30 Jun 2017 09:06:21
When the cost of replica shirts hits £200, a season ticket exceeds £2000 and your sports TV channels cost £100 a month, I just want everyone to remember this window where they demanded their football clubs become completely unsustainable and pay ridiculous fees and wages on players, because 'it wasn't their money'. Not just LFC fans, but Premier League fans.

I actually worry about football. It's going too far. When the bubble bursts, only the top clubs who get their pan break away league move, and the sensible clubs who spent within their means will survive. We better hope we are in one of those categories when the time comes because we are not right now.

I do not begrudge anyone an opinion, but any of you demanding we spend £70m on this or that player, have no rights to complain when your match day cost goes up. You want Liverpool to spend more, then be prepared to pay more in one way or another. If you fail to understand that blatant correlation, then I fear for you.

1.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 09:18:25
Agree. When I saw the length of the post and heard the tone of the message, I knew it was you MK.

2.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 09:22:22
I'm not sure what you want from fans MK? Do you want us all to criticise the club for spending money and prefer us to opt out of signing players and slide down the league on principle?

Ideally I'd love a global cap on income and costs in football, because things are ludicrous, but it won't happen. Unless of course the whole thing collapses in on itself and high profile clubs start going under. But considering the biggest football clubs in England and Europe basically demonstrated themselves to be recession proof, I don't think that'll happen either.

3.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 09:26:49
Adam, I fear you may have missed the point.

I believe that the majority of the posters here are not "demanding" we pay £70m for a player.

The majority of the posters here, and fans in general, want their team to buy players that will improve the first 11 and the squad.

Whether that player ends up costing £7m or £70m essentially comes down to the two teams negotiating over him.

I, and I believe most fans, would fully trust the administrators and negotiators at the club not to stretch the finances beyond our means. let's not forget that FSG saved us from going into administration in the first place, so I very much doubt they would themselves push us back to the brink by overspending a la Leeds and Portsmouth in the last 10-15 seasons.

Just like you, I do not begrudge anyone an opinion. But my opinion is that those demanding we DO sign a £70m player, and those demanding we DON'T sign a £70m player are both equally wrong.

We should be debating and demanding the RIGHT players to improve our chances of success, irregardless of what they cost. The cost is just an arbitrary (albeit increasingly obscene) number negotiated by two parties (well three parties if you include the agent! ) .

4.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 09:35:54
I think MK is pointing out that the fans who actually go to matches and provide the atmosphere are being priced out of the game, these are the true core of a club. When the football manager generation start calling for £70 mill transfers they fundamentally misunderstand the full nature of football and the consequences of a club when it loses touch with its grass roots.

5.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 10:35:34
I strongly disagree with your post HBR. I come from a long generation of scousers but I now live in the south. That doesn't mean I am any less of a fan than the tourists who come over and pay extortionate fees for a ticket yet probably couldn't name our previous 5 managers. Anyone who buys a shirt or in some way puts money into lfc has as much right as any fan who buys a ticket.

6.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 10:38:39
Maybe a club salary cap similar to what exists in the NHL would help. It would need to be a bit more stringent and also attempt to be a bit more level but since you can't cap players salary then enforcing a cap on how much clubs can spend on salaries would be the next best alternative.

It would also need to avoid the trap of the cap being x% of the club turnover as that simply shifts the problem and doesn't solve it.

7.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 10:49:06
Exactly HBR, spot on. I have nothing else to say on the matter. It is the working class fan who will pay the price in the long run though.

8.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 11:00:14
Stuie I don't think that is what HBR meant. Fans are the lifeblood though and fans of all kinds are being priced out, but especially the people who provide the atmosphere in the stadium.

9.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 11:59:52
If that's the case then fair enough, I may have misunderstood his but that's how I read it.

10.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 12:13:34
I suppose I'm an idealist who's out of touch with modern football, for me it was about players, fans and managers all pulling in the same direction, now money and merchandising are separating the clubs and fracturing the identities, its definitely not the same as it was at anfield and in my eyes that is more important to results than Van Dijk or Keita will be.

11.) 30 Jun 2017
30 Jun 2017 18:46:55
The money spent on tickets and merchandise would no where near cover the price of one high level player? Seriously how do you think the club earns money just from ticket sales and merchandise? No, it's all commercial revenue ticket sales are what 20m a year?

As for the fact your saying TV prices will go up, Sky are in fact REDUCING the price it costs people to watch Sky Sports by separating the channels by sports and you pay for the sport you want to see. As well there are LESS people paying for sky sports yet the new deal for PL is 4x that of before.

How is that if less people are paying? That's because the money comes from commercial revenue not fans pockets. I assume clubs could make tickets free and it wouldn't really effect revenue, its all about getting fans eyes on advertisements, that's where the money comes from. Just relax, if the club can't afford the 70m they wouldn't pay it.