Well you cannot on one think that man city's spending is fundamentally (save for Liverpool ) good for the game and then agree with fergie who says it is silly.

Well you cannot on one think that man city's spending is fundamentally (save for Liverpool ) good for the game

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I don't think it is good for the game, I have been telling you this for the last five hours.

Really? You haven't made your point very well if you have...
Very well then one last time

Man utd spending 500m repaying debt to financial institutions

V

Man city spending 500m on players...

Which one is better for the game and why?

comment by Redinthehead -at least we didn't finish 13th (U1860)
posted 6 minutes ago
Really? You haven't made your point very well if you have...
Very well then one last time

Man utd spending 500m repaying debt to financial institutions

...............

Are you under the misaprehension that we are not spending money on players, and that we are spending all our money on the debt?

You get more daft by the minute.

Nope but if you like; take it as 600m for man utd... 500m on debt to financial institutions and 100m on players..

V

500m on players by man city

Which one is better for the game, and why?

Nope but if you like; take it as 600m for man utd... 500m on debt to financial institutions and 100m on players..

V

500m on players by man city

Which one is better for the game, and why?

..............................

Probably United spending 500 million on paying off our debt.

Just how much more do you think we might have won if we had spent it on players? Now, that just wouldn't have been good for the game.

Our paying off of our debt has had no effect what so ever on the game, where as Cities silly spending has, clearly demonstrated by the price of an very unprolific goall scorer.

comment by Redinthehead -at least we didn't finish 13th (U1860)
posted 15 minutes ago
Nope but if you like; take it as 600m for man utd... 500m on debt to financial institutions and 100m on players..

V

500m on players by man city

Which one is better for the game, and why?
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I still don't understand why you think this has anything to do with what SAF said. City are spending stupid money on buying players and paying their wages. We all know this. SAF hasn't said that city are being unethical. Why are you getting so confused.

I disagree, 500m leaving the game is worse for the game overall, certainly the money that fans put into the game leaving in favour of debt and interest payments is sad really.

You're looking at it from the perspective of one club rather than for the overall football industry.

Your perogative of course.

I hanker back to the days when clubs did not run up huge losses and whilst there were always rich clubs, the gap was not so great, which is why Derby could win a couple of titles and Forest could win a title after being promoted.

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Derby and Forest benefitted from investment during those periods of their success. Derby had the record signing of Colin Todd in their ranks - an (at the time) huge signing costing £170,000. Doesn't sound like a lot today (because today it is a pitiful amount). But back then...

comment by Redinthehead -at least we didn't finish 13th (U1860)
posted 31 seconds ago

certainly the money that fans put into the game leaving in favour of debt and interest payments is sad really.

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This is the only sensible thing you have said all day long. And you will not find anyone who disagrees with that.

....................

You're looking at it from the perspective of one club rather than for the overall football industry.

...................

Again, I have used your club as an example of why City and Chelsea having free money to inflate transfer prices and player wages is bad for the game.

I know you have figured out how this has been bad for Liverpool, you really could not fail to understand this. It has a domino effect all the way down below you as well.

United and Liverpool, in their dominant periods have been able to buy the top players and pay them within reason, but that has all changed now with the advent of free money.

I have to leave now, work is done for the day, but I think you are beginning to understand this now.

In simplicity, so long as Chelsea and City can freely spend on who thay want, then Liverpool are going to find it harder and harder to get in the CL.

If you think that is good for the game, then so be it.

Absolutely if more money ie investment comes into the game it's good for the game.

please stop trying to compare previous 'investment' with city being handed success on a silver platter.

But Ripley's, you can see the other side can't you? Fans of other clubs who look at city getting a huge windfall from nothing and think 'what's the point?'

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That's always been the case. Football has never been any different. Clubs owners taking a risk by splashing the cash on players. Sometimes it succeeded. Other times it spectacularly failed. We look back today and ridicule such financial outlays. City with Steve Daley. United with Gary Birtles. And we also look back today and compliment past events. Leeds signing Cantona, right back to Billy Meredith moving across Manchester.

When I first started watching football, in the mid-to-late Eighties, City could barely afford to sign a player on a free transfer! We tried to sign Frank Stapleton and Graeme Hogg for a combined fee of £200k. Both transfers never happened. At the time, the likes of United had £1m players in their team. I remember the signing of Brian Gayle from Wimbledon for £325k, for that was the first transfer since I really got into football that City made that was above the £300k mark.

A few years later we were entering the market signing defenders for £2.5 million. Yet those transfers, however exciting they were in and of themselves, in hindsight brought no success to our club. But we still celebrated our club signing them. In the hope that our club can always progress. It's a shame that so many people these days seem resigned to their club never competing, and the sad fact is that they are right to feel that way. My point is that it's always been that way. Just that the very notion of nostalgia paints a different picture for us. We like to think that the game was more romantic "back in the day", but it really wasn't. City have paid big money for big signings at several points in our history, yet only twice before (prior to this weekend) has that resulted in City actually being successful in terms of winning the league.

Back in the 80s, I recall reading match-day programmes at the start of a season in which a new sponsorship deal was announced. X-amount (thousands rather than millions) being the value of such deals. Back then, clubs earned thousands (as opposed to tens of millions) in tv revenue. Merchandise the same. It was a major event if your club opened a shop in your local Arndale. Now such shops are springing up in placing that we've never heard of.

I dunno. It just puts it all into persepctive for me. And that perspective makes me think. If 20 years ago the most valuable club in the world was valued at £20 million and today it's valued at close to £2 billion, then what the hell will it be worth 20 years from now. If 20 years ago we were all shocked at a player earning £5k per week, and at a transfer for £3.5m, and today we don't blink an eye at a player being signed for £20m and earning £100k per week, what the hell will we think 20 years from now should such figures seem like small fry?

Which I suspect they invariably will.

VC, now that United's free-spending has been curtailed by the Glazers would you welcome state intervention in the transfer market so that everyone else is also handicapped?

Ole are you saying sheikh mansour hasn't invested?

it's called 'financial doping'.

Again, I have used your club as an example of why City and Chelsea having free money to inflate transfer prices and player wages is bad for the game.

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To inflate transfer prices? How?

10 years ago players were moving for £30m. Madrid signed Ronaldo for £80m before City's owners really got their teeth into the game.

City and Chelsea haven't inflated the market. The market has always inflated and would have continued to do so with or without the likes of Mansour or Abramovich splashing their cash.

please stop trying to compare previous 'investment' with city being handed success on a silver platter.

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No. People should never stop comparing. Because to do so is to understand how the game overall has progressed.

comparing self generated income to undeserved wealth is just silly though.

ole_1999 - but there are many periods in the history of game where united and other clubs have benefited from "undeserved wealth". If it's silly now, it's always been silly x

Undeserved? So everton getting 24m for Lescott was undeserved?

Villa 20m for Milner and 18m for Barry undeserved? They in turn all bought other players from other clubs who in turn bought others etc.

That's what investment sheikh mansour brought.. it's good for the game. It's created stiffer competition which will in turn bring stronger competitors.

not for united there aren't. do you know what self generated income means?

So in united's entire history united have never benefited from a wealthy benefactor, or are you one of those people who think football started in 1992? x

we've never had a sugar daddy. our conscience is clean.

united have never had a sugardaddy?! you know the history of your own club do you?!

so I assume united have never spent beyond their means and nearly gone bust. No one called James W. Gibson invested £2,000 in December 1931 and saved you from bankruptcy?! x