth. Nobody who pays any attention to football media could reasonably come to the conclusion that journalists are on City's side.
Not really true.
They’ve turned the epl into the bundesliga
Looks like Pep wants Gvardiol aka one of the best defenders in the world to replace Laporte.
Another well run state funded rule flouting team will eventually battle it out with them. May take awhile but that’s the shitty direction we are headed in.
They added Haaland to the champions so it should have been a formality really. Didn’t expect arsenal to be the best team in the league for 3/4ths and then completely fall apart but we got where everyone expected the season to be at (initially).
We were. But guess when i started supporting United? 1995. The trebel help cemented my affection
In 10 years time 20-30 demographics would lean on City due to their success.
Just like I didnt follow Liverpool despite them being the biggest English club circa 80s
Massive club
because you pissed about in the first half of the season. Check the following season for proof
When your mate says "come to my party, its going to be lit" but you know full well that he is a nerd with no friends but you turn up anyway out of pity, this is how the actual party looks like.
Ah yeah, poor little City
SkySports have like four different articles about City being champions. It should be one article with one sentence "Man City are champions." and one photo.
Then the rest should be about the actual division.
What do you mean we were?
I don't think it will happen in 10 years. Liverpool didn't win a title in 30 years and they still had and have a huge following, just like United.
Damn, yet another player from the farmer league. Somebody should tell Pep that they aren't good enough for the EPL.
British media going hard on state ownership. Hypocrites.
City are basically what an American sports club is - a franchise. It's like the original City ceased to exist, closed up shop around 2008 and reopened as a modern-day sporting franchise. And the Sheikh has done so with other clubs around the globe with NYCFC a true franchise.
I think this kind of nitpicking really undermines your argument.
If Bayern and Real Madrid this season are in disarray then so were Inter and Juventus in 1999: they finished 8th and 7th in Serie A, respectively.
Similarly, you could pick apart our 07/08 Double: we were pushed all the way in both the league and CL by... Avram Grant. In the CL we faced a decent but unspectacular Lyon, a Roma side we walloped 7-1 a year before, and a completely collapsing Barcelona that finished La Liga behind Villarreal.
If you just stick to the "they broke the rules" part, the argument is far stronger.
City are so strong (and have been so for many years) only because of Financial Doping and nothing else.
The PL is in a pretty bad state right now, but the German league is even worse and should be seen as a warning to the PL as to the way it's heading if City are allowed to just illegally buy their way to the league every year.
I think European football was already on a slippery slope before City, PSG and Chelsea came along with their oil money because of the financial rewards qualifying for the CL season after season brought. Leverkusen got close to a league and a European title in the 00s but Bayern instantly dismantled that exciting side which was a real shame.
Pumping oil money into the game just makes things even worse and City fans pretending they're some plucky underdog and that other fans' concerns about the state of the game is no more than sour grapes is exactly what their owners would hope for.
This is the first time in history I've heard of a potential treble being boring. You could make the same argument about Bayern's treble or Barcelona's sextuple in 08-09 being boring... And i can say I've never heard that term being used. Actually the games they blew the opposition away (Barcelona 6-2 Madrid, Bayern 8-2 Barcelona) were not lamented as situations of them leaving the opposition in the dust, but hailed as memorable landmarks to their greatness.
(It blew my mind seeing people lament City's dominance over Madrid, as if Madrid were underdogs being hard done by. I had to look at their squad list just to be sure.)
Not even mentioning that City's season hasn't been entirely smooth. Teething pains with Erling, mid season funk, Cancelo's histrionics, difficult away games at Munich and Madrid... There's enough to make for memories associated with this treble for City fans and unbiased neutral fans (should they win it of course). Doesn't measure up to 1999, but attempts to frame their season as event-free dominance in retrospect don't tally up with what exactly happened.
It's one thing to call our treble the greatest in the way it was won (FA cup semi-final, league race with great Arsenal team, comebacks in Turin and Barcelona, bla bla) and sure, no argument there. But every treble is memorable.
I was obviously wumming but on a more serious note, I fully agree with you. Still think the only solution to this is a salary cap and I was a bit surprised that Ceferin publicly saying that they are working on it and the support for it is almost universal didn't receive more attention in here. If City really pays its players beneath the table this won't help, obviously, but it probably makes the whole practice even shadier. It is probably the best solution we have. albeit not perfect.
It's been the solution* for years!!
Because if you have tight salary cap restrictions then who cares who your owner is? It could be Saddam for all I care. You can only spend 100M on your squad in a year. And the differentiator no longer becomes money (as it has been for eons), but how well you can build a team within constraints that are applicable to everyone, regardless of idiot factors like history and heritage and whether your owner is oil wealthy. Put in incentives for using youth developed internally.
Subject clubs and players to audits to ensure they are not getting paid under the table. Severely punish those who step out of bounds with disbarment from domestic/European competition.
And we've seen that rich leagues in China and Saudi Arabia can't lure a critical mass of talent. The majority of players see Europe as the optimal destination to play in. That would continue with salary caps that ensure they are well compensated, and other stakeholders (clubs, fans, FAs, UEFA, television companies, tv consumers) don't continue to get shafted.
*Along with me seizing power
Pedantic much??
Titles, Trophies
It’s all silverware that’s put in their Trophy Cabinets that is only getting larger and Larger at City.
Money isn’t an instant guarantee to dominance either. City are if anything a prime example of that. It does though of course help! But when did the money come in for City? Initially 2008? It’s taken them 10 years with filthy amounts of money to become the dominant force they are now.
That all being said, the game is ruined now, City, Newcastle and Chelsea, and perhaps United soon if they get taken over by the Qataris or Radcliffe, Arsenal
All have owners worth over £10 billion
How can you compete??
Well, as long as you could pay over the threshold
The cap needs to be high enough so that players really stay in Europe since I think there'll be a "turning price". But clubs who would stay below the threshold anyway (say, Bochum in the Bundesliga who probably can barely afford €3m in salaries for their top players) don't really profit from it. Plus it basically moves much of the profits from the players pocket into those of the clubs/owners. I guess we'll see changes to the image rights there. Don't get me wrong, I'm 100% for it. But there are definitely some downsights to it as well. Still, the best solution we have.
Inter's treble. Maybe lacked the drama of the arsenal FA cup game and CL final but they had to beat barcelona, at one point it looked like they'd blown the league, won the cup against roma, in rome, the volcano, the camp nou game, the chelsea tie, the miracle in Kiev...I'd say it's at least close
Now that PL title has been wrapped up, City will have ample time to rest their players for FA Cup and CL final.
They have a squad packed full of world class players, near enough two in every position.
It doesn't matter who they rest, that's the reason they have been so strong since the world cup, squad depth has taken its toll on everyone else bar them.
They are doing this already.. The last time they played their strongest 11 in the Premier league was the 4-1 against Arsenal. B.Silva like KDB only started 1 of the 4 PL games they’ve played since then…
Can't ever see it happening TBH, it would probably be against EU law for starters and no individual league will do it because it would just handicap the teams in that leagueWell, as long as you could pay over the threshold
Don't get me wrong, I'm 100% for it. But there are definitely some downsights to it as well. Still, the best solution we have.
Now the question is how much does Haaland care about getting to 40 league goals, and if he does, whether Guardiola is gonna humor him or not
We’d better fecking win this cup, I can’t live in a world where they do a fecking treble.
Accept it.
The shits like Thanos atm.
I think Pep will want to do this then the quad.
I don't see how salary caps could be introduced across Europe, assuming all the top leagues would be playing under the same system. If it's a percentage tied to not exceeding club revenues that still favors the big clubs.
In the US, it's based on collective bargaining based on a percentage of league revenues. And it requires collectively shared revenues across the league in the US. That's much easier to do in a closed system but nigh impossible in Europe/Globally. Can anyone imagine Real Madrid giving up 40% of their revenues to a distribution pool? Same applies to United, Bayern, so forth. This could happen in a Super League if the clubs approved.
I find the primary driving force behind salary caps in the US is it restricts player compensation and thus puts more money into ownership pockets.
In the US, it's based on collective bargaining based on a percentage of league revenues. And it requires collectively shared revenues across the league in the US. That's much easier to do in a closed system but nigh impossible in Europe/Globally. Can anyone imagine Real Madrid giving up 40% of their revenues to a distribution pool? Same applies to United, Bayern, so forth. This could happen in a Super League if the clubs approved.
I find the primary driving force behind salary caps in the US is it restricts player compensation and thus puts more money into ownership pockets.