Bayern Munich to Italy?

[Calis]

Bayern Munich to Serie A?

To sum up, Bayern Munich threatened to move to Italian Serie A if a fine that the Bundesliga is threatening them over for a "questionable" sponsorship


Any thoughts on this? I mean, if something like this were to happen, which I doubt...or at least seriously hope, I can't imagine the ramifications, I think it would really hurt the European Leagues general, Not too mention killing the tradition.

So, does anyone think this could actually happen? If so, what do you think it would do to the European Leagues in general?

[GoldenEagle]

I don't think it will happen. But thats just my opinion. If it did happen it would just make the Bundesliga weaker and the Italian league stonger.

Of course, Bayern could be just a medicore Serie A team, and then slip into Serie B, which would be really funny.

[superbama]

FourFourTwo talked about a World League

Premier

Ajax, Al Ahly, Arsenal, Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Boca Juniors, Celtic, Corinthians, Dynamo Kyiv, Galatasaray, Juventus, Kashima Antlers, LA Galaxy, Manchester Utd., Milan, Penarol, Raja Casablanca, Real Madrid, River Plate, Sao Paulo


Division One

Al Hilal, Borussia Dortmund, Colo Colo, Flamengo, Hearts of Oak, Independiente, Inter Milan, Kaizer Chiefs, Liverpool, Marseille, Olimpia, Olympiakos, FC Porto, Rangers, Red Star Belegrade, Rosenborg, Spartak Moskow, Suwon Bluewings, Sydney Sharks, Valencia


I know it won't happen but still........

[ice4277]

Bayern would be a top 6 Serie A team, but I don't think something like this would happen in the near future.

[ice4277]

Dola

There has been plenty of talk in the past about breakaway leagues; that is basically why UEFA expanded the Champions League to the size it is today, so the top clubs in Europe would have a way to make more money and play each other more often. Now, with UEFA trimming one of the group stages beginning next year, there is more talk of a "superleague" again.

[GoldenEagle]

Rangers and Celtic wanted to go to England, but FIFA said no. FIFA will probably say no again.

[ice4277]

Not only that, but I think there would have then been a push for the UK to receive only one representative in FIFA, instead of the way it is now. There's no way they would want to make that tradeoff.

[MrBug708]

The Galaxy in the World Premier League? Awesome!

[GoldenEagle]

The Galaxy could win some games in that league too.

[MrBug708]

I'd imagine. They would need to upgrade a little bit though


Golden Eagle, in CM 01/02 they have a limit on foreign players. Is that true in MLS?

[cartman]

Hmm, gotta put Inter in the premier league, since they are tied for first in Serie A, and beat 3 of the other teams listed as Premier candidates in this season's UEFA Champions League matches.

But hey, since the owner of Inter is a relative of my company's primary investor, I'm not biased. No, really, I'm not!

[superbama]

Originally posted by cartman
Hmm, gotta put Inter in the premier league, since they are tied for first in Serie A, and beat 3 of the other teams listed as Premier candidates in this season's UEFA Champions League matches.

But hey, since the owner of Inter is a relative of my company's primary investor, I'm not biased. No, really, I'm not!

And take out Juve or Milan? Well? Which one?

[GoldenEagle]

Yes. CM is correct. The rules are a bit more complicated than what CM portrays though.

MLS active rosters feature 24 players per team. Each team’s roster must include up to six developmental players (including Nike Project-40 signees) and no more than three Senior Internationals.

MLS teams are allowed a maximum of three (3) international players on their active roster. U.S. Soccer, the sport’s governing body in the United States, has established that a player is considered an international unless he meets the following criteria:

• The player is a United States citizen
• The player is in the United States as a resident alien (green card) or under asylum protection, regardless of eligibility to play for the U.S. National Team.

For the 2003 season, MLS will allow up to 20 league-wide places for young international players, who need not be distributed equally among all MLS teams. These youth international players will be considered Transitional Internationals.

TI's (Transitional Internationals) do not count torward the three, I don't think. You will find some good finds in the TI's. I think Carlos Ruiz was one.

All this info comes from the MLS official website.

[Calis]

Somebody mentioned the expanding of the Champions League as well, that's another thing I have some complaints about.

I'm curious about peoples opinion on that? I find it a really bad decision, I think it's a short term fix, and in the long run will do more harm than good.

They're destroying the UEFA Cup, as it's now just a bunch of average teams duking it out. I think it hurts even the FA Cup and some of the other smaller ones as well.

And lastly, just to be nitpicky, it is called the CHAMPIONS league, me thinks they should be renaming it soon if this is how it works.

[GoldenEagle]

I do not want to see the Champions League expanded. But with the current economic state of soccer, it could prove necessary.

[ice4277]

I personally don't mind the Champions League as it is, but I think it will be much more intense with the second group stage being eliminated. Something tells me, though, that UEFA may backtrack on this before next season begins.

[MrBug708]

Cienfuegos, Vanney, Elliot, Du, "Little Fish"


Seems like we have a good deal of International stars...

[GoldenEagle]

Vanney is an American citizen. I think Elliot may quailfy for a green card, not sure though.

The reason MLS did this was so the league would not be full of forigeners like the old NASL, therefore hampering the development of US players.

[GoldenEagle]

Dola

Vanney is no longer with the team. He is in France with Bastia I believe.

Elliot - SI
Ruiz - SI
Cienfugeos and Bo hold green cards. Marshall qualifys as US citizen.

The Galaxy had one more SI, which I guess they used on Chacon.

[ColtCrazy]

Galaxy in the Premier and Liverpool in division one? please...

I don't think it will happen anyway, but I can't see the football elite letting teams like the Galaxy, Penarol, or even Antlers in a top flight world premier over the likes of Liverpool, Inter, or Rangers.
You'd have a riot alone in Scotland if Rangers were not put in the same league as Celtic.

[Katon]

Why shouldn't Liverpool be in division one? They're only the fourth- or fifth-best team in the English Premiership right now. Chelsea, who're ahead of them in the league, aren't even in division one. For my money, that list's too concerned with getting teams from everywhere in and not concerned enough with getting the best teams in.

[superbama]

Speaking of money

Los Angeles= untapped market. The TV rights alone would make the FIFA think twice about excluding an American team. That being said I don't think a World League will come to pass. It was just a nice insert to a great football magazine.

[CAsterling]

European super league idea has been around for decades and never been able to be formed, a Word league is no more viable - every big club wants to play big clubs to maximise earnings, but trying to get agreement for a format that would satisfy all the FAs involved would be worse than trying to get the European Union to agree on anything.

Bayern are making an empty threat, with the current financial situation in football (soccer) there is no way the Italian league would accept them, nor would the german FA let them go.

Even if I'm totally wrong on all the above, by the rules of the Italian league they would have to start in Serie 2C (or whatever the lowest divsion is called) and work their way up - don't see them doing that

[GoldenEagle]

Well if the Italian FA wnated them bad enough, they would make an excpetion.

[ColtCrazy]

back to Bayern. It won't happen, but if it did, Bayern would be stupid to do so. Like GoldenEagle joked, they'd be mediocre at beast in Serie A. Probably wouldn't fall out of it, but midtable would be their usual position. Kind of like the argument to put Celtic and Rangers in the English Premier League. They wouldn't challenge for the title, and they'd more than likely lose their yearly slot in the champions' league.

[GoldenEagle]

I think Celtic could challenge for the Preimeirship, but yea your right. Clubs would lose alot of money in the Champions League if the move leagues.

[Calis]

Hey now, don't doubt the Bhoys. I really think Celtic could compete well in the EPL, I can easily see them finishing 3rd, possibly even higher. I think even the Huns would fare pretty well.

But, the money loss from Champions League would be a big deal, and the fact if those two left, the Scottish league would basically fall apart. Which is kind of sad, I mean, I dont' see the other Scottish teams ever really having any chance to rise up in prestige and such, which sucks for them, but I guess that's how it works. It all comes down to the money in the end.

[GoldenEagle]

I took Dundee Utd to honors in CM.

[Katon]

Celtic could finish around seventh with their current squad, a few spots higher if they signed a couple class players. If they were good enough to be a top 3 EPL team, they wouldn't have crashed out of the CL in the qualifying round.

[Calis]

I stand corrected GoldenEagle.

I see what you're saying Katon, but I still believe they would go above 7th, sure they choked big time in the Champions League, but that happens to most everyone at some time or another. They just "stuck it to" Liverpool so to speak in the UEFA cup, who I believe are 5th in the Premiereship? Now, I'm not going to argue that Liverpool is a class team, as they've been pretty poor as of late imo, but I really see Celtic as AT least a top 5 team there. I will admit though, the CL exit was rather embarassing this year. Now, I might be just a wee bit biased, as I'm a Celtic supporter, so take this all with a grain of salt.

Of course, it sounds like Larsson is leaving after next season, that worries me. I'd hate to see him leave.

As an aside, I'm considering upping, well, getting even, digital cable, and shooting for the Fox World Sports network, as from looking at the TV guide, they appear to play quite a bit of soccer from all around the globe, is this true for the most part? I guess my point is, I'll be basically paying 50 bucks a month or so JUST for this channel, so I want to make sure it'll have what I want. It seems to me to be about the only option in the states for seeing the good stuff.

[GoldenEagle]

Fox World Sports is great from what I hear. Mostly soccer, but some circkett and rugby, and just world sports.

[MIJB#19]

For those who haven't woken up yet, it's more then likely within a decade, the G12 (a group 12 and later 8 big clubs from Europe) will start it's own league.
Amazingly, all 8 quarterfinalists of the Champions' League are members...

[Katon]

I'm not entirely unbiased on the subject of Celtic either - I'm a Chelsea season ticket holder, and we've currently got the CL spot that Celtic would be shooting for if you moved into the EPL. I really do think you'd be down between fifth and seventh. For one thing, you employ Chris Sutton. Seriously, I know he isn't really as bad as he seemed when he was playing for us, but I don't think you're any better than us, Liverpool, or maybe even Everton. You're definitely not a top three team. At the moment, there's a fairly big divide between the big three (Man U, Arsenal, and Newcastle) and the rest. You'd definitely fall south of that divide.

[Calis]

Ahh, ok. I can give you that, I don't think Celtic is at the level of the Big Three, I can definitely agree with that. As for the Chris Sutton comments, understandable as well. Although he really isn't doing that bad for us, I can see where someone wouldn't care for him much, I don't consider him a real class player.

I guess this is just where biases come into play, I would definitely say Celtic is better than Liverpool at this moment. Liverpool has just looked pathetic as of late. Chelsea could very well be better than us, I think it'd be a close call. I haven't seen Everton at all this year, so I'm not really sure, but I'd hazard to guess we'd have a good chance.

I guess I can't say we're too good, as I think we've pretty much lost our Division, and then just blowing a game against frigging Caley. Just not our best year, hopefully it gets turned around this year, or maybe we can keep on trucking in the UEFA Cup, who knows.

I'm pretty easy to please though, as long as they beat Rangers at least once, I consider the season a success.

I think it would be interesting though, Celtic throughout the years has had a pretty good run taking down the upper echelon of European teams. They really seem to rise up to the big teams, and just flounder against everyone else. I've just always had a soft spot for them, as I think they do well for themselves, with less money, prestige, and players than most of the big name teams. They're definitely not the best, but the frigging guys try their best to be just that.

[GoldenEagle]

I dont think it would be far fetched for Celtic to reach top 3. If they have a good year. Even a club like Blackburn is capable of that, though every 5 years or so.

[Katon]

Blackburn might have won the league a few years back, but that's changed. They played the third-placed team last weekend and lost 5-1. Right now . . . well, Chelsea did make a run at the top three this year, but there is a clear divide there and it's rather unlikely that anyone will jump that. Just looking at the talent, I can't see Celtic finishing ahead of any of the current top four.

[GoldenEagle]

But like I said occasionally, a team, with talent will make a run to the top of the EPL. They can rarely put it together for many years, although Newcastle has. They didnt use to be a top team.