General Football forum • Re: Saudi Arabia taking over football
I said the other week, the fact is that if it was Villa or West Ham in our shoes we wouldn't give a fuck what happened to them, and we'd be saying 'Throw the book at the them'.I wasn't sure where to put this as it is a bit of a cross-over subject. An interesting article in the Guardian about the German Bundesliga supporters battle with the DFL about foreign investment and influence through TV and media rights. A battle the supporters, at least for the moment, appear to have won. Two things jump out, the two main equity funds trying to buy the rights were both Saudi backed funds. So, another attempt to wield influence over world football?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/ ... rs-and-won
The other, for me, interesting take is the power of collective action. It is as a result of the pretty much united determination of all supporters clubs to disrupt matches (in inventive and often amusing ways) which has forced the League to re-think. I wonder is this a lesson we can learn in the EPL or are we too "tribal" in our support to work together? Are United, City, Shite, etc supporters content with the status quo of limited true competitiveness to really care what happens to us, Forest and the rest of the cannon fodder? For that matter, are we and Forest supporters arsed what happens to each other as long as it's alright for us?
There is precedent as the rejection of the Super League showed but that had pan-European momentum, would we (should we?) take a more collective approach to what effects us as fans? Finance and the football pyramid? Fit and proper ownership? Fan ownership? TV influence and control in football? Love or hate the Geordies an 8pm kick-off on a Saturday night in London is just the latest in crass TV manipulated timings which show no care at all for the supposed "life-blood" of football, the ticket buying fans.
Statistics: Posted by Goaljira — Fri Feb 23, 2024 2:12 pm