Championship is more competitive than Premier League

[gordoncharles]

The prospects for promoted clubs seem to be declining rather than improving.

Last season Burnley, Luton and ourselves managed only 9 wins between us in a combined 108 games against teams other than ourselves (in fact Luton won more (5) than Burnley and United combined (2 each).

This season so far the promoted clubs have played 17 times (not including the drawn Southampton v Ipswich game) and managed zero victories between them.

Maybe the Premier League will get its much wanted closed shop by default.

 

[Lama]

have every club in the league receive the same amount of money (TV/prize money) regardless of where they finish or how many of their matches are televised.

Not sure I quite agree, I think that could reduce competition potentially, if 5th place receive the same compensation as 17th, I think the structure as it is isn’t the problem.

The prospects for promoted clubs seem to be declining rather than improving.

Last season Burnley, Luton and ourselves managed only 9 wins between us in a combined 108 games against teams other than ourselves (in fact Luton won more (5) than Burnley and United combined (2 each).

I don’t think last years relegated teams really did ourselves much credit.

Burnley persevered with a tactic that was evidentially suicide from the first few game weeks: They got what they had coming to them.

Luton did show some ambition, but were fairly conservative still - possibly due to the upcoming stadium development? Whatever it was, they pulled punches in the transfer market.

We were the worst of all; sold our best two players and replaced them with low cost gambles from poor leagues. We were so woefully underprepared. We can blame ourselves (well, the powers that be) for our performance.

You are right though, it is becoming tougher; I think for a newly promoted team to compete they need to take huge financial risks, have novel tactics that bridge the gap somewhat or just get really lucky.

 

[MobileBlade]

The answer would be to put in place a wage cap with the exception of maybe two "marquee" players who can earn more than the cap. The PFA would hate it but so long as the cap is at a level that people can't complain about, then they would be fighting a losing battle. The big clubs would also hate it as well no doubt saying they should be allowed to pay what they earn.

Think more TV money should also be filtered down to the lower leagues. Don't think there is anything wrong with performance pay but I think they system they are proposing of the top club earning a maximium of x amount of the bottom club would work on this.

Re TV appearance money. The big clubs have argued because they are shown more they should get more. Answer to this would be either distirbute that element evenly (like they do for the overseas money because every game is shown) or limit the number of times each club would be show, or just show every game (even if it means no more 3 pm Saturday games as a consequence).

 

[Ned the Donkey]

But can you honestly say that you watch more League Two football than Premier League football?

Yes. Absolutely. I keep an eye out for Notts County and AFC Wimbledon for various reasons. I can't recall the last time I watched anything to do with the "Premier" League.

"It's not football anymore."

That's not the game I grew up watching and playing. It's sanitised and gentrified. Jumpers for VAR cameras?

Does gentrification have some benefits? Yes. It has lots of benefits. It also has lots of costs.

Beyond all this, the size of the audience is not be a measure of the quality of the sport.

WWE has millions of viewers. Actual wrestling has maybe thousands.

One of them is sport, the other is sports "entertainment".

Does this make me some elitist chin-stroking connoisseur? I neither know nor fucking care.

The "Premier" League is WWE Football. Lots of people watch it. I'm not one of them.

 

[Selly]

From 1992 to 2024, only 7 teams (out of 51 teams) have won the Premier League, with Liverpool, Leicester and Blackburn winning 1 title each, while both Manchester clubs have 21 titles between them.

...

Compare that with the championship/first division in that same amount of time, there have been 20 different teams to win the league, with Sunderland having the most titles at 4 with Newcastle and Norwich have 3 each, everyone else has either got 1 or 2 titles each, granted there will have been more different teams in the championship over the years.

Whilst I agree with your general point - you cant use number of winners as a measure to compare two leagues where in one of them winning the league means you aren`t in it the following season. Man C wouldn`t have won 4 straight titles had they not been in the PL the following year.

More competitive doesn't equal better.

Not on its own - but the appeal of sport (as a neutral) is the inherent uncertainty, both on an individual game basis and also on a season long basis. The season long uncertainty hasn`t really been a thing in the top flight for at least 30-40 years - its pretty much nailed on that 1 of 2 or 3 clubs will win the league - you won`t get a team like Forest winning it any longer having only just been promoted.

You might get the odd story (us in 2019 for example) but the league is largely stratified.

Unfortunately what we have seen in the last 5 years is that increasingly is that even on an individual game basis there is a real lack of uncertainty. A promoted club beating Man C is almost as unlikely as Giant killing in the FA cup used to be.

Even if you look like you are going to pull off a shock on 60 mins, the other team will just bring 5 players on, with fresh legs, each of whom cost more that your entire squad. There is no uncertainty anymore in the PL.

The above is not as bad in the Championship (although the haves - and i count us as the haves this season - still tend to do very well vs the have nots)

It is what it is unfortunately.

I don't see how it can ever change now without a drastic reset of everything which isn't going to happen.

Regrettably I agree

How would it even be possible to make the Premier League a level playing field?

Salary cap (at a level that is spendable by all teams)
Even distribution of TV money
Squad limits (no hoarding players)

 

[Selly]

The answer would be to put in place a wage cap with the exception of maybe two "marquee" players who can earn more than the cap. The PFA would hate it but so long as the cap is at a level that people can't complain about, then they would be fighting a losing battle. The big clubs would also hate it as well no doubt saying they should be allowed to pay what they earn.

I'm not sure they would - remember they represent all players, not just PL players.

If you look over to the NFL - whenever the Collective Bargaining Agreement comes up for renewal the NFLPA tend to ensure that the agreement includes more guarantees/benefits for those on league minimum - rather than attempting to extract more value for the marquee players.*



to expand further on this - RB's are comparatively poorly paid* in the NFL partly because their best years are often when they are on their 4 year rookie contract - so they tend to get discarded for a new RB within that period (there is also an oversupply of RB's who are good enough for the league).

there was some talk about trying to change the RB's Rookie contract to get them more money in the last CBA - but it didn`t happen and it was, at least in part down to the NFLPA getting more cash for those on league minimums

**in as much as anyone earning $800k/year in their rookie deal, or $5m+ on a second contract, can be considered poorly paid.

 

[SuperSonicBlade89]

My view on money in regards to where you finish in the league is this:

The higher you finish, the less money you get, as you don't need it if you already finished 1st for example.

The lower you finish, the more money you get, to help you get competitive with those that finished above you.

Of course this would not work though.
Good way of digging out the weeds though by seeing who's at the race for the bottom.

Very similar to the reverse grid proposal of F1. Whereby if you qualified with the fastest time you would start at the back. Which would then turn the event into an actual race with lots of overtaking, rather than a convoy of cars. The guy at the front won't be there for very long.

 

[Selly]

Very similar to the reverse grid proposal of F1. Whereby if you qualified with the fastest time you would start at the back. Which would then turn the event into an actual race with lots of overtaking, rather than a convoy of cars. The guy at the front won't be there for very long.

How would this even work - what would be the motivator for finishing first in qualifying?

My view on money in regards to where you finish in the league is this:

The higher you finish, the less money you get, as you don't need it if you already finished 1st for example.

The lower you finish, the more money you get, to help you get competitive with those that finished above you.

This only works with a closed shop.

 

[Sheffsteel]

Maybe the Premier League will get its much wanted closed shop by default.

Still say the biggest factor in making the gap bigger between the PL and Championship were the recent changes in rules regarding

Change A
The change from 3 subs from a bench of 5 rule to being able to use 5 subs from a bench of 7.
In the past promoted teams have focussed on trying to have a starting 11 than can compete, so it usually means making 3 or 4 big signings.

However in the past 2 years the onus, more than ever is on squad depth, not so much the 1st 11.
Even with a £120 million a year windfall how can any promoted hope to have a squad of 20 high quality players .

Change B
The added time rule for time wasting.
When you have a David versus Goliath type match, it's normal for the weaker team to use gamesmanship.
Slow down the game, break the game up etc. When Arsenal did it against Man City last week the media praised Arsenal for being clever and having a winners mentality. However when Sheffield Utd did it last season we received negative publicity and the ref always added on at least 10 extra minutes.

So when most matches regularly last 100 minutes, then the subs options become more important that ever. Established PL clubs have the finances to make sure they have a bench of 7 high quality players where as newly promoted clubs scrape the barrel regards their subs bench.

 

[John Street West Terrace]

From an entertainment perspective & the ability of any team in the division to beat another the Championship ticks the boxes for me .. but and a big but is as we all know the difference in quality is an absolute chasm.
I now very rarely watch the PL games nowadays & even can’t be arsed with MOTD , the diving , cheating , VAR and complete lack of any physical contact has almost made it a 5 a side game but on a big pitch & I don’t find it entertaining.
I think as the gap grows each season they’ll be more & more clambering from the elite & to make it a fully franchised league & no relegation which will be the last nail in the coffin for some EFL sides . I’m afraid football got too greedy sadly

 

[TopBoy]

I stopped watching MOTD at least 10 years ago, that's when top-flight football died for me. Love the Prem in the 90's and early 2000's but it has been largely geared towards TV viewing since then. Give me the championship, League 1 and League 2, any day of the week—it's much more like the game I played as a kid and grew up watching. Non-league is even better. Been to see my local non-league side Stamford a few times and everything about it is a real breath of fresh air. I was tempted to get a season ticket at Stamford this season instead of United but couldn't quite do it. It's coming though ...

 

[Blademan18891889]

Weat ham and villa both recently in Europe and non considered top 6 as a regular .
It's the cups now that clubs are aiming for.

That literally couldn't be any further from reality, in both cups every single premier league club other than maybe man u make wholesale changes. Neither of those 2 got in Europe from the cups either. The last 10 years of winners of both cups have been won by the main 5 clubs other than one year where Leicester won an fa cup.

 

[PeterNdlovu081]

Salary cap (at a level that is spendable by all teams)
Even distribution of TV money
Squad limits (no hoarding players)

Nice ideas but none of these things would dethrone the big clubs at the top of the league.

 

[wak1889]

Might be an odd point I'm going to make to show that the Championship is more competitive (and frankly better) than the Premier League, which anyone who has watched championship football will usually say that it is more competitive than the Premier League.

From 1992 to 2024, only 7 teams (out of 51 teams) have won the Premier League, with Liverpool, Leicester and Blackburn winning 1 title each, while both Manchester clubs have 21 titles between them.

That might be considered competitive to these top clubs but for the rest of us it isn't competitive in the slightest.

Compare that with the championship/first division in that same amount of time, there have been 20 different teams to win the league, with Sunderland having the most titles at 4 with Newcastle and Norwich have 3 each, everyone else has either got 1 or 2 titles each, granted there will have been more different teams in the championship over the years.

Rather ironic really that the fans of these top clubs resented this European Super League, yet with the money being spent by these top teams, they've created a super league at the top of the Premier League (only without anyone from Europe) as most of the premier league cannot compete with them money wise.

But what U are not factoring in is the team that wins it can no longer win it the following season unlike the premier League

 

[petcharlie]

I stopped watching MOTD at least 10 years ago, that's when top-flight football died for me. Love the Prem in the 90's and early 2000's but it has been largely geared towards TV viewing since then. Give me the championship, League 1 and League 2, any day of the week—it's much more like the game I played as a kid and grew up watching. Non-league is even better. Been to see my local non-league side Stamford a few times and everything about it is a real breath of fresh air. I was tempted to get a season ticket at Stamford this season instead of United but couldn't quite do it. It's coming though ...

I used to spend a lot of time at Stamford on business at the cement works .Used to stop at the George in the square and remember going to watch the local team and really enjoyed it .It is some years ago now but i thought they were a good watch .

 

[loyalblade95]

But what U are not factoring in is the team that wins it can no longer win it the following season unlike the premier League

Fair enough