Football today and the values of Scousers

[Bruce Wayne]

Spending as much time as I have around you fine folk over the past decade not only has the pride of our left leaning values been quite clear, but those values have also rubbed off on me. I couldn't help when, reading about the Richarlison rumour yesterday, feel a pang of disgust that the club is spending so much money on a player with so little obvious pedigree. I couldn't help but think how obscene it was and how that money could be put to better [social] use.

It got me wondering whether there was a point where football became too excessive. We've seen Fiat workers on strike in protest against the money spent on Ronaldo, and I pondered whether a city such as Liverpool might be among the first to recoil at such flagrant capitalism gone mad?

 

[zzr45]

Csn you draw as direct a comparison between Juventus and ourselves? The main bone of contention was the belief that the family had bankrolled the signing of Ronaldo and that put the fiat workers at risk as the family may skimp on investment on the fiat plants, threatening long term job security etc. Is Mosh taking food from anyone’s table?

Football has always dealt in fees that are obscene to the common man and will continue to do so. Where I think the problem is (and I think it was linked to yours) stems from the fact that to keep up, some clubs are cutting academy programs etc. which has a huge impact on kids growing up in the area. If this is paired with reduced spend on community work by clubs then realistically to compete, the clubs are potentially taking hundreds of meals off tables.

It’s an odd one.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Csn you draw as direct a comparison between Juventus and ourselves? The main bone of contention was the belief that the family had bankrolled the signing of Ronaldo and that put the fiat workers at risk as the family may skimp on investment on the fiat plants, threatening long term job security etc. Is Mosh taking food from anyone’s table?

Football has always dealt in fees that are obscene to the common man and will continue to do so. Where I think the problem is (and I think it was linked to yours) stems from the fact that to keep up, some clubs are cutting academy programs etc. which has a huge impact on kids growing up in the area. If this is paired with reduced spend on community work by clubs then realistically to compete, the clubs are potentially taking hundreds of meals off tables.

It’s an odd one.

It's hard not to think the game is become more and more detached from the plight of the common man however. I won't lie, my thinking was flavoured as I watched the docudrama about Jerome Rogers and zero hour contracts/payday loans on iPlayer last night (https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p067bmlh), and went from that harrowing story to news that we were splashing £50 million on someone so wholly unproven, and it just seemed utterly obscene. I'm probably not as left leaning as many Scousers, so I wondered how you guys thought.

 

[chrismpw]

Yeah - the action is simple enough - everybody just ditches sky, bt and all the paid football services. It'll be tough for a bit without the obsession, but soon enough football will be devalued and impoverished enough to reenter the real world.

Will this happen? Unlikely because it will require coordination, a few months self-sacrifice, and discipline.

But the result - football clubs who earn their money from the turnstiles, fans in control, no obscene waste. Plus think of the money - it will still exist but be somewhere else - perhaps spent at the local school bazaar, in a corner shop, etc. It ain't be in the pocket of the uber-wealthy few, who are long past the point of needing it, it will be in the general economy.

Ditch paid for tv football now - use that money elsewhere.

*not a scouser, but south living northerner to the bone.

 

[tonyhorne]

I agree. But if he, and others, come for silly money and we end up winning a cup will we care?

 

[Tramps_mate]

Football lost the plot years a go. The football is secondary to the money now..

It's disgusting some of the sums involved for fees and salaries and agents particularly. I'd walk away from it but it keeps drawing you in.

We should follow rugby with salary caps, but unless it's a world wide football cap then we would lose all the good players to abroad.

It won't be long until Google/Facebook/Amazon out bid Sky for the main package. Then it really will get ridiculous, even more so.

 

[Moomin]

Spending as much time as I have around you fine folk over the past decade not only has the pride of our left leaning values been quite clear, but those values have also rubbed off on me. I couldn't help when, reading about the Richarlison rumour yesterday, feel a pang of disgust that the club is spending so much money on a player with so little obvious pedigree. I couldn't help but think how obscene it was and how that money could be put to better [social] use.

It got me wondering whether there was a point where football became too excessive. We've seen Fiat workers on strike in protest against the money spent on Ronaldo, and I pondered whether a city such as Liverpool might be among the first to recoil at such flagrant capitalism gone mad?

The premier league is pure capitalism while strangely the NFL is very much based on socialist values on how they operate.

 

[AndyC]

The premier league is pure capitalism while strangely the NFL is very much based on socialist values on how they operate.

If you're suggesting the annual draft system, as used in all North American sports, whereby the last placed team gets the first choice of the best up and coming talent, I wholeheartedly agree, it makes the leagues, be they the NBA, NHL, NFL or Baseball so much more even and fairer.

Teams might build a winning dynasty for four or five years, and in sporadic cases even longer, but sooner or later along comes a resurgent franchise to take the big prize.

 

[Deleted member 28206]

My view has been for sometime that I hope the arse falls out of modern footy. The catalyst for these recent obscene transfer costs was neymar i think. Nobody saw that coming for that price. They even hand delivered the fee.

It's a race to the bottom from here.

 

[ToffeeTim]

The game has been gone for many years. No one can justify the money. The thing is though that football is in our DNA. None of us can really help it, and we all want to win, so we've just got to go with it.

At least our club certainly does its fair share of good things for the community.

 

[Moomin]

If you're suggesting the annual draft system, as used in all North American sports, whereby the last placed team gets the first choice of the best up and coming talent, I wholeheartedly agree, it makes the leagues, be they the NBA, NHL, NFL or Baseball so much more even and fairer.

Teams might build a winning dynasty for four or five years, and in sporadic cases even longer, but sooner or later along comes a resurgent franchise to take the big prize.

Not just that, Sponsorship and merchandise deals are split equally between all the clubs. Plus, they all have the same salary cap. As you say, the draft system is great and gives the worst teams in the league to improve.

 

[abelard]

It's hard not to think the game is become more and more detached from the plight of the common man however. I won't lie, my thinking was flavoured as I watched the docudrama about Jerome Rogers and zero hour contracts/payday loans on iPlayer last night (https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p067bmlh), and went from that harrowing story to news that we were splashing £50 million on someone so wholly unproven, and it just seemed utterly obscene. I'm probably not as left leaning as many Scousers, so I wondered how you guys thought.

Any suggestions, @Bruce Wayne?

Football is an instructive example of what moving to a globalised economy looks like. When you shift from a market of 50 million supporters to 5 billion consumers in little more than a decade, the sums start to water the eyes awfully quickly.

It is interesting that there isn't more backlash against Ronaldo or Messi committing blatant tax fraud in a country where youth unemployment was approaching 40%. But football tends to serve a palliative function in periods of crisis (which is partly why the more enlightened mill bosses came to embrace it, the last time the political economy so closely resembled our own). Also, the talent displayed on television is so obvious that, with some justification, people don't really begrudge them raking it in (or rather, earning the next step up from pocket change compared to the truly wealthy). I'd prefer for the Fiat workers to enjoy their share of the proceeds, but between Ronaldo and Agnelli, I'd take Ronaldo getting the cash any day.

Anyhow, what's happening to football is just a symptom of broader trends. £50m on a Brazilian with 12 decent games to his name is, for someone like Usmanov, the equivalent of us placing a fiver at William Hill.

I think part of the reason why our politics haven't imposed a more sensible arrangement is that the amount of concentrated wealth is so staggering that it's very difficult for people to even conceive it. Value ceases to be tangible once you've passed the first hundred-million.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Any suggestions, @Bruce Wayne?

Football is an instructive example of what moving to a globalised economy looks like. When you shift from a market of 50 million supporters to 5 billion consumers in little more than a decade, the sums start to water the eyes awfully quickly.

It is interesting that there isn't more backlash against Ronaldo or Messi committing blatant tax fraud in a country where youth unemployment was approaching 40%. But football tends to serve a palliative function in periods of crisis (which is partly why the more enlightened mill bosses came to embrace it, the last time the political economy so closely resembled our own). Also, the talent displayed on television is so obvious that, with some justification, people don't really begrudge them raking it in (or rather, earning the next step up from pocket change compared to the truly wealthy). I'd prefer for the Fiat workers to enjoy their share of the proceeds, but between Ronaldo and Agnelli, I'd take Ronaldo getting the cash any day.

Anyhow, what's happening to football is just a symptom of broader trends. £50m on a Brazilian with 12 decent games to his name is, for someone like Usmanov, the equivalent of us placing a fiver at William Hill.

I think part of the reason why our politics haven't imposed a more sensible arrangement is that the amount of concentrated wealth is so staggering that it's very difficult for people to even conceive it. Value ceases to be tangible once you've passed the first hundred-million.

Well I suppose there has already been a microcosm of the issue here in this truncated debate, in that we have a degree of power in the money we plough into the sport, whether on the gate, through merchandising or via television subscriptions, but despite many disagreeing with the way the sport has gone, it's hard to wean ourselves from it. It's that level of devotion/addiction that has allowed the sport to grow/mutate into its current form isn't it?

 

[Bruce Wayne]

When you say I'll have Richarlison rather than 1,800 nurses for a year something has gone horribly wrong somewhere.

 

[LEONARD]

Football is no longer a sport, but a manifestation of raw capitalism.

Speculate to accumulate, supply and demand, and the complexities of consumerism.

We all appreciate that transfer fees, players salaries, and the way fans are now treated are all obscene.

It's too late for me to give up on supporting Everton FC, but I have no illusions as to the state of affairs.