A Game of Four Quarters
A Treasonous Breach of the Foundations of English League Football
Ready the gallows, prepare the guillotine and inform the firing squad; for what I’m about to suggest is a treasonous breach of the ‘foundations’ of English League Football. As can be discerned from the barrage of overwhelmingly clichéd soundbites yawned at us by Premier League managers every year, the League is the staple of every English Club. While those competing in Europe, except in the Europa League, would obviously love to come home brandishing a big, shiny, foreign thing, and for Everton the FA Cup is a nice distraction, managers from Big Sam to Brian Little have convinced us over the years that The League is their bread and butter. Well, what I suggest is not that we change the basic diet of the Premier League altogether, but merely divide the hallowed format into quarters.
The League is rightly considered so sacred as it is felt that it represents the only logical way to determine the truly best team in the country. Only by having every team play the same teams the same amount of times every year and comparing the results, it is believed, can the true Champion be determined. While this logic remains sound, I feel that it is also a system that is responsible for maintaining the biggest problem in English football at the moment; the disparity between the Big Four and the rest. The lack of parity in the Premier League is a self-sustaining problem, i.e. the rich get richer. The League format and Champion’s League qualification procedures have ensured that there remains little hope for those outside but to pray for a outrageously wealthy Arab.
Like Aston Villa, Man United and Arsenal before, the way forward may lie in looking across the Atlantic. While many with little appreciation for the format of US sports will find this detestable, the best way to cure the ennui and nausea caused by the least exciting of the major leagues in the world is to adopt the US system of dividing the competing clubs into smaller geographical regions.
This is what I suggest: taking last years competing Premier League clubs, we divide the Premiership into four, roughly geographical, Divisions:
1. London- Arsenal, Chelsea, Fulham, Tottenham, West Ham
2. Midlands- Aston Villa, Porstmouth, Stoke, West Brom, Wigan
3. North-West- Bolton, Everton, Liverpool, Man Utd, Man City
4. North-East- Blackburn, Hull, Middlebrough, Newcastle, Sunderland
As anyone with a passing knowledge of English Geography will realise, these are not strictly geographical but as close as can be attained while maintaining equal numbers, but strict alignment is not important, the important part is the grouping together of the current strongest teams.
The fixture list would work as such: Each year the teams in each Division play each other four times- twice home and away. The teams in two Divisions, changing year on year, will play each other home and away once. The remaining fixtures will consist of teams in one division playing all the teams in another at home, and all the teams in the remaining division away. For instance, every year all the London teams play each home and away twice. Then, all the teams in London play the teams in North-East home and away. The teams in London then play all the Midland teams at home and the remainder of their fixture list is made up of games away to teams in the North-West. Each division would have a similar structure but consisting of different opponents each year. Thus there would be a 36 game season each year, with all the teams competing in the same Division playing the same teams, maintaining the crucial element of fairness provided by the league format. The winners of each division would go into a playoff format with the winner with most points playing the winner with the least at home, this being followed by an ultimate Final between the playoff winners. While the playoff participants would be the Champions League representatives the following season. The finalists would each play a total of 38 games. Relegation would be determined in a similar way, with playoffs and the two defeated teams being sent down.
While this may seem unbelievably complicated, the league table at the bottom explains how last year would have panned out using the Division system.
I realise that proposing a replacement for the traditional league format is blasphemy. A curse against the God that is football. But football is already cursed. For better or worse the Premier League has abolished numerous traditions of English football as it once was. Gone are 3pm Saturday afternoon kick-offs. Gone is Match of the Day as the only source of TV football. Gone is the fan with the fag in the crowded terrace. Gone is the two-way street of player/club loyalty. Gone is a fair competition between competing teams. I am casting no judgment on the benefits or detriments of each of these changes to football as we know it, I am merely making the point that football in the last 20 years has changed more than in the previous 100, and that it is time to realise that nothing is sacred anymore, Sky and Setanta have made sure of that. Everything is subject to change. So why not the league format.
By placing the Big Four into the same division it ensures that only two can reach the playoffs each year. As the league below indicates, they would most likely dominate any smaller team in the division, but gradually, as success breeds success, the smaller teams would grow and attract better players. Conversely, the richer teams, without the guarantee of a place in the top four and European football, would lose attractiveness to fans and players and thus would come back toward the field. The rich would get poorer and vice versa.
The effect of having the stronger teams competing for limited places in the final reckoning has benefits beyond simply bringing them back toward the field. By having Chelsea and Arsenal play each other twice as often as normal, it will arguably lead to the best team being declared division winner. By increasing the direct competition between Man Utd and Liverpool, then truly the better side can be determined. Wouldn’t we rather the league was decided not by which team beats Hull most often, but by which team beats their direct competition for honours most often? I hear the deafening assent of Liverpool fans.
Yet, the noble pursuit of unhindered competition is not the only benefit of the system. The darker, financially-driven aspects would also prosper. Year on year, the most popular games in the League, both in TV viewers and in attendance, are the games between the Big Four and derby games. By doubling the amount of Man Utd-Liverpool, Chelsea-Arsenal, Man-Utd-Man City, Liverpool-Everton, Arsenal-Tottenham and Newcastle-Sunderland games, both the gate receipts and viewing figures would increase over the season. The argument that this might dilute the product, as it were, can be rejected with a view north of the border, where the Old Firm derbies happen just as frequently but remain no less viewed or enjoyed by fans. As an added benefit, every two seasons, there would only be one Man Utd-Chelsea or Arsenal-Liverpool game, so it would become an occasion to savour and one-off spectacle that year.
Every season, like clockwork, right around Christmas, we hear a loud groaning emanating from somewhere in the League. Sir Alex, after a 1-1 draw away to Fulham, two days after a victory in the FA Cup, will moan about fixture congestion. Or a player will look enviously at the continent and lament the lack of a winter break in the Premiership. The Division system has only 36 games for 60% of the teams. By shaving two valuable weeks off the calendar for the season, we could finally afford to give the poor, overworked players a Christmas break. In return, maybe they would shut up and stop comparing themselves to slaves.
Any financial loss incurred by having two less league games every year could be offset by the increase in interest in the Premiership Playoffs and Final, sure to garner greater viewing figures than a last day of the season, 11th place showdown between Bolton and Wigan.
But I can hear the arguments already. The existing league format is the only objectively fair system to determine the best league in the country. Well the current system is not fair, that’s plain to see. Without any hope of competing financially with the Champions League clubs, other clubs have no chance of competing at all. In any case, the league below illustrates that the system has very little effect on the overall points tallies of most teams. The stronger teams will still get more points, but the system allows them the weaker teams a chance to compete at the business end of the season; in the playoffs.
In actual fact, the current league system is not objectively fair anyway. The Aston Villa that Chelsea play away in September is bound to markedly different from the one Liverpool play away in May. Injuries, form, January signings, fixtures and any possible change in management will make a difference in terms of the difficulty of the task facing the teams. At least by competing against your direct rivals more often over a season, the chance of the truly better team emerging victorious increases.
I’m not a fool, I realise that the chances of this system being adopted are as likely as an Ngog hat-trick. Neither the fans, with their attachment to ‘tradition’ and Amerophobia nor the Big Four, with their attachment to their wallets, will stand for it but something must be done. The wealthier the Big Four get, the poorer the League becomes as a whole and there’s only so many Middle-Eastern bazillionaires willing to come in and Sheikh things up.
The League is rightly considered so sacred as it is felt that it represents the only logical way to determine the truly best team in the country. Only by having every team play the same teams the same amount of times every year and comparing the results, it is believed, can the true Champion be determined. While this logic remains sound, I feel that it is also a system that is responsible for maintaining the biggest problem in English football at the moment; the disparity between the Big Four and the rest. The lack of parity in the Premier League is a self-sustaining problem, i.e. the rich get richer. The League format and Champion’s League qualification procedures have ensured that there remains little hope for those outside but to pray for a outrageously wealthy Arab.
Like Aston Villa, Man United and Arsenal before, the way forward may lie in looking across the Atlantic. While many with little appreciation for the format of US sports will find this detestable, the best way to cure the ennui and nausea caused by the least exciting of the major leagues in the world is to adopt the US system of dividing the competing clubs into smaller geographical regions.
This is what I suggest: taking last years competing Premier League clubs, we divide the Premiership into four, roughly geographical, Divisions:
1. London- Arsenal, Chelsea, Fulham, Tottenham, West Ham
2. Midlands- Aston Villa, Porstmouth, Stoke, West Brom, Wigan
3. North-West- Bolton, Everton, Liverpool, Man Utd, Man City
4. North-East- Blackburn, Hull, Middlebrough, Newcastle, Sunderland
As anyone with a passing knowledge of English Geography will realise, these are not strictly geographical but as close as can be attained while maintaining equal numbers, but strict alignment is not important, the important part is the grouping together of the current strongest teams.
The fixture list would work as such: Each year the teams in each Division play each other four times- twice home and away. The teams in two Divisions, changing year on year, will play each other home and away once. The remaining fixtures will consist of teams in one division playing all the teams in another at home, and all the teams in the remaining division away. For instance, every year all the London teams play each home and away twice. Then, all the teams in London play the teams in North-East home and away. The teams in London then play all the Midland teams at home and the remainder of their fixture list is made up of games away to teams in the North-West. Each division would have a similar structure but consisting of different opponents each year. Thus there would be a 36 game season each year, with all the teams competing in the same Division playing the same teams, maintaining the crucial element of fairness provided by the league format. The winners of each division would go into a playoff format with the winner with most points playing the winner with the least at home, this being followed by an ultimate Final between the playoff winners. While the playoff participants would be the Champions League representatives the following season. The finalists would each play a total of 38 games. Relegation would be determined in a similar way, with playoffs and the two defeated teams being sent down.
While this may seem unbelievably complicated, the league table at the bottom explains how last year would have panned out using the Division system.
I realise that proposing a replacement for the traditional league format is blasphemy. A curse against the God that is football. But football is already cursed. For better or worse the Premier League has abolished numerous traditions of English football as it once was. Gone are 3pm Saturday afternoon kick-offs. Gone is Match of the Day as the only source of TV football. Gone is the fan with the fag in the crowded terrace. Gone is the two-way street of player/club loyalty. Gone is a fair competition between competing teams. I am casting no judgment on the benefits or detriments of each of these changes to football as we know it, I am merely making the point that football in the last 20 years has changed more than in the previous 100, and that it is time to realise that nothing is sacred anymore, Sky and Setanta have made sure of that. Everything is subject to change. So why not the league format.
By placing the Big Four into the same division it ensures that only two can reach the playoffs each year. As the league below indicates, they would most likely dominate any smaller team in the division, but gradually, as success breeds success, the smaller teams would grow and attract better players. Conversely, the richer teams, without the guarantee of a place in the top four and European football, would lose attractiveness to fans and players and thus would come back toward the field. The rich would get poorer and vice versa.
The effect of having the stronger teams competing for limited places in the final reckoning has benefits beyond simply bringing them back toward the field. By having Chelsea and Arsenal play each other twice as often as normal, it will arguably lead to the best team being declared division winner. By increasing the direct competition between Man Utd and Liverpool, then truly the better side can be determined. Wouldn’t we rather the league was decided not by which team beats Hull most often, but by which team beats their direct competition for honours most often? I hear the deafening assent of Liverpool fans.
Yet, the noble pursuit of unhindered competition is not the only benefit of the system. The darker, financially-driven aspects would also prosper. Year on year, the most popular games in the League, both in TV viewers and in attendance, are the games between the Big Four and derby games. By doubling the amount of Man Utd-Liverpool, Chelsea-Arsenal, Man-Utd-Man City, Liverpool-Everton, Arsenal-Tottenham and Newcastle-Sunderland games, both the gate receipts and viewing figures would increase over the season. The argument that this might dilute the product, as it were, can be rejected with a view north of the border, where the Old Firm derbies happen just as frequently but remain no less viewed or enjoyed by fans. As an added benefit, every two seasons, there would only be one Man Utd-Chelsea or Arsenal-Liverpool game, so it would become an occasion to savour and one-off spectacle that year.
Every season, like clockwork, right around Christmas, we hear a loud groaning emanating from somewhere in the League. Sir Alex, after a 1-1 draw away to Fulham, two days after a victory in the FA Cup, will moan about fixture congestion. Or a player will look enviously at the continent and lament the lack of a winter break in the Premiership. The Division system has only 36 games for 60% of the teams. By shaving two valuable weeks off the calendar for the season, we could finally afford to give the poor, overworked players a Christmas break. In return, maybe they would shut up and stop comparing themselves to slaves.
Any financial loss incurred by having two less league games every year could be offset by the increase in interest in the Premiership Playoffs and Final, sure to garner greater viewing figures than a last day of the season, 11th place showdown between Bolton and Wigan.
But I can hear the arguments already. The existing league format is the only objectively fair system to determine the best league in the country. Well the current system is not fair, that’s plain to see. Without any hope of competing financially with the Champions League clubs, other clubs have no chance of competing at all. In any case, the league below illustrates that the system has very little effect on the overall points tallies of most teams. The stronger teams will still get more points, but the system allows them the weaker teams a chance to compete at the business end of the season; in the playoffs.
In actual fact, the current league system is not objectively fair anyway. The Aston Villa that Chelsea play away in September is bound to markedly different from the one Liverpool play away in May. Injuries, form, January signings, fixtures and any possible change in management will make a difference in terms of the difficulty of the task facing the teams. At least by competing against your direct rivals more often over a season, the chance of the truly better team emerging victorious increases.
I’m not a fool, I realise that the chances of this system being adopted are as likely as an Ngog hat-trick. Neither the fans, with their attachment to ‘tradition’ and Amerophobia nor the Big Four, with their attachment to their wallets, will stand for it but something must be done. The wealthier the Big Four get, the poorer the League becomes as a whole and there’s only so many Middle-Eastern bazillionaires willing to come in and Sheikh things up.
Playoffs: Liverpool v Sunderland
Chelsea v Aston Villa
Relegation Playoffs: Fulham v Middlesbrough
W Brom v Bolton
Chelsea v Aston Villa
Relegation Playoffs: Fulham v Middlesbrough
W Brom v Bolton
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posted by Rich @ 5:37 PM
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