success the worst thing for small clubs?

pickarooney

When you look at the success stories of the smaller European clubs, it seems obvious that winning is not always a good thing when you're not one of the big guns.
Teams such as Red Star, Ajax, FC Porto and PSV Eindhoven have all managed to progress to the latter stages of the Champions League in the last 15 or so years, but at what cost?
No sooner does a minnow make it to or near the final than their entire team gets stripped, often for very little compensation.
Added to this the fact that success in the Champions League does not always equate to a massive windfall (e.g. Porto earning less from the CL than beaten quarter-finalists Real Madrid), winning a competition after coming from nowhere seems to have more downsides than advantages. It's next to impossible to keep a player once a cash-laden big club comes a-knocking, and once the player has decided to up sticks, the buying club can usually get them for a song.
Red Star produced a fantastic set of players to win the European Cup, whereupon the entire squad was disassembled and headed westwards, for a fairly poor cash return and the team faded into oblivion. Ajax, as many times before in the past assembled an amazing collection of young talents and won the CL playing fantastic football. A season later they were back trawling the lower divisions to replace the departed legion.
Porto lost the bulk of their defence, two midfielders and the best manager they're ever likely to have after winning, only to lose thir grip on the Superliga and fail miserably in Europe the next year.
PSV, though they 'only' reached the semis have said goodbye to their captain and midfield fulcrum, van Bommel, both Koreans Lee and Park, their brightest attacking prospect (as happens every season) Vonlanten, and in all likelihood both central defenders Alex and Ooijer, and Vogel, with the departures of netminder Gomes and manager Hiddink also looking to be on the cards.
With the cash they received, they'll be lucky to find adequate replacements for two of the above. The slight consolation that their traditional rivals Ajax and Feyenoord have both been pillaged and owefully mismanaged of late may make the task of defending the domestic title somewhat more achieavable, but in all honesty it'll be a decade before they challenge in Europe again.

Are there and fans of small teams* that have punched above their weight only to be left winded and dazed once their stars have had their heads turned? Is it an acceptable trade - a night of glory, a year as top dogs and an untarnishable memory for the guts of a squad and a return to square one?
How much is a CL win worth to you? Would you gladly agree to give away every last one of your current journeyman loafers in exchange for a last season of collective magic from them? Is (another) ten years of mid-table obscurity** a fair swap for a bite of the European cherry, or would you prefer a slow-burning success, rising a league position per year, or going one round further in Europe, while replacing one or two players a season?

As a fan of one of Europe's élite (Juventus), I can't really complain about the way this sort of thing inevitably transpires, though I can't help feeling a little guilty when my club snaps up a small team's best players, and often discards them after a year of sporadic substitute appearances. On the other hand, it's terrible to see the same thing happen year after year to the likes of PSV.


*does not include Liverpool. No, seriously.
**may include Everton. Sorry.

PHB

Yep, but at the same time, its how football works.
Its how the elite clubs stay the elite clubs.
Hence why people want stuff like transfer caps and wage caps and trading systems brought into play.

MooShop

if you support small teams then you'll want a slow rise in success so that when it comes, your club could be in a better position to keep players or get a good price for them so you can adequately replace them. but more often thn not people want the fast route to success which will ultimately lead to their downfall i.e. Leeds United

vorbis

eh didn't porto make quite a bit of money from selling Deco, ferriera and carvlaho? I'd be blaming the current manager for their failure to be competivie last season, it certainly wasn't finances.

pickarooney

True, they must have got close to 50 million for those three, and something like 20 for Maniche (how the hell could a Russian club afford that for one player?). Have they been able to spend that cash though, luring players to the Portuguese league? I admit I know very little about the league and who has replaced these players last year.

MooShop

pickarooney wrote:

True, they must have got close to 50 million for those three, and something like 20 for Maniche (how the hell could a Russian club afford that for one player?). Have they been able to spend that cash though, luring players to the Portuguese league? I admit I know very little about the league and who has replaced these players last year.

i agree its more to do with the league most of the teams mentioned are the likes of Porto, Ajax and PSV all from lesser leagues so its hard to attract quality players and to keep players that have caught the eye of teams from bigger leagues, quality players want to play for the best teams in the best leagues thats just the way football is

evilhomer

pickarooney wrote:

how the hell could a Russian club afford that for one player?

Abramovich isn't the only Russian billionaire interested in football.

but there is also talk that Abramovich is using russian clubs as a proxy to bring players to Chelsea, so he can get them cheaper. He hasn't brought in a single player from russia yet but I would bet against it happening soon enough.

Big Ears

Jarosik was at CSKA .

evilhomer

Oh yeah, forgot about him.

But he wasn't bought in from a big club then shipped off to chelsea the next season.
Was He?(I could be wrong)

Jivin Turkey

But its a vicious circle, and the way football (or any other industry) is, people have ambition, and they want to further that.

PSV/Porto etc may have some of their players picked up by Europes elite clubs following successful seasons, but invariably these players have been plucked from the smaller clubs in their league and so forth.

In the case of the PSV exodus both Van Bommel and Vogel have been there since 1999. Both are at the peak of their careers and feel now is the time to make the step up. Its only natural.

The same goes for Porto. Deco and Carvalho were both their for years and were at the stage of the career where they wanted to move up. Porto were paid a kings ransom for these players, as they were for Maniche and Ferreira. And sure all the players here had dominated their own league, and hardly did too bad in Europe for years. There was no challenge for them remaining there.

As regards Red Star I think the Balkan war was probably the most influential factor on the demise of them and the Yugoslav national team in general. Back in the nineties there were Yugoslavs littered around all the top European clubs, nowadays I cant actually think of a single player on the team, same goes for Croatia. Corruption is also rife in that league (I would imagine), and I reckon there are deals where agents/club officials are coming out far better than the club themselves (Bosko Balaban?).

So in summary, this thing is going to happen, smaller leagues that produce sackfuls of quality players (Holland/Portugal/France) will not be able to compete (in competitive terms) with the bigger ones (England/Italy/Spain) who will just pillage their players. Players want the best for themselves like in any job and will want to move. The only way around this is building a team loyal to the jersey, the best example of this is the great Ajax teams over the years whom were bred through the youth system and felt like they were completely part of Ajax. They still however all ended up moving on though after years of success domestically and in Europe.

redspider

Yes, there are sometimes specific reasons for the demise of a team, like Red Star Belgrade.

In terms of Ajax, and teams around that time, a huge factor was the Bosman ruling. This allowed many players who only had a few months or a year left on their contracts to jump ship, make **** loads of money in the process and leave the club without gaining anything from the sale of their "assets". Ajax were caught out badly on the hop as many of their players, such as Kluivert, had short terms left on their contracts. Money hasnt helped him improve his career since, btw, as his form has been chequered to say the least, yet he is very wealthy.

By the way, Ajax were a power house in the 1970's, as they won it 3 times in a row and were wealthy for their day, so are not really a minnow per se. They got hit with another wave of player power, as Cruijff and Neeskens left for Barcelona, so starting the Dutch link with Barca, again for a **** load of money. Ajax have never forgiven Cruijff as the story goes that he was going to sign a new contract with "his heart and soul club" Ajax, only for him to become a mercenary and head to the hills. Some of this acrimony was a factor of the 1974 Dutch team who lost to Germany, more through lack of team spirit than through anything else, they were clearly the better team in terms of footballing skills, and that lack of team spirit and player power has dogged the Dutch football scene ever since, well, apart from 1988!

Redspider

pickarooney

redspider wrote:

Some of this acrimony was a factor of the 1974 Dutch team who lost to Germany, more through lack of team spirit than through anything else, they were clearly the better team in terms of footballing skills, and that lack of team spirit and player power has dogged the Dutch football scene ever since, well, apart from 1988!

Redspider

Meh, they're like that even at Sunday League level

Slash/ED

If you ask those fans what they would prefer I'd say they wouldn't trade their success for anything.

That's why I think, though not many agree, for all the madness of the Leeds situation, as far as fan enjoyment is concerned, making two european semis, being genuine title contenders and then getting relegated for me beats the hell out of finishing somewhere between 15th and 7th each and every season. Would Porto trade their european double for anything? Very unlikely, even if it means sacraficing prolonged success domestically.

KdjaCL

Smaller clubs?


LOL from what point of view, consistently rebuidling their squads time after time and gaining futher success.

Ajax for instence are a selling club always have been train young players and sell them on , PSV also Porto not far behind just sell less and import more. But they always rebuild usually takes 4 to 5 years or so.
If it wasnt for "smaller" clubs there wouldnt be big clubs


kdjac

andyman

Have to agree with kdjac on that one

Pigman II

Lets face it , practically every club in European football is aso called smaller club.

To see what I mean, if theres another club out there who have enough cash and prestige to cherrypick whoever they like off your team then your team falls into this category.

I'd say probably RealMadrid/AC Milan/ManU are the only exceptions to this rule. It's the way of the game.

evilhomer

Pigman II wrote:

I'd say probably RealMadrid/AC Milan/ManU are the only exceptions to this rule. It's the way of the game.

Chelsea, Barcelona, Inter Milan, Juventus? are they not big clubs?

PHB

Real Madrid
Barca
Juve
AC Milan
Man U

Are the only clubs in the world atm, who can afford to keep every single one of their players, and have all their players want to play for that team.
When was the last time a player from these clubs said they wanted to play somewhere else, without the club urging them to do so.
Inter are up there, but a lot of their talent gets picked away, Ronaldo being an example.
Arsenal same, but Vieira for example.
Chelsea maybe, in time, but don't have the stability, or percieved stability yet.

PiE

KdjaC wrote:

Ajax for instence are a selling club always have been train young players and sell them on , PSV also Porto not far behind just sell less and import more. But they always rebuild usually takes 4 to 5 years or so.
If it wasnt for "smaller" clubs there wouldnt be big clubs

I can't imagine that they're "selling clubs" by choice. If they could hang on to their best players, they would.

Slash/ED

PHB wrote:

Real Madrid
Barca
Juve
AC Milan
Man U

Are the only clubs in the world atm, who can afford to keep every single one of their players, and have all their players want to play for that team.
When was the last time a player from these clubs said they wanted to play somewhere else, without the club urging them to do so.
Inter are up there, but a lot of their talent gets picked away, Ronaldo being an example.
Arsenal same, but Vieira for example.
Chelsea maybe, in time, but don't have the stability, or percieved stability yet.

Man U is debatable, look at the Rio Ferdinand situation. Atm you have to put Chelsea on that list.

MooShop

PHB wrote:

Chelsea don't have the stability, or percieved stability yet.

thats why chelsea aren't on the list

pickarooney

Even Barcelona, Juventus and Inter had to let Figo, Zidane and Ronaldo go, albeit a few years back, so the list is very short. Of course tens of millions of euros for a bunch of has-beens is good business sense in any case.

PHB

Indeed, there is no top list.
IMO, I think the top of the list will be Real Madrid for a long time.
They will always be able to attract the biggest talent with the most money. Chelsea might have a billionaire, but Real Madrid have the nation of Spain behind them, willing to finance their goals, which no one person can compete with.

The rio situation. What do you mean exactly? The fact that he has two years left on his contract and that he wants 20 k more, United aren't willing to give it, and that he inturn has started to look elsewhere. Its not due to the fact that United can't give it either, as Keano is on 10k below thats, its that they don't value him as highly as he does. Nothing to do with money or prestige.

Chelsea don't have the ability to attract big name talent yet.
Who have they signed this summer, except for up and comign youth players.
They must have made a bid for every top level striker in the world, and gotten turned down. Also they've tried to sign the best youth players, i.e. Robinho and Gilardino, and gotten turned down.
They resorted to recalling Crespo from loan, and he doesn't even want to be there.
Why this is the case, I'm not sure. They have future success and a great team, maybe its cause they are an English club, but I think its more to do with the fact they are so new to the scene, and aren't even in the G14 or whatever number it is.

KdjaCL

PHB wrote:

Real Madrid
Barca
Juve
AC Milan
Man U

Are the only clubs in the world atm, who can afford to keep every single one of their players,

Makele
Ronaldo/Rivaldo
Zidane
Shevchenko
Beckham

Every player has a price usually called a buy out clause, every club needs/wants money.

kdjac

PHB

Makele(Real didn't want to pay him enough, and he left. He would have stayed if they were willing to pay him properly)
Ronaldo/Rivaldo(long time ago)
Zidane(got 42 million for a player who was just past his peak. They could have kept him if they wanted, but decided to sell)
Shevchenko(:))
Beckham (Was sold after a bust up with Fergie)

Zaph

Slash/ED wrote:

If you ask those fans what they would prefer I'd say they wouldn't trade their success for anything.

That's why I think, though not many agree, for all the madness of the Leeds situation, as far as fan enjoyment is concerned, making two european semis, being genuine title contenders and then getting relegated for me beats the hell out of finishing somewhere between 15th and 7th each and every season. Would Porto trade their european double for anything? Very unlikely, even if it means sacraficing prolonged success domestically.

As a Leeds fan I have to agree that the two seasons of European runs and doing well in the league were amazing, but I'd quite happily trade them for a financially stable club wallowing in Premiership mid-table obscurity right now. Maybe if they'd actually won either European competition I'd have to think twice about that, but certainly at this stage it's a no brainer. There's absolutely no fan enjoyment in seeing your club bankrupted through financial ineptness and then being relegated.

KdjaCL

Dunno about that would agree with Slash, would prefer to have something to play for whether it be champions or place in league. Mid table obscurity sucks after 15 games your season is over.


Thankfully our horrendous cup record keeps me going till august or so. If it wasnt for that jesus the season would suck.

Buty i say that as not being relegated


kdjac

Zaph

I agree that as a fan mid-table can be frustrating and not very exciting, but it's acceptable if the alternative is bankruptcy, relegation and losing almost your entire squad. Fortunately this has only happened once. Unfortunately it happened to my team.