Yeah, Reece Oxford. Decent player, defender, but slightly surprised BM are that interested in him, tbh.

the bundesliga in many ways is all about the young player that's a good value

from pulisic to démbélé to guerreiro to renato sanches, they're always looking for a teenager with potential

not sure about reece oxford but i guess i'll find out this season ha ha

oh btw i totally missed the concacaf gold cup final. apparently the usa beat jamaica 2-1.

Oxford's definitely a prospect player, still learning but shows good signs. I remember one game where he absolutely had Ozil on toast for 90 minutes. Pep was apparently wiling to pay 15m for him last summer but it fell through, and he sort of disappeared after that. It'd be great for him if he could nail down a starting spot in the Bundesliga., but he is still really young.

Of which I've actually changed my opinion on goal poachers

yeah, gladbach haven't tasted real glory since the 70's but since i've been watching they've been a solid team with a usual european spot. except recently they've had some coaching problems. they finished 9th last year (out of 18) after stemming a dangerous downward slide. they now have dieter hecking, who had wolfsburg fighting for the top spot against bayern when dortmund was suffering. should be an interesting season for them.


ha haaaa! good to know. cuz nothing wins a game like goals :o

Urgh, this whole Neymar farce is just grim.

In other news, Salah is clearly gonna be a great singing for Liverpool. The swines.

oh ha ha thanks for the notification, i just started reading about it

where's the farce part and the grim part?

i just see megatons of money

I wonder how prices for football players will be in 5 or 10 years. Will there ever be a threshold? same goes for any other sports btw, e.g in NBA.
all those people earn in a day what I earn in a month, and all they can do is kick a ball in the right direction.

The youngest Kluivert is 9 years old and already signed a contract with Nike ....

good for the kid! as long as he can still receive a dope slap when he fucks up he should do alright

as for salaries-- it's whatever the market can bear

there could be a bubble and it all collapses when people can no longer afford to watch and/or buy the merchandise

the other day i met an immigrant inglés who told me he can watch more prem games on NBC than he could do in england.

but let's face it, the expansion of the global middle class is gonna bring mucho dinero to the most popular sport on the planet

(it's not cricket is it? im seriously asking)

The farce is that the money is being put up by Qatar's oil money. It's a farce that the idea of FFP is totally ignored/circumvented and supposedly the way they're doing it is by paying Neymar (not Barcelona) the £200 million clause. With that £200 mill they're saying he's going to be an ambassador for the (bullshit) Qatari world cup. Football goes down the pan further and further.

So in effect, Neymar would be buying himself out of the clause.

Neymar wants to do things on his own and away from Messi's long shadow. I get that. However, the fact is he knew Messi was #1 at Barcelona when he signed for them. Messi is always going to be #1 whilst he's still there. Neymar wants to win the Ballon D'or and essentially carry PSG to the Champions League on his own. However, going to the fucking French league is NOT going to win him the Ballon D'or. And I really hope UEFA see the money being spent and know that it's not legally right and slam down on PSG hard.

And how can you not think it's grim? If Neymar is worth £200 million, what's Coutinho, Aubameyang and the rest "worth". It lost any semblance or reality a long time ago, but this kicks it up a level.

I'm praying there is a bubbe and that it's bursts real fucking soon. There's only so much tv money to be made.

The U.K channels aren't allowed to show 3pm games.

People are streaming more and more games now and it's no wonder. In my eyes anyone who pays £70 a month for sports channels is a total mug.

And don't get me fucking started about Neymar Snr. getting about £20 million for "facilitating" the move. The cunt doesn't have to do anything.

right, bubbles do burst. footballers might follow tulips in the annals of economic history. well, not that bad, but... yeah. there's always a limit.

im sort of relaxed about this because my bundesliga/CL stream (good signal and no weird languages or malware or legal persecution) come out to only 11 or 12 bucks per month, and that's good enough for me. for now, anyway.

but i didn't know all this bullshit about qatari petrodollars. the world cup... might have seen worse venues. argentina 78 comes to mind, historically. but let's see what records putin might set. you never know with the kgb.

anyway so you're in favor of FPP? i didn't know this. demonyo is on the other end of the issue, saying it favors the status quo in perpetuity. who knows?

i try to practice detachment. at least till it really hurts ha ha ha. hasn't yet.

economics is an interesting science. i can always get my kicks from that. not as thrilling as neymar's 100 barcelona goals but o well. i'll take whatever i can get.

ps- neymar has always been a douche schooner

The money talked about at that level is effectively abstract to me now. It's as difficult for me to conceptualise 200m spent on a player as it is 1bn, or almost any price, if I'm honest. I can only look at this deal in terms of how it affects players and teams. Barca lose a great player and gain 200m they probably don't need. PSG get a great player and lose 200m they'll hardly notice. Neymar gets a team built around him, but in a league that few outside France watch or are interested in. I agree with h8kurdt: he'll never win a Ballon D'or at PSG, even if he deserves to. Ultimately PSG are the only real winners here - besides Neymar's dad, of course.

i think that few IN france watch or are interested it. no? i mean. i often see half empty stadiums in french games. so i don't know how this whole operation is sustained.

as for money, we're in the middle of a bull market, as i just read in this morning's paper. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...or-first-time/

and yeah, "emerging markets" are the key to this. china, india, latin america are bringing people into the middle classes at a fast pace, and they all want to enjoy themselves.

so i don't see this growth in wages necessarily as a pure capriciousness, but rather reflecting of the new global audience who gets satellite tv in the middle of the amazon jungle or the mongolian steppe. just look at how much it costs to make a hollywood blockbuster that takes years to make. meanwhile, neymar can potentially provide one or two shows per week for years and years. it's not so much when you see it as that.

not saying that it's not a bubble and that it can't burst. just saying we have to think about global audiences rather than national ones at this point. i guess im hedging my bets with this argument ha ha ha.

and speaking of money-- are you seeing that tv money have much effect on the prem's hires yet? or is it the same?

yeah but it's not a farce really is it? i mean neymar is an idiot and his dad wants to cash in on his raising the boy wonder, and they will take it from whoever offer it. the stuff about psg being his ticket to glory is where it's lies and a bit of a farce yeh ok. however going after big money isnt.

the point that the guardian makes is that the inflation will trickle. sure. but there are 2 sides to the story.

for example, i don't know how dembélé's contract is structured, but since he's bound to go anyway, dortmund might potentially get MORE to let him go (but again im not sure). so the price increases trickle down-- a rising tide lifts all boats.

there's more money in football than ever. it only makes sense as the audience expands globally.

But at a rate of the record signing doubling in barely a year? Na that's not a good thing, no matter how you look at it. I get there are always going to be increases in the signings of player. Look at the last 5 record signings

2016 Pogba £89 million
2013 Bale £86 million
2009 Ronaldo £80 million
2001 Zidane £46 million
2000 Figo £37 million
(Well done to Real on being in the top 4 :D )

That I get. Steady increases that in an market is sustainable. A doubling of it n a year is just daft. How long will it be before we see the first £500 million man? Normally you'd say "pfft, not for at least 20 years" now? I woudn't be surprised if it was in the next 5 years.


Not necessarily. The only reason PSG is able to do this is because of a bullshit corrupt government handing the money over like it's a bag of sweets. All this does is push the gap from the top few further and further.

You only have to look at the last few champions league finals, or even semi-finals to see how it's going. It's generally limited to the massively richest teams and that's it. That's not a good thing for football. The big teams buy from who they see as a threat to their hierarchy and they go further ahead.

Juventus, Real, Barca, PSG, Bayern are the worst for this.

:mad: Not often I go on Severian length rants :D

haaa haa haaa

ok

so seems to me there are 2 keys to your argument




that's a bull market yeah? all sort of commodities shift in price, sometimes quickly sometimes slowly. whether it is daft is up to the market. i've identified 2 possible scenarios for this. a) it's a bubble (and it very well might be), or b) it's the rational reflection of an expanding global market and audience.

im not qualified to say which one though. my "hope" is for the 2nd scenario-- more people achieving a comfortable standard of life around the planet. the end of poverty for billions. but really i couldn't make a pronouncement here. i can only entertain hypotheses.

anyway the other part:


that goes to the effectiveness of the so-call financial fair play. i understand the good intentions behind it, but i don't know that they actually work. im not saying this to cast doubt on the regulations which i don't understand, it's just a statement of my own ignorance.

i'd like to invite demonyo to argue this one with you though because he seems to be against fpp regulations on the basis that they actually maintain the existing hierarchy.

because as i understand big money injections are actually capable of turning a lil' shitty team like, let's say, rb leipzig, into actual contenders that break the monopoly of the establishment.

or what's the other-- monaco?? didn't they get russian money too?

or manchester city which went from a nothing to getting their first title in history and what not?

but i dont know the actual details of the fpp regulations or how they're supposed to work, so i couldn't sensibly argue them with anyone. i just know that the opposite point of view exists and i'm quoting it a bit. so i'm declaring my ignorance here and standing back and hoping for a good match. i really like questions more than answers, ha ha.

They do work, the problem is they only apply to teams that work at a loss; ignoring debt altogether. The big new-money teams can work at a loss because of the wealth of their owners while the big establishment teams can take out massive loans against their blue chip status. FFP would be a lot harder to argue against if it tackled loss and debt. So in that sense I'm not entirely opposed to the idea of FFP, just the details of it.


It does, which is part of the problem. When the top-line was around 100m, players could roughly value themselves in relation to that, so it makes sense that say Lukaku is worth 70m, but to double that top line effectively means all players' values will be recalculated in accordance. Good news if you're a smaller club cashing in on an in demand youngster but that money will itself become worth a lot less when trying to replace them. (Although in fairness, that was the case when the top line was 100m.) In terms of buying talent, though, a team like West Ham might be in a position to really stretch itself for a player priced at around 40-50m, but if that same player suddenly gets re-valued at closer to 100m, he's no longer an option. Most clubs, even those in rich leagues like the Prem, just don't have that kind of money and struggle to compete in the transfer market as it is, this will only make it even more difficult.

aaaaaaaaah. ahhhhh. ah.... okay i understand now and i hope i will remember in the future

so it's not about balance sheet ratios but rather just against "new money injections." i can see how it discriminates then


but in that case then the team that bought a bunch of expensive players and can't sell them to west ham at a profit is stuck with a loss and/or debt no? so it would be a case of a bubble bursting. like people who bought a bunch of gold only to see the price drop.

so it doesn't matter which direction the market goes-- it's always game of musical chairs either way and someone is always left wanting

The bubble will burst when players not good enough to tempt the richest clubs are priced too highly for the clubs ranked just below them. Although I suppose that's where China comes in.

right, so it's an expanding market-- but it can only expand so far. the earth is round (well, a spheroid) after all.

so maybe the inflation has nothing to do with neymar but with china.

I certainly think it's a factor in some cases, but not this particular one. At least I've not heard anything to suggest it is.

well through a... chain of causality

meaning it doesn't necessarily have to be the top rising pulling but rather a groundswell lifting the tops

what's teh max that china is paying these days and for what quality players?

what do you have to pay a middling player to keep him from going to china?

gotta look at both sides

eta: https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/chin...wettbewerb/CSL

That link only shows transfer fees but a bigger part of it is the wages these Chinese clubs are offering. The club Tianjin Quanjian apparently offered Chelsea 75m for Diego Costa, which isn't that far off what I'd expect him to get in the regular market. The kicker was that they were also offering him a 600k a week salary, which is almost 4 times what he gets at Chelsea. and even more than Neymar's getting in this PSG deal. And nothing about it is illegal. These Chinese clubs are just emphasising wages over transfer fees, which is obviously great news for players but terrible news for the clubs they're with, who can't match those wages and If they set the buy-out clause too high then players (or more likely their agents) will simply accuse them of deliberately pricing them out of the market.

Before the PSG deal, the world's top 2 players in terms of weekly wage were both at Chinese clubs. Oscar on 440k pw, and Tevez on 600k pw. Ronaldo was in 3rd place. Real pay him 350k pw. Neymar's probably number 1 now but it still shows how much China is bucking the market.

right-- so yes, when you start looking at all the money spent on hulk or old tevez in china, then the neymar deal suddenly doesn't look so insane.

im not saying "this is it" btw, just pointing at the complexity of the global football market and all the variables to consider in the changes we're seeing.

i wish william gibson would write a novel about football haa haa

Ah football. Welcome back, you've been missed.

not quite yet for me-- bundesliga starts this coming friday-- but sooo loking foward to it

dembélé might be going to barcelona for a bunch of money... but i hope he doesn't! such a prodigy.

---

eta: dortmund rejected a 100 million euro offer for him, ha ha ha, they're holding out for 130-150 i read. the neymar effect! well barca got 200, so...

Yeah, supposedly Barca offered similar to Liverpool for Coutinho and they rejected it.

Chelsea 3-0 down to Burnley. This clearly means Chelsea will be relegated.

You can't base anything on one game but there does seem to be problems at Chelsea. Conte's made no secret that he isn't happy with the transfer dealings during the summer.

Also was cool seeing Rooney score your winner.

Aye, he managed to change things around last season, but it's gonna be interesting to see how he deals with this one.

Him and Benitez have been shafted over this window. You can say "Well Chelsea signed for 60 million" but that's missing the bigger picture of a team that's just won the league.

And yeah, I was glad too. Watching the game highlighted we need another striker. So many times Everton would go on the counter and barely anyone would be up there to help finish it off. Worst thing is I've not heard any decent rumours of strikers coming through.

There it is, Lukaku scoring against West Ham again (except for the one time I bet on him to score and he didn't). He really is gonna be a beast for Utd isn't he?

Yeah, Lukaku and West Ham. :(

Predict this is gonna be a big season for him. MU in general look good. Pogba had a great game ... and Matic! No wonder Conte's so pissed off about him being sold ... especially to a title rival.

Fortunately WH's season won't depend on results against teams like that but we have a decent run of fixtures from next week where we must pick up points.

Barca will be weak as fuck this season.

Oh, West Ham how we hardly knew ye...

Is the Bayern Munich train all set and ready to win the league...again?

i would think so, but here's the thing with me:

the fox service i subscribed to for the past few years has been "updated" and is now broken. i can't watch shit on it. does not work.

i have 7 days "free trial" to decide to keep it or dump it-- $140 for the year is not bad at all, but if it doesn't work then what's the point?

i might go on a fussball diet till the world cup, or something. kinda puzzled at the moment.

also lots going on so i could use the spare time from so many games to maybe do something with my life. ha! ha ha ha! sure....

but no, seriously, i might stay away for the year or till something else happens that changes things.

What's wrong with it? Surely you can find out why it''s not working?


Nope. I've read that three times and I'm still baffled by the "maybe do something with my life" line. You can't just UP AND LEAVE! Nor does it have to take over your life. I say join us in watching the Premier League ;) It's about as predictable as mosquito's flight path at the moment.

Or at the very least the Champions League.

well bundesliga is the same subscription i use for champions-- they call it fox soccer match pass now

problem is they've bloated the interface and their video streaming is just crap. stutters like mad, blurry as fuck, works worse than before. check out the reviews in the app store. i just cancelled my subscription, which is for a full year. i could always get it later, either month to month or some other format. but right now it's out of the question to pay for something that's broken.

as for doing something with my life-- i do have a lot of work right now, so if i could do some work saturday mornings instead of spending 3-4h glued to the tv i guess there could be some benefit in "productivity" or whatever ha ha ha. same thing with mid-day cl games during the workweek (makes for very long lunch breaks)

but yeah super disappointing.

there are possible fixes, but the issue in the background is that my living situation is a bit up in the air at the moment. i mean, we have this place in the boonies, which we own outright and has tricky internet, but we might move elsewhere, with better connection, im not sure, and not sure when precisely. it's not really a housing issue but a work thing we might need to follow, actually.

things might definitely change in 3-4 months time, so it's best for us to make no commitments right now-- that might include a contract to upgrade my internet, or a satellite tv installation, or who knows what. don't wanna start them till i know where we're going... so best to make a clean break with football instead of pining--until im sure i can watch again. never been a piner. not sure that's a word?

im crazy, am i not? haaa haaa haa. fml.