# SDMB Footie Focus March **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 1, 2004, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895 "2004-03-01T13:15:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![owlstretchingtime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/958977/32.png) [@owlstretchingtime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/owlstretchingtime)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2004, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/21 "2004-03-02T16:03:25Z")
I have a feeling that AFC won’t be the first or last to try to re-start outside the league. Aldershot Town are going well, and I believe there is an AFC Bradford waiting in the wings, after their (pretty certain) bankruptcy. An obviously vital plan for these teams is to have goals to aim at in terms of league progression. Mind you I used to like going to Enfield (who have their own AFC - Enfield Town) with my dad when I was little. They were about the best amateur team in england. Jumpers for goalposts…(the stadium is yuppie flats now (well as close as Enfield gets to yuppies, which isn’t really that close) ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2004, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/22 "2004-03-02T17:44:36Z")
Ah, so my beloved Marine AFC are battling to enter the Conference North by right rather than face the horrors of Play Offs, losers of which would enter the lowly Isthmian League Premier Division. See you in the Conference, AFC Wimbledon and Wimbledon MK! ---
**Author:** ![owlstretchingtime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/958977/32.png) [@owlstretchingtime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/owlstretchingtime)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2004, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/23 "2004-03-03T09:12:49Z")
> [@SentientMeat](#): > > Ah, so my beloved Marine AFC are battling to enter the Conference North by right rather than face the horrors of Play Offs, losers of which would enter the lowly Isthmian League Premier Division. > > See you in the Conference, AFC Wimbledon and Wimbledon MK! Wimblestein won’t start next season - that’s pretty much a certainty. Remember when they had the brainwave of moving to Dublin? Oh how we laughed. The pile of rubble that is their old stadium is driving down the price of my house. Probably. One thing that slightly bothers me about AFC Wimbledon is that I can see history repeating. The root of this whole thing is that their old stadium wasn’t good enough for league football. Kingsmeadow isn’t either, and isn’t too obviously expandable. In other news au revoir Papa Smurf - complete and utter cunt. However he was sound about Chelsea fans - pen 'em in and electrocute them. THe only thing on which we would see eye to eye. (Read Tom Bower’s book - broken dreams for the inside on Mr Bates. Not nice.) ---
**Author:** ![owlstretchingtime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/958977/32.png) [@owlstretchingtime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/owlstretchingtime)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2004, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/24 "2004-03-03T12:51:14Z")
Here’s the “Rich List” from Deloittes. It’s only turnover so not the whole story. We are the highest placed club without eurocup stuff. Interesting. What would be really useful is to comapre this list against debts. 1 (1) Manchester United 175.8 (251.4) 2 (2) Juventus 152.7 (218.3) 3 (4) AC Milan 140 (200.2) 4 (6) Real Madrid 134.7 (192.6) 5 (3) Bayern Munich 113.8 (162.7) 6 (12) Inter Milan 113.6 (162.4) 7 (8) Arsenal 104.6 (149.6) 8 (5) Liverpool 104.4 (149.4) 9 (13) Newcastle United 97.1 (138.9) 10 (7) Chelsea 93.6 (133.8) 11 (10) Roma 92.6 (132.4) 12 (15) Borussia Dortmund 86.7 (124.0) 13 (9) Barcelona 86.3 (123.4) 14 (n/a) Schalke 04 82.9 (118.6) 15 (16) Tottenham Hotspur 66.9 (95.6) 16 (11) Leeds United 64.3 (92.0) 17 (14) Lazio 62.2 (88.9) 18 (17) Celtic 60.8 (87.0) 19 (20) Olympique Lyonnais 58.9 (84.3) 20 (n/a) Valencia 56.3 (80.5) Legend: Position - (previous year’s position) - Club - income in sterling - (income in euros) ---
**Author:** ![London\_Calling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@London\_Calling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/London_Calling)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2004, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/25 "2004-03-03T14:29:20Z")
Interesting that, given near identical capacity, the Gooners have an income of over 50% more than us; got to be mainly Champs League income, plus more teevee money and some additional sponsorship. Leeds do well in the circs (no Europe, or cup runs, plus performance in the league); regardless of the debt, that’s still some serious sized asset. The debt ration would indeed, be nice to know, as would the respective percentages given to players salaries ---
**Author:** ![TwistofFate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cdc98d/32.png) [@TwistofFate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwistofFate)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2004, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/26 "2004-03-03T14:33:37Z")
I doubt that you could find Real Madrid’s true debt figure, due to it’s history. there are quite a few “special relationships” that still exist between the banks and Real. ---
**Author:** ![owlstretchingtime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/958977/32.png) [@owlstretchingtime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/owlstretchingtime)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2004, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/27 "2004-03-03T15:16:52Z")
Today’s bloody silly idea: "Hearts want to play a Scottish Premier League match in Australia next season. The SPL confirmed it is considering a proposal from the Edinburgh side to stage a match in Melbourne. Celtic have not confirmed they could be the Jambos’ preferred opponents in the scheme to spread the gospel of Scottish football Down Under." Can anyone beat this for stupidity. ---
**Author:** ![garius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e19b73/32.png) [@garius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garius)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2004, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/28 "2004-03-03T15:28:02Z")
> [@owlstretchingtime](#): > > Today’s bloody silly idea: > Can anyone beat this for stupidity. personally I think our “wear red to the match” and “sing for highbury” initiatives are far, far worse. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![TwistofFate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cdc98d/32.png) [@TwistofFate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwistofFate)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2004, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/29 "2004-03-03T15:37:46Z")
> [@owlstretchingtime](#): > > Today’s bloody silly idea: > > "Hearts want to play a Scottish Premier League match in Australia next season. > The SPL confirmed it is considering a proposal from the Edinburgh side to stage > a match in Melbourne. > > Celtic have not confirmed they could be the Jambos’ preferred opponents in the > scheme to spread the gospel of Scottish football Down Under." > > Can anyone beat this for stupidity. what, attempts to increase a fanbase and viewing figures by a club that could desparately do with the related boosts in income? It makes sense, but I don’t know how successful it would be. ---
**Author:** ![owlstretchingtime](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/958977/32.png) [@owlstretchingtime](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/owlstretchingtime)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2004, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/30 "2004-03-03T15:50:15Z")
> [@garius](#): > > personally I think our “wear red to the match” and “sing for highbury” initiatives are far, far worse. :rolleyes: You’ve got form for this sort of thing you know. “Good old arsenal” was written by jimmy hill as you didn’t have any songs to sing. Jimmy Hill. Nuff said. And as regards the scots - exhibition matches? - no problem. Actual Scottish league matches in Australia? Very very wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Tansu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/67e7ee/32.png) [@Tansu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tansu)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/31 "2004-03-04T10:37:06Z")
Oh, not again. [http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/l/leicester\_city/3532059.stm](http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/l/leicester_city/3532059.stm) Sent home from La Manga again, except for 8 players who are talking to Spanish police. Can’t take them anywhere. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![London\_Calling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@London\_Calling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/London_Calling)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/32 "2004-03-04T11:21:25Z")
I’ve always found it very hard to build up a head of steam about a few blokes having a drink in Spain; for goodness sake, if setting off fire extinguishers gets you sent home . . . Then I Don’t Know What The World Is Coming Too. Still, it’s always nice to read what they’ve been up too ! On another note, someone pointed out that on that list of the 20 clubs with the largest income, only one has never played Champs League footie . . . [sub] cough [/sub] Also, I see the Spurs home game vs. Newcastle (planned for a week on Sat) is likely to become a victim of European success - not ours, of course. Looks like it’ll be moved to the Sunday - watch this space. Or not. ---
**Author:** ![Tansu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/67e7ee/32.png) [@Tansu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tansu)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 11:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/33 "2004-03-04T11:43:41Z")
I’m not personally frothing at the mouth about whatever they’ve done. Probably just got a bit rowdy, but we’ll see. I do apologise if I gave the impression of wanting the players to be Perfect Saintly Children. But - I do care that they’ve got themselves in enough trouble to get the police involved, because that causes disruption, which isn’t really what we need right now. ---
**Author:** ![London\_Calling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@London\_Calling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/London_Calling)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/34 "2004-03-04T12:28:27Z")
Not sure, though. Depending on what happened, someone like Sir Mad Jock would turn it into an ‘us against the world’ scenario and get much better performances out of them as a result – how many times has he done that. . . But like you say, we don’t yet know if its just high spirits. ---
**Author:** ![Tansu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/67e7ee/32.png) [@Tansu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tansu)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/35 "2004-03-04T12:35:03Z")
Not everyone runs a club like the red-faced man, though. I wish we were getting better performances out of them anyway. Ah. Just heard this on radio 9 players arrested, Follows claims that 3 German women were attacked in their hotel rooms. ---
**Author:** ![TwistofFate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cdc98d/32.png) [@TwistofFate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwistofFate)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/36 "2004-03-04T13:00:40Z")
Once again, where Stan Collymore leads, the Premiership follows. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/37 "2004-03-04T13:37:35Z")
I hear poor Stan has been dropped by the Beeb after trawling a car park looking for some action. This was after hosting a phone-in where some joker kept asking him about England “beating the Swedes” at the World Cup. ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/38 "2004-03-04T15:44:44Z")
[UEFA Cup draw](http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/europe/3531691.stm). Looks like we’d only meet our sis…er, “club who sings the same song” in the final, after they’d beaten Barcelona, Roma and Valencia, say. Marseille will be interesting, since we’ll get a good look at the Peter-Sutcliffe-in-negative lookalike Djibbril Cisse, whom we’re signing in summer for a bajillion euros. Possible semi-final with Newcastle. ---
**Author:** ![London\_Calling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@London\_Calling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/London_Calling)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/39 "2004-03-04T15:45:13Z")
[Vas is das ‘roasting’](http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/l/leicester_city/3532059.stm) - is not in ze trabslation buk, Englanders ? Come what may, I wouldn’t like to have to explain this one to the Misssus when I got home . . . ---
**Author:** ![SentientMeat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SentientMeat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SentientMeat)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2004, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895/40 "2004-03-04T15:46:46Z")
What am I on about? Cisse plays for Auxerre. Never mind. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sdmb-footie-focus-march/231895.md?page=3)