Sligo won 5-2 in the end
We All Dream Of A Team Of Curly Wurly's!!! A Team Of Curly Wurly's!!! A Team Of Curly Wurly's!!!
UD Salamanca folded in Spain yesterday.They weren't one of the giants of Spanish football (were in the regionalised third tier) but were in La Liga only 14 years ago. Sad to see a club like that just disappear.
http://as.com/diarioas/2013/06/18/en...95_016900.html
We are at war with Eurasia. We've always been at war with Eurasia.
Founded by Irish people too, always looked out for their results. Getting relegated from the 2nd Division killed them
Well that and having debts of 23 Million.
Could be the first of many to go under in Spain, most Clubs are crippled by debt, including plenty currently in the top flight. The distribution of TV money there is disgraceful, Barcelona and Real Madrid between them get about 50% and the rest has to cover every other club in the country because each club is allowed bid individually with the TV companies (by comparison Man Utd and City combined got about 12% of the EPL TV pot last season).
We are at war with Eurasia. We've always been at war with Eurasia.
The disparity in the distribution of TV money in La Liga is obviously a well-established fact, but it's also a bit of a red herring used by clubs and their fans to disguise the fact that they are very badly run. Portuguese clubs also sell their rights individually but there seems to be a greater degree of sanity in the running of clubs outside the Porto-Benfica-Sporting axis than there is in Spain outside the top two, Athletic being a notable exception.
Matchday income and other commercial activities exceeds TV money by a ratio of about 3:2 for both Barca and Madrid. Why? Because they're bigger clubs with more fans, and a fairer distribution of TV money (which is an inevitability; if not next year, the year after) won't be anywhere near enough to improve sustainability in the league as a whole.
Not disputing a lot of clubs have been poorly run. However Barca (debts of 400m) and Real (debts of 600m) are both poorly run in strictly fiscal terms too, it's just that their turnover to debt ratio is less than other clubs in Spain operating on much smaller budgets. A huge part of that is due to the disparity in TV income.
Portugal isn't a valid comparison - outside of the Big 3 there aren't any other genuinely big clubs in Portugal.
Strongly disagree. Most seasons, the TV money in the top flight gets doled out roughly as follows:
Barca: 140-160m
Real: 140-160m
Most of the rest: Anwhere from 15-40m
Granada/Vallecano etc 12-15m
If the same amount was distributed as per the EPL, that would read more like:
1st: (Barca this season) 38m
2nd: (Real this season) 36m
Most of the rest: 28-35m
Bottom placed club: 27m
And that's just one year - imagine the impact of that over a decade or more. Any reasonable person would concede that would fundamentally alter the ability of the challenging teams to hang on to their players etc. It would also be a massive help to the weaker teams and in turn trickle down to help the Salamanca's etc make ends meet.
Last season Spain had 7 clubs besides Barca and Real that averaged over 25,000 per game. Among those you have clubs that compete strongly in Europe (5 Europa League between them in the last decade) so we're hardly talking about clubs that are either small or would be unattractive to the viewing public either in Spain or outside it. There is a natural pressure on clubs that size to be signing quality players and competing, which costs serious money. Most of them are receiving TV money of the order of 25-35m per year - scarcely half what QPR got for finishing bottom of the Premiership last year, while Barca and Real each received twice what Man Utd got for winning the EPL (where the overall pot is twice that of La Liga). It was that pressure to compete and close the gap in turnover on the big two that led Valencia to take the huge risk of selling the Mestella and move to a new 70,000 seat stadium - a deal that's gone tits up and left their existence at the mercy of banks.
The current proposals for a 'fairer' split won't genuinely address the injustice and disparity and won't fundamentally change anything (under the proposals Barca/Real will still get 34% of the TV money between them and that's guaranteed regardless of where they finish in the table). I appreciate that they're bigger clubs with bigger support and a bigger media profile, but the continuation of a policy so favourable to them only exacerbates the unfair advantage they have. It allows them the luxury of wasting tens of millions in a given year and starting again at no great disadvantage - if other clubs do that, they risk their very existence. As a Bιtico I'd hate to have seen it happen but I honestly believe that Sevilla could have become a genuine force in CL football with a more equitable share of Spanish TV money to sustain the progress they were making 5/6 years back.
Anyway, I find it hugely ironic that I'm having to make the argument for equal distribution of wealth to the forum's only self-confessed communist.
We are at war with Eurasia. We've always been at war with Eurasia.
I don't think La Liga has anything to envy the EPL about, but broadly agree with the rest of your post
A fairer distribution of TV revenue is obviously desirable, but it's not by any means a panacea for problems which are largely of clubs' own making, which is pretty much what my point boils down to. The league itself is run fairly shambolically, facilitated by regional governments and a central one happy to let clubs write their own rules as it suits. That's why clubs are so indebted; there's no-one willing or able to rein in wild speculation that most clubs were/are guilty of on the coattails of credit that was available for a decade or so before the recession. That has nothing to TV money, yet that's all the clubs and English-language media bang the drum for.
And Sevilla could have been a force but their model was to buy low sell high predicated on success on the field. In most sports business models that rely on a certain level of sustained achievement are doomed. It's a massive gamble. Arsenal, for example, could have been completely spent as a force in English football if they had missed out on CL football a few years ago.
It should be pointed out that Spain being a complete basket case economically speaking is a major factor in clubs coming under increasing pressure. 50% unemployment for under 25s. 27% unemployment overall.
"We've seen you come, we'll see you go"
Definitely a factor too. Banks are on the verge of complete collapse and apart from trying to scrape back every cent they're owed, they aren't lending at all. Clubs can't get finance to bridge the gap.
TBH football is the least of Spain's problems. Most people in Ireland haven't a clue how bad things are over there - it's far worse than here. I've friends in Madrid that are degree-qualified with 10 years of work experience taking home 900-1000 a month if they're lucky enough to be working. That's if they get paid - it's commonplace for employers to miss months at a time in paying wages. Another lad I know who's a college lecturer was called in a few months back to be told they were cutting 300 a month off his gross pay just like that. The cost of living is cheaper there but not much cheaper - rent is about the same with groceries about 70% of what you pay here. It's atrocious.
We are at war with Eurasia. We've always been at war with Eurasia.
1 in four people sleeping rough in Madrid have some form of third level education. That's a measure of how deep the crisis is, that people who normally would consider themselves to be relatively immune to the effects of recession are amongst its greatest victims.
That said, in many respects Spain is holding out better than Ireland as a result of a stronger civic society. It hasn't had anything like the same spike in rates of substance abuse, depression, suicide, etc as Ireland in the last five years. (Although domestic violence is a major issue here).
I wouldn't trust the unemplyment figures, though. They only tell a partial story. The black market here is huge, and it's tolerated.
I'm not talking about a tradesman doing a nixer at the weekend with company tools or a window cleaner signing on for 10 years.
Companies - big, well-known ones at that - use the black economy to circumvent labour laws, health and safety regulations and supress wages in the real economy as a matter of course in Spain.
To give a personal example, I was advised by a tax officer that one of my former employers was committing fraud on a massive scale. Employment contracts were yearly switched from one company name to another to deny incremental entitlements, hours worked were documented as less than they were, unbeknownst to the employees as they were paid as normal, and holiday pay was illegaly built in to the salary. I was effectively in part-time employment on a temporary contract, although I didn't know it. When I was out of work I couldn't sign on as I didn't have enough credits, despite working full time for 3 years. As far as the national stastistics office was concerned, I didn't exist.
And without being too specific, I know of a multi-national that's earned some notoriety in the UK lately that had a contract with the Catalan governemnt which couldn't be paid for. In lieu of that a blind eye is now turned to some of the shadiest employment practices you could imagine in a developed country in the 21st century, the likes of which could only happen in a country that still has some of Franco's labour laws on the statute books.
Homlessness itself is shocking, but yeah, that put the willies up me.
http://www.thelocal.es/20130422/home...educated-elite
Spain vs Tahiti about to kick off... This could be an interesting scoreline
Negativity is the new Positivity.
Finished 10-0 to Spain. Tahiti got a standing ovation at the end from the crowd, unlike most poor teams (San Marino, Faroes etc) Tahiti gave it a real go...
Negativity is the new Positivity.
Amazing to think that Spains second string team consists of players like Torres, Cazorla, Villa, Navas and Mata
Some goal by Bohs lad, apparently he has retired now, dunno when it was.
We All Dream Of A Team Of Curly Wurly's!!! A Team Of Curly Wurly's!!! A Team Of Curly Wurly's!!!
NZ put their B team in it apparently. They walked the world cup qualifiers. Only unbeaten side in the last World Cup too
"We've seen you come, we'll see you go"
Oceania. Australia moved to Asia because there are only 4 and a half qualifying spots for Oceania. It goes to a playoff then with a South American team. Australia were like fuck that we've had enough, we're moving to Asia and FIFA left them. That just leaves New Zealand as the only decent team in the confederation. The rest are minnows like Tahiti and American Samoa who got beaten 31-0 by Australia. New Zealand went out on the piss the night before their semi-final and got beaten in a shock result by some other nobody team. Tahiti went on to beat them in the final and qualify for the Confederations Cup.
Posts about Oceania and Tahiti football moved here from the "Ireland National Team" thread
We should do this http://www.manchestereveningnews.co....s-spot-4714096
We All Dream Of A Team Of Curly Wurly's!!! A Team Of Curly Wurly's!!! A Team Of Curly Wurly's!!!
Did we not do it twice?