Here we go

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/52595505

Small clubs and small businesses are going to get a kicking from all over in the next 18 months .

Yep, inevitable and grotesque that they’d use the current situation to shoe-horn in what has always been their plan - ever increasing dominance of the revenue football generates at the expense of clubs like ours.

Any right minded person would look at the Prem, unable to sustain their 50+ player squads plus first XI’s on up-to half a million quid per week, and say THAT is where the problem lies. Hoarding young players from age 6 to 23 and all the infrastructure that requires, clubs like Arsenal taking a 14-minute flight to Norwich, paying the likes of Stuart Taylor tens of thousands of pounds a week just to meet quotas. It’s sick, beyond comprehension, but WE’RE going to pay for it!

Reform needs to come at that level first. Salary caps, squad caps, caps on ticket prices. The problems that clubs like ours face aren’t going to be solved by played Brighton u23s, and it should be resisted all the way. Unfortunately you only have to look at who’s in the EFL Chair to see what kind of leadership we’ll get on that front.

I see the fans are the last thing on anyone’s mind again, typical from someone who used to be at the FA. Ideas like regionalisation at our level, draft systems for loanees, scrapping the EFL Trophy all have potential, but clubs will need to fight for it or will just be swallowed up.

An analogy could be made with the 2008 financial crash, and when the bubble burst it was Joe Public who paid for it and the bankers got off scot-free. Look where that’s got us.

Local shops will suffer too . We are heading into a huge recession that could last year's . Support your local teams and use independent shops where you can is going to be the message

The real villains in any disaster usually get away scot-free.  It is must easier to make the smaller fish pay the price (literally).  "Do as I say, not as I do".

The big Prem clubs are too entrenched in their greedy, selfish aims to notice or care how football is suffering down the leagues.   Much less help them substantially to survive.

Brighton ffs

Quoted from ska face

Yep, inevitable and grotesque that they’d use the current situation to shoe-horn in what has always been their plan - ever increasing dominance of the revenue football generates at the expense of clubs like ours.

Any right minded person would look at the Prem, unable to sustain their 50+ player squads plus first XI’s on up-to half a million quid per week, and say THAT is where the problem lies. Hoarding young players from age 6 to 23 and all the infrastructure that requires, clubs like Arsenal taking a 14-minute flight to Norwich, paying the likes of Stuart Taylor tens of thousands of pounds a week just to meet quotas. It’s sick, beyond comprehension, but WE’RE going to pay for it!

Reform needs to come at that level first. Salary caps, squad caps, caps on ticket prices. The problems that clubs like ours face aren’t going to be solved by played Brighton u23s, and it should be resisted all the way. Unfortunately you only have to look at who’s in the EFL Chair to see what kind of leadership we’ll get on that front.

I see the fans are the last thing on anyone’s mind again, typical from someone who used to be at the FA. Ideas like regionalisation at our level, draft systems for loanees, scrapping the EFL Trophy all have potential, but clubs will need to fight for it or will just be swallowed up.

An analogy could be made with the 2008 financial crash, and when the bubble burst it was Joe Public who paid for it and the bankers got off scot-free. Look where that’s got us.

Top post. I hope if they ever do try and introduce B-teams there is some coordinated mass protests at game. Not just like the check-a-trade boycotts, which were good but easily ignored by FA & the media, but taking heed of Spanish fan's methods, tennis balls onto the pitch at a certain time, live on TV. Sit on the pitch and dont let the game go ahead.

The clubs might get fined but we need to take the hit for the bigger picture. I'd hope FSF could arrange fundraisers/crowdfunding to indirectly 'pay' the fines via donations to clubs & fans groups who take a stand.

This is just flipping cynical of the FA.

Totally agree about the b team thing . Can’t ever see that being given the ok by anyone tbh . It just goes against everything the English pyramid system is about and even though it doesn’t seem like it I reckon Sky , Prem league etc get that .
The rest of the article, although hard to swallow makes absolute sense

Quoted from Abdul19

Brighton ffs

You're right. It's only some twenty years ago they flirted with relegation to the then Conference, and were playing at an athletics track on the outskirts of town. F*ck 'em..

Quoted from louth_in_the_south

Totally agree about the b team thing . Can’t ever see that being given the ok by anyone tbh . It just goes against everything the English pyramid system is about and even though it doesn’t seem like it I reckon Sky , Prem league etc get that .
The rest of the article, although hard to swallow makes absolute sense

Why can't the bloody Prem  B teams just play each other ?

Let the Premieshit go it alone, No 'B' teams in the EFL. No promotion relegation to EFL. No FA Cup, no EFL Cup no Micky Mouse Cup. And more importantly kick them out of the FA so they can not qualify for European Cups.

Quoted from jock dock tower

You're right. It's only some twenty years ago they flirted with relegation to the then Conference, and were playing at an athletics track on the outskirts of town. F*ck 'em..

Whenever the hatred of Premiership clubs raises its head all I can see is jealousy
.
So Brighton have gone from the vverge of non-league to the top league in the world. Good luck to them and just for once can everyone please be honest, if Town got to the Premiership would everyone vstill be so against it?

I think not somehow

I’m not jealous of anyone in the Prem, good luck to em, it’s good to watch and if people want to pay hundreds of pounds to watch it on a Saturday that’s their shout.

Why should they have any influence on any club below the Prem though? Why should we have to bend over to support their broken model?

Quoted from ska face

I’m not jealous of anyone in the Prem, good luck to em, it’s good to watch and if people want to pay hundreds of pounds to watch it on a Saturday that’s their shout.

Why should they have any influence on any club below the Prem though? Why should we have to bend over to support their broken model?

None at all I agree, but I still maintain our dislike of the Premiership, which exists across the board not just on this particular topic, would soon disappear if Town were up there

I'd love Town to be in the Premier League, but I'd be against us trying to make Scunthorpe our B team.

Quoted from jock dock tower

You're right. It's only some twenty years ago they flirted with relegation to the then Conference, and were playing at an athletics track on the outskirts of town. F*ck 'em..

Both of you share my thoughts. Delusions of grandeur/jumped up little upstarts. You can’t have two years at the top table and sit 15th in the PL and start dictating how a decades old football pyramid works. They also happen to have a huge amount of debt trying to get where they are now and would be one of the biggest losers should the season be completed and then be relegated. No wonder they want it voiding.

Think the trouble is with the top 6ish prem clubs, they are not that bothered about playing some of the premiership teams, eg, Man U would rather be playing a big European club then Watford, Bournemouth etc. They feel they need all their revenue so that they can compete against Barcelona, Madrid, Juventus etc

Brighton got a lot of sympathy and support from fans of other clubs when they were in the sh!t after having their ground sold. Now it’s a intercourse you attitude from them. If this doesn’t get slapped down by their fans I hope they go down and do a Bradford, straight back where they came from.

It’s absolutely despicable the way they’re trying to foist B teams on the League to solve a ‘problem’ of their own making. In the unlikely event of Town getting to the Prem I hope we behave with more respect and solidarity.

The Football League has been going since 1888, over a hundred years before the premier league and had survived two world wars. Christ England even won the World Cup without the premier league*. It does not need any outside ‘solutions’.

* interesting fact. It was 26 years between 1966 and the creation of the premier league and one of the arguments was that it would help us win it again . It’s been 28 years since the premier league was launched and we’ve managed one semi final thanks to ludicrous good luck with most major countries having a nightmare tournament. I’d say the PL is a failed experiment. Time the FL took it over 😄

I presume that it would need the vote from EFL clubs to happen . Can’t see many chairmen having the balderdash to ok it . The backlash would mean empty grounds. I wouldn’t set foot in BP if fenty , sorry Day !! voted for it .

As far as I'm concerned the big 4 or 6 whatever  can p off and create a Euroleague with no relegation out or promotion in, as long as it means they have no influence on the rest of the leagues.

Quoted from ska face

I’m not jealous of anyone in the Prem, good luck to em, it’s good to watch and if people want to pay hundreds of pounds to watch it on a Saturday that’s their shout.

Why should they have any influence on any club below the Prem though? Why should we have to bend over to support their broken model?

Not that I in any way agree with the Premier League's behaviour, but without them subsidising our level, it would be of a far lower standard and possibly part time. There isn't enough interest in this level of the game for it to survive without handouts. Possibly the way they hoover up all the young talent contributes to this, but any young player going to the highest level is completely understandable.

B teams are a no go, but if you were subsidising somebody else, you'd probably feel you should get some benefit from all the handouts you give them.

These “solidarity payments” or, handouts as you crassly refer to them, are the effectively the grease that keeps the Prem machine running, and allows them to blackmail their way to committing the most egregious offences and encroach further & further into the lower leagues.

A young player going to the highest level is understandable, but the Prem has corrupted the whole process. They’ll take any kid with a bit of potential, bribe the parents, invite their teams down for open days & training days at their training grounds, and hoard them for 5, 10, 15 years in the hope of making a few quid on them. Those players could be playing for teams like ours and getting people through the gate. The EPPP blackmail scandal now means you can’t even sell your best prospects for a decent fee - Chelsea robbed Exeter of Ethan Amapadou - first team at 15/16 and Wales international.

The game is rigged in the Prem’s favour and unless clubs start to fight back and lose urine-weak attitudes like yours, then we’ll all end up as a feeder team for Hull or Sheff Utd.

I dare say that Football League clubs would soon adapt if the PL ‘solidarity’ payments disappeared. Players would just have to accept lower wages. More money just inflates the wages anyway since there are a limited number of jobs available (OK squads can increase but only if the money available is an order of magnitude higher than that available in non-League).

We’d probably be better off without the money and the ties to EPPP. If Prem clubs want young FL players they’d have to pay for them properly.

Same as any money from the FL Trophy.

Best cut all such ties with the PL.