D
Deleted member 5849
Guest
With ever more overseas owners brought up on a culture of a protected competition (American Football doesn't promote and relegate teams), and with the higher stakes, is it inevitable that football will end up ring fencing its top division, restricting promotion and relegation and... franchising teams?
Sky might well want promotion and relegation cut off too. It's all about the brand after all, and certain well-marketed teams are more reliable for selling your product than others.
If it then gets fenced off and restricted, we then end up in a franchise model where cities buy the place of teams in the top division, should they consider themselves to be ready for a step up to the top division.
Personally I see this happening in the next 20 years. The only things that might stop it are, ironically, a European competition taking precedence over the national ones. Leicester's success last season may have put off this march too, as it at least offered Sky something unusual to market, a 'story' that could grip the neutral. That's not the safe option though, the option that guarantees sales.
The money absolutely has to be taken out of football if it's to survive as we know it, in my view.
Sky might well want promotion and relegation cut off too. It's all about the brand after all, and certain well-marketed teams are more reliable for selling your product than others.
If it then gets fenced off and restricted, we then end up in a franchise model where cities buy the place of teams in the top division, should they consider themselves to be ready for a step up to the top division.
Personally I see this happening in the next 20 years. The only things that might stop it are, ironically, a European competition taking precedence over the national ones. Leicester's success last season may have put off this march too, as it at least offered Sky something unusual to market, a 'story' that could grip the neutral. That's not the safe option though, the option that guarantees sales.
The money absolutely has to be taken out of football if it's to survive as we know it, in my view.