I did a quick search and didn't see any discussion of this. Given that it has driven most football-adjacent media in the UK into a Very English Swivet Indeed, I thought it merited a thread. Boiled way, way down, Project Big Picture is a plan developed by JWH and the Glazers to reshape the structure of English league pyramid. It has apparently been approved, either in detail or in outline, by the EFL. It has two major parts: a change in the funding of the EFL and a change in the governance of the EPL.
EFL Changes
Reaction has been plentiful. Everybody seemed to hate it at first, but the places I read (mainly the Guardian) are starting to come around to the idea that making the EPL even more oligarchic than it already is might be a reasonable price to pay to save the pyramid. I am operating at the very limit of my understanding of these issues, so I'd be curious to hear what people think.
EFL Changes
- The Premier League would provide short-term financial support for teams in lower divisions, to the tune of 250MM pounds. The FA would also get 100MM, presumably just to shut them up for a bit.
- In the future, the EPL would jointly negotiate future TV rights with the EFL divisions. The EFL would get 25% of the pie, thus guaranteeing lower division clubs a stream of revenue over the long term.
- Parachute payments would be abolished on the theory that clubs wouldn't see as dramatic a revenue drop off through relegation.
- The nine longest-tenured EPL clubs (Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United, Chelsea, Tottenham, Arsenal, Everton, Southampton (!) and West Ham (!!)) would essentially act as a Star Chamber with the EPL, with the ability to create new rules, approve TV deals, veto new owners, and maybe some other stuff as long as 6 of the 9 agreed. The other EPL clubs could not override those decisions even if all of them disagreed.
- Speaking of "all of them," the EPL would shrink from 20 teams to 18, leaving more schedule space for an expanded Champions League in the future.
- The League Cup would be eliminated as well (for those of you following my work in the other thread, I like this idea because it means Newcastle will get to keep the trophy after they win this year and the competition is eliminated).
Reaction has been plentiful. Everybody seemed to hate it at first, but the places I read (mainly the Guardian) are starting to come around to the idea that making the EPL even more oligarchic than it already is might be a reasonable price to pay to save the pyramid. I am operating at the very limit of my understanding of these issues, so I'd be curious to hear what people think.