Reply To: Salary Cap

[Anonymous]

There’s also the element that many of these bank rolled clubs are funded by questionable people and regimes. PSG, Man City and Chelsea in particular. They are used as a whitewash for their branding abroad and I am very uncomfortable with that. Go on a Chelsea or Man City forum and a large chunk of their fanbase will defend their owners from links to human rights abuses and corruption because they have given them pleasure in football.

When the Saudis were interested in Newcastle many of their fans were the same, seeing the financial opportunities from that as the sole focus. Who cares if the people involved were linked to murders of journalists or the suppression of women in their own country if they can tempt the Mbappes and Haalands to the north-east, so they can have a title shot? You even got some trying to say it shouldn’t matter because of Mike Ashley’s questionable business ethics. Ashley may be a rotter, but he is yet to stoop to state sponsored killings of dissidents and widespread abuse of women across the entire country.

Let’s also not forget that these new money backed clubs don’t have any interest in preserving the league’s integrity either. Man City were one of the big proponents of B teams in the lower leagues to suit them, I believe.

While, on the level of a competition, it’s good to see fresh teams, I cannot get behind Man City or Chelsea for these reasons. Although I am not a fan, I do like seeing Leicester up there. Their success seems more organic and it is not connected to such horrid regimes. Plus, of all the teams at the top their fans seem the most grounded and less like glory hunting. I also feel they get ignored and underrated by pundits. When Leicester played Man Utd in December Glenn Hoddle was practically commentating as a Man Utd fan, as if the whole audience will be willing them to win. So, for these reasons, I do enjoy seeing Leicester up there challenging the bigger teams and I hope more can follow their lead.