^^ Thanks Pep.
I was going to post this reply to Claudius in the Suarez thread, but it fits this one better.
Claudius wrote:
In previous summers, we have blamed Chelsea and Citeh for destroying our transfer plans. This year, the French clubs have taken things to another level, to the extent that even clubs like Real probably cannot compete with them.
What it means for us is we're further down the pecking order and have even less of a choice when it comes to the truly big players. If we have a chance with someone of Suarez's quality, we have to take it. We cannot afford to turn up our noses. We might never get a chance like this again. FFP is clearly a pipe dream: we will never see the day where we are allowed to outspend Monaco and PSG due to our better revenue streams.
There is no way under the rules introduced that FFP sanctions could have been applied before now, so the fact they haven't been yet is hardly surprising.
It seems ropey with these other new financially doped clubs entering the market, but I still believe FFP is going to have an effect. It just won't be pretty.
We have to bear in mind that these remaining, lesser clubs which have become the pet projects of cash-happy billionaires simply could not compete on the European stage—which in football terms is where the prizes worth winning are, for a Ligue 1 club—without a massive financial injection.
The fact that they also can't compete if FFP is applied to ban them is therefore not conclusive: FFP and a lack of cash are two hurdles they absolutely have to get over to win the CL, even if the resolution of the latter means exacerbating the former.
My guess is that they plan to push the limits of FFP, see how things pan out, taking whatever medicine is meted out before seeking a more financially stable regime (as Chelsea are now doing). They may be excluded from European competition for one or more seasons, but without the money, they have no chance of winning anyway. They may not care about being excluded, if it means they get a profile boost by becoming enviably infamous for their wealth.
And there always remains the possibility that Platini and company won't have the resolve to enforce their own rules.
At the same time, PSG and Monaco spraying cash without rhyme or reason is no doubt already a concern to the existing doped clubs that have established a form of incumbency, including City, Chelsea and the twin TV rights giants of La Liga. This will actually reinforce the collective momentum of FFP.
FFP is designed in a way that will protect clubs with strong revenue. PSG and Monaco are late to the party, but may just be brute-forcing their way into a stronger brand and revenue position (following the fair-weather friends principle—how many French fans won't soon have a "preferred" club out of their two clubs with a shot at the big time?), because FFP means that they have to do that, at this point, if they want to compete over the longer term.
In a counterintuitive way, FFP actually increases the incentive for immediate, aggressive financial doping by raising greater future barriers to market entry than it does in the present.
The slow-changing system of CL qualification by UEFA coefficients also explains why Ligue 1 clubs have most recently been chosen for this strategy despite the deficit of revenue in that league. In that league, it was still easily possible for a doped club to establish a relative stranglehold on one of three precious CL qualifying places—not so easy in any of Europe's top leagues especially with other ownership shenanigans getting started.
By this logic, now that Ligue 1 is partly colonised by this sort of investor (with Lyon's and Marseilles' position interesting), the next cab off the rank for doping could definitely be one of Portugal's historic clubs. Or maybe Italy, but Serie A could present a fresh set of problems for an enterprising quasi-criminal group of investors, considering AC Milan's intimacy with Berlusconi's spent political force, and the degree of endemic corruption.
Couple this with some of the hypothesised strategic motives of billionaires when they invest in major football clubs, that we recently discussed regarding Abramovich—profile (based on competing in the Champions League), potential political protection based on the internationalised pain of dislodging them, and the habit of acceptance borne of familiarity.
If these motives apply, they help to explain some otherwise inexplicable behaviours prior to FFP's arrival, like spending £50m on Torres. For a club owned by a person whose brand is "owns Chelsea, is stupidly rich, spends stupid amounts of money on football, doesn't brook failure", spending any amount of money to secure a target is an act with perfect brand alignment, regardless of how it works out on the pitch.
In fact, the alignment with Abramovich's brand actually improves the worse that Torres does up to a point, because that £50m looks ever more arbitrary and therefore impressive. Another counterintuitive moment. On the other hand, FFP will prevent him from making these gestures so often.
With all of these conjectures, you have a relatively complete picture of why an economic powerhouse in a position of non-negligible geopolitical risk, like Sheikh Hamad, Sheikh Mansour, or Dmitry Rybolovlev might want to do what they're doing for an apparently stupid outlay of around £1-2bn which, while enormous, is still only comparable to their overall present and future wealth.
At some point, however, the supply of people who are rich enough (£10bn+) and sufficiently geopolitically embattled, and the supply of fallow football clubs with brand potential capable of being brute force cash-formed for Champions League qualification starts to become a problem. Muddying the water are the slow-moving genuine sports investors (Kroenke, the Glazers, etc) and the clubs that are established financial giants without this sort of doping (Bayern, Madrid, Barcelona, etc).
And at the same time, the value of being just one "nutcase" tycoon owner among many attenuates, diminishing the alleged motive for investment. In the 90s, everyone knew Al Fayed's name and that he was the Harrods guy. Everyone knows Abramovich's name. Some people know Mansour's name. Very few people know Hamad's, or Rybolovlev's names. And so on.
So at some point the domino effect of clubs falling to exotic investors will start to slow down. When new competitors do arrive, their cash will be met by an equal and opposite force, leading to the type of mutually assured destruction scenario that motivated FFP in the first place. In the meantime, this dynamic will continue spreading vast amounts of cash throughout football, and absent an artificial cash injection of our own, we can only focus on our revenue (Puma deal: check), our profile, and our results.
Kroenke must also be overjoyed to have invested in a commercial entity whose value, if he plays his cards right, will be significantly buoyed by all this cash entering its market niche for ulterior reasons.
