Meh, as a fan of a Scottish team, i've watched my team go from being able to get great players, to struggling to compete financially with mid table Championship teams. The EPL has been a big money pit for foreign billionaires and corporations for the last two decades and all the Saudi teams are doing is playing them at their own game.
There's only really 2 or 3 Saudi teams who are going to be buying top drawer throughout, so maybe the real endgame is the world league featuring the biggest 20 teams, UEFA might be getting a bit twitchy if the end game is something like that, as the PIF could throw billions at it to start up without breaking a sweat!
^^^ which is the next point - NUFC offload him for big money to who are basically the same funders and NUFC get to circumvent FFP rules. Absurd.
PIF are big funders of Clearlake as well, who fund Chelsea. Funny how many Chelsea players have headed off to Saudi, might just help Chelsea comply with FFP and trim down the squad a bit.
Apparently Fabinho’s move is being held up by some wrangle about whether he can take his French bulldogs with him!
The money PIF has staggers me - LIV golf for example paid Phil Mickelson £50m to sign up! And yes, Jordan Henderson’s salary 😳
i guess the more they take up western ways and open their doors to this, the more chance that the next generation may be more open to change
Yeah? How's that working out in Russia, almost 40 years on from Glasnost? This is the worst and weakest version of Thomas Friedman's McDonald's theory of capitalist peace.
@binners I get what you are saying about the absurd money Henderson is on and that's obviously why he's doing it but I can't imagine he's short of a few bob anyway so why not going and play somewhere nice where the quality of life might be enjoyable for you and you family, even if it is for substantially less cash (I do appreciate that an enjoyable quality of life is subjective and different people want different things even if I don't agree with them but I can't imagine KSA was top of Hendersons or Ronaldos holiday destination list)
Are the Saudi's really trying to bring in Tourists. Granted it was years ago, now, since I was there but it is a ballache to get in the country. You need to be invited and go through a visa process. Stating atheism as your religion got you declined (as many people in my company decided to do to avoid going). It's not like we'll be hoping on an easyJet flight anytime soon.
My guess is the players won't live there and on the money they are on will simply take a private jet in for each match. Of pick one of the better local options like Dubai or Bahrain. But lots of people do it. Friend of mine has just retired from the police and is going to do a few years on the Neom thing. Basically it pays for his wife to retire as well.
Are the Saudi’s really trying to bring in Tourists.
Yes. Its one of their target growth industries with a massive amount of investment and sports tournaments are part of the plan.
Its a new thing with them only issuing tourists visas in 2019 but its a priority for them.
@binners I get what you are saying about the absurd money Henderson is on and that’s obviously why he’s doing it but I can’t imagine he’s short of a few bob anyway so why not going and play somewhere nice where the quality of life might be enjoyable for you and you family, even if it is for substantially less cash
You'll have to ask him that. And all the rest of them. I can't imagine any of them are short of a few quid, but they're off there to cash in. I bet they've all got a place in Dubai anyway so its just a short hop in a private jet for training
Meanwhile, the details of Mbappe's potential deal has emerged as he's had the green light to talk to whoever it is (who cares?) in Saudi. I bet he has!
PSG get 260 million to buy out the last 12 months of his contract and Mbappe gets a pay packet of 600 million for the year (he presently earns a mere 72 million PA), then swans off to Real Madrid
Its utterly insane as we all know how the world of football works. Every agent is now going to start any transfer fee or wage negotiations by saying 'my client has been offered the equivalent of the GDP of Portugal to play for Oil Reserves United in Saudi....'
I gather there are no financial fair play rules in Saudi (of course there isn't) as the gate receipts for games will be about twenty quid and the TV broadcast rights will be less than for non-league football in the UK. As far as balancing the books are concerned, that makes Citeh look like bastions of financial probity
It's pretty much all too good to turn down deals, Jota who moved from Celtic basically gets 10 times his pay now, he'll be based in a city that will have every type of amenity, leisure and luxury to keep him going, same will go for the rest, for a single contract, we're talking generational wealth for the players, if Henderson is getting 600k-700k a week basically tax free, he'll be earning as much in a year or two as he has in his entire career to this point!
It's the endgame that's the big question, Saudi's aren't daft, they're not going to fritter away £5-10 billion from their PIF for a couple of years of decent players in their big teams, there has to be more, such as the worldwide league, where we see Al Hilal and Al Ittihad in with the big boys of Europe and playing weekly.
Saudi’s aren’t daft, they’re not going to fritter away £5-10 billion from their PIF
How's LIV Golf going?
The problem here is that you have a tiny number of inconceivably wealthy (and often poorly educated) people making quick decisions based on the back of the envelope recommendations of a feeding frenzy of foreign bullshitters, consultants, agents and wideboys. There is zero incentive among these people to say "this is a crap idea that will lose of money" because all that means is that the cash sprinkler gets turned off and you get put on a plane home.
It's like a less restrained version of Twitter-era Elon Musk.
How’s LIV Golf going?
Seems to be a success. They have forced the PGA tour to back down.
It’s like a less restrained version of Twitter-era Elon Musk.
A closer match would be soft bank with its investment strategy of just throwing money at things especially those thought to be "disruptors". They do have the money to spare though and they just need some to pay off.
@politecameraaction - you’re bang on. It’ll be interesting to see how much of this is being egged on by the limitless greed of agents and the likes of the people responsible for the Superleague proposals, who will be telling them they’ll be the biggest league in the world in ten years time
But can anyone think of anything else, other than football, that has better demonstrated that throwing money at something doesn’t necessarily give you the answer you were looking for?
Maybe ask Todd Boelly how his ownership of Chelsea is going since he bought it and started throwing money around like a pissed sailor on shore leave?
But can anyone think of anything else, other than football, that has better demonstrated that throwing money at something doesn’t necessarily give you the answer you were looking for?
rugby? smaller sums but same effect
I know very little about football.....anyway, Mbappe (I've vaguely heard of him) is he genuinely being offered 600m per year to play there?! I know that they're all on crazy money....but that's the GDP of some small nations!
@Tom-B - Thats the 'basic' salary he's being offered. If he actually goes then I'm sure he'll have 'add-ons' of win bonuses and image rights on top of that.
He'll probably be looking at 3/4 of a billion a year, all in, I reckon
Utterly insane!
It'd start a domino effect though. So if he goes then PSG have then got 260 billion to spend on players, so they go on a shopping spree and it then drives up (the already ridiculous) transfer fees and wages across the board and the already vast chasm between the rich clubs and the rest grows ever wider
The money PIF has staggers me – LIV golf for example paid Phil Mickelson £50m to sign up!
tiger was offered 700 mil and turned it down apparently. Either he’s got morals, or getting his head cut of for shagging his way round the kingdom didn’t appeal
edit..that makes no sense actually as no liv events are in Saudi!!😂
He’ll probably be looking at 3/4 of a billion a year, all in, I reckon
Utterly insane!
It’d start a domino effect though. So if he goes then PSG have then got 260 billion to spend on players, so they go on a shopping spree and it then drives up (the already ridiculous) transfer fees and wages across the board and the already vast chasm between the rich clubs and the rest grows ever wider
It really is insane. And all that is going to happen is that they end up with this league full of big-name players playing for clubs with no real history, no passionate fan base, just a bunch of half-interested blokes going to see these 'great' footballers play football for them. The games will inevitably end up feeling like exhibition matches, like some kind of football-playing Harlem Globetrotters.
the limitless greed of agents and the likes of the people responsible for the Superleague proposals, who will be telling them they’ll be the biggest league in the world in ten years time
The football is just the most obvious, most silly example. But it's just picking up a model that was well-established across other economic sectors where people don't usually wear sheepskin coats: you find a patron, you find a broker/sponsor, you tell them how this gigantic gold dog egg will be transformative and the biggest and the buzzword-est, you get a whole bunch of money to plan it, then to build it, and if you're clever you escape with full pockets before it becomes obvious that it's a disaster...
Any cricket fans in? we've had 15 years of the Indian Premier League.
I will admit to not knowing the financials of how things are going; but a cursory look shows they have filled stadiums, big TV audiences and big (for the sport) paychecks for the stars.
And it has affected, but not ruined, the world wide cricket scene.
But cricket has always been absolutely massive in India anyway, which is exactly why the IPL has grown into the behemoth it is
It’s football equivalent is the Premier League in this country. Remember that it’s only been going 30 years in its present format too. The most watched league in the world by a country mile, with a global audience of billions. Thus attracting the big money owners and sponsors, and the best players on the highest salaries
Other countries leagues have a couple of dominant teams that win everything every year and just aren’t in the same … erm… league, entertainment-wise. It’s all so tediously predictable.
Imagine if Saudi Arabia announced tomorrow that they were setting up a national cricket league as a rival to the IPL, and then started offering all the worlds top cricketers ten times the salaries of the IPL to move to Saudi instead?
That’s what’s happening here
But cricket has always been absolutely massive in India anyway, which is exactly why the IPL has grown into the behemoth it is
It’s football equivalent is the Premier League in this country.
Absolutely this - inners has it spot on.
IPL was different - that was about creating a new league in a populous country with rising incomes and an expanding media sector. Importantly, there was a sanity check on the enthusiasm of the founders: the IPL would only work if other business owners thought it would be worthwhile buying some of the franchises from the founders, and that would only work if they could persuade media networks to pay them for the rights. The last round of IPL rights went for about USD 6 bn...
What is the business model for Salt Bae United paying 10 zillion dollars a year to individual footballers? An increased gate? More merchandise sales? More valuable media rights? It ain't gonna happen. All this is convincing daft patriots that this will be for the good of the country and will position them as a top tier superpower...somehow...
Another great example of the ‘morality’ of modern football.
Hey, we’re all dealing with the Saudi’s, who are a bit dodgy on the human rights frond
Daniel Levy… “hold my beer….”
https://twitter.com/guardian/status/1684061946155352064?s=46&t=1lK7Dw1b6RqGJyvufO-trQ
More from today’s Guardian
The very definition of selling out!
I see all this saudi money sloshing around makes united think Maquire is worth 40 mill.
Nah… he’ll go out on loan. Nobody’s that gullible, not even the Saudi’s 😂
Wheels are falling off already, now it looks like Benzema is also trying to find an exit. Henderson had to forgo his wages for the time he spent there to get out, I suspect a higher profile player like Benema will find the exit negotiations harder. Will be a bigger slap in the face for a high profile muslim player to also want out.
Any players tempted by the money are going to be having second thoughts now.
