Salary Capping - A Sensible Approach?

[TrentVilla]

All a salary cap will do is make club owners richer instead of footballers, won't benefit us as fans in any shape or form. The prices won't drop because the players are having their wages capped. Most clubs charge as much as they can get away with for everything and those incomes are still dwarfed the TV money in most instances.

Salary capping won't achieve anything, in fact it'll make make the status quo within the leagues more permanent as the best players will still move to the "best clubs". You really want to make a difference? Scrap the champions league and go back to the three solid cup competitions in Europe we had before. Yes there was inequality under that system but none so much as there is now

BINGO!!!!

[kurtsimonw]

Salary capping won't achieve anything, in fact it'll make make the status quo within the leagues more permanent as the best players will still move to the "best clubs".

Not if lesser teams offered them more money, in my opinion anyway. And a salary cap allows for that to happen.

Not going to happen anyway. Shame to see a decent amount of parity in the American sports where the better run teams win things, rather than the richest (aside from baseball) like here.

[TrentVilla]

Yes but American sport isn't anything like comparable to Football its a closed shop. Its not like their best players can say "well this salary cap isn't working for me. I'm off to play American football in Italy". Its a totally flawed comparison.

If the Premier League introduced a salary cap the best players would go abroad. If the best player left the league the global TV audience would drop, then the Sky TV contract would drop in value, then the only thing keeping most clubs afloat would be suddenly worth less meaning clubs going to the wall.

It is simply not possible for the Premier League acting alone to introduce a salaray cap. So what then? We ask FIFA or UEFA to introduce one? I can't see them doing that and even if they did how on earth would you set it? Also how would it work when different countries have different levels of taxation and living costs?

[kurtsimonw]

Yes but American sport isn't anything like comparable to Football its a closed shop. Its not like their best players can say "well this salary cap isn't working for me. I'm off to play American football in Italy". Its a totally flawed comparison.

If the Premier League introduced a salary cap the best players would go abroad. If the best player left the league the global TV audience would drop, then the Sky TV contract would drop in value, then the only thing keeping most clubs afloat would be suddenly worth less meaning clubs going to the wall.

It is simply not possible for the Premier League acting alone to introduce a salaray cap. So what then? We ask FIFA or UEFA to introduce one? I can't see them doing that and even if they did how on earth would you set it? Also how would it work when different countries have different levels of taxation and living costs?

Well, I never said it could happen or will happen. Which is why I voted 'no' an said 'not going to happen'.

[The_Rev]

Okay, we have established why a wage cap won't work in Europe for the 8th time this season. How long before this thread gets started again by somebody else? I give it three weeks.

[TrentVilla]

Okay, we have established why a wage cap won't work in Europe for the 8th time this season. How long before this thread gets started again by somebody else? I give it three weeks.

That long?

[The_Rev]

Well, I figure people will be slowing down over Xmas and New Year. Its odd though, do people really think nobody ever thought of introducing a salary cap before? An amazing idea first thought of in December 2010, a salary cap!

It wont work in Europe unless we have a European Super League (which Villa wont be invited to play in) or we stay as we are and everybody agrees to it and then doesnt break it once its in place. If you want a shitty analogy then it's like the fact that if you in the Holte End on a Saturday afternoon and everybody is sitting down you can all see perfectly, but somebody will stand up to get a better view. Once one person stands, everybody stands and nobody has a better view than they did when they were all sitting. Somebody is always going to stand up, arent they?

[TrentVilla]

Yep.

Actually I think that is a pretty good analogy.

[spoonman]

The NFL salary cap has worked well since 1994.. granted big clubs can still find ways round it to bring in big names ('signing bonuses' etc).

You can read about it here

[ml1dch]

The NFL salary cap has worked well since 1994.. granted big clubs can still find ways round it to bring in big names ('signing bonuses' etc).

You can read about it here

The NFL doesn't have EU legislation to get around though.

Nor does it have three or four other leagues of comparable quality where the players will just up and leave to if they don't like the wages on offer.

And considering the current cap is $7.8m per annum for a player, it's not as if an NFL style cap will change a huge amount anyway.

[Dodgyknees]

For a start you couldn't do that based on recent age discrimination legistlation before we even get into other issues.

Thats bull though isnt it?

No. You can't have a pay structure for people doing the same job based on nothing but age.

You may not agree with it but its the law.

Absolutely, unfortunately.

[Stevo985]

The NFL salary cap has worked well since 1994.. granted big clubs can still find ways round it to bring in big names ('signing bonuses' etc).

You can read about it here

Flawed comparison.

The NFL is the ONLY league for top American football players. There is no chance of them saying "Well i want to be paid more I'm off to play in the canadian league or NFL Europe." There are no other leagues so there's no chance of players going abroad for better pay.

If you limited pay in the Premier League, players would just nip over to Spain where they'd still get paid loads and be in a league just as good, and getting better because all the good players would be leaving the English league.

[The_Rev]

Indeed. And to expand on that further (even though it has been done to death already on this forum) the point that the NFL is the only league worth playing gridiron in works in the clubs favour on two fronts. Firstly there is the fact that nobody in their right mind would want to leave the NFL for another league once they are there, meaning the clubs can drive a harder bargain when it comes to things like this and secondly, because there are no rival leagues competing for continental level trophies then you dont have the problem of Manchester United not wanting a wage cap because they are worried Real Madrid wont stick to it and win the Champions League with their squad full of more talented and better paid players.

Okay, we have established why a wage cap won't work in Europe for the 8th time this season. How long before this thread gets started again by somebody else? I give it three weeks.

It was actually five days.

[Tomaszk]

Wage cap is not enforceable and will always be circumvented

Next

Tee hee circumvented.

Sorry.

[Bazdavies79]

• Premier League Shirt manufacture is put to tender by the FA.

• The winning bidders are awarded licence to manufacture all Premier League shirts. 

• All shirts are sold under license of the FA who, in conjunction with the manufacturer, set a standard retail price. 

• Only official Premier League sponsor and shirt manufacturer logo allowed on shirts and in stadium.

• All other club merchandise sold must be official Premier League licensed merchandise. 

• Revenue goes to the FA who would re-distribute it equally between Premier League clubs. 

• Premier League tv revenue is also distributed evenly.  

• A prize pot would be awarded to 1st 2nd and 3rd place finishes.

• Same rules must apply in all leagues worldwide. 

• Intercontinental competition tv revenue distributed evenly to all participating clubs, with a prize pot for the winners and 1st and 2nd place runners up. 

• A maximum 4 foreigners per squad rule would apply to all domestic and intercontinental competitions. 

None of the above could ever happen. The stable door is wide open and the capitalists horse is running rampant around the courtyard. 

Clubs would leave the FA on mass exodus if you removed their ability to profit from their own name. Big clubs running massive debt but with huge turnover, such as Man Utd, would go bust, as the massive turnover would obviously disappear. The club would be worth less than the debt. 

Conversely, clubs such as Blackpool would benefit hugely. Wages would be depressed to a more sane level and all clubs would be competing on a more level playing field. 

[juanpabloangel18]

I am in favour of a European wage-cap, but remember:

If you're a professional footballer, you have almost definitely sacked-off education at a young age. Not uncommon. However, whilst footballers are earning immense amounts for the best part of a decade, their prospects, once their playing career is over, are pretty much limited to media and coaching. A 35-40 Year old bloke, with no job experience, and no education, is virtually unemployable. Only a select few can get into media, and coaching, well... there are loads of jobs out there I guess, but it's not on the whole particularly lucrative and you have to be good at it. So a footballer's earning years are very small indeed.

Then consider the risk of injury. A career ending injury suffered at e.g 26 could financially devastate that player and his family.

Of course, there are exceptions - Megastars on huge salaries, with huge sponsorship deals, set for life after shooting one dumb pepsi advert. But these exceptions occur in most professions: bankers, musicians, businessmen, actors....

I dunno. Football is a cruel business, and I don't have a problem with top players being paid top salaries, as a form of insurance if not anything else. But some form of wage-capping should occur because:

a) It reintroduces fairness to the competition amongst rich/poor clubs, and goes some way to counter-act the growing trend of ''my teams owner is richer than yours so we win''

No single person needs 200k a week. No-one.