Post by sahahaha on Jun 6, 2006 17:10:09 GMT
Something needs to be done. They are ruining OUR sport!
Karl-Heinz Rummenigge - Byern munich president, member of the G 14 and avid Chelsea hater!
Rummenigge snorts when asked to relive the moment he knew for certain that Ballack would leave Bayern for Chelsea. "To tell you the truth no one informed us officially. Not Ballack. Not Peter Kenyon. At the end of April Peter sent me a fax but, by then, the story was well known on the street. I know Peter Kenyon but for what reason does Ballack behave like this? You saw the consequence. Bayern's goodbye to Ballack was not very happy because he avoided saying the truth. When I left Bayern for Italy I was open with the club. I met with the fans and offered them beer and bratwurst and the goodbye was fantastic. And that's why, when I came back, I was welcomed. That won't happen for Michael."
His disdain for Abramovich and Chelsea, however, is even more scathing. "Chelsea have shown that football is no longer rational. Bayern had a profit last year of €35m (24m). Chelsea had a loss of €204m (£140m). We would be bankrupt if that happened - but nothing happens to Chelsea. They just spend another £100m on new players. It is legal, what they are doing, but only from Chelsea's point of view. For the rest of us it is not acceptable or fair."
As an increasingly vocal representative of the G-14 elite of European clubs - which excludes Chelsea - Rummenigge fears that the Champions League could eventually become as much of a procession as the Premiership. "The feeling of people who love football is that Chelsea go against everything we believe in. I understand why there is such negative feeling towards Chelsea in England. We feel it too. And of course if this continues Abramovich will win the Champions League. But what will it mean?"
With their magnificent record, having won Europe's premier club competition on four occasions and losing three additional finals, Bayern loathe being swamped by Chelsea. Rummenigge, who played his part in Bayern's three consecutive European Cup victories in the mid-70s, argues that "while we might keep on winning the Bundesliga and the German cup it is not enough. We still dream of European glory - our fans expect it - but it becomes more impractical every year. We are not the only big club to feel this way and so I have asked Uefa to find a way to make football fair again."
Bayern's own reputation, as Germany's least loved and most oppressively powerful club, lends his words a certain irony. But Rummenigge is right to point out that there is still a belief in Germany that football "belongs to the people". And so Bayern are compelled to share German television income more fairly with other Bundesliga clubs than is the case for either their English or Spanish counterparts. The refusal of German fans to pay the same kind of cash for televised football or season tickets, which only cost £82 at Bayern, also means that the Bundesliga lags behind the Premiership and La Liga.
In an effort to rein in his continental rivals, Rummenigge is "a great believer in the salary cap. I'm not saying give Mr Ballack less than he will be getting at Chelsea. But, to make it more fair, Chelsea would have to adjust their payments to other squad members. I really don't believe any club should be allowed to spend more than 50% of its income on salaries. If you spend more than 56% of your income on salaries you end up in the red. Eighty-five per cent of clubs in Europe are losing money but only one of them has a Mr Abramovich. That can't be allowed to go on. We have to find a time-frame to honour existing contracts, but by 2010 no club should be allowed to spend more than 50% of its footballing income on wages. Some members of the G14 are in favour and others are not. But it's in Uefa's interests and there is a growing feeling for a salary cap because football is a runaway car and somebody has to dive inside and stop it. Until Abramovich, we were becoming a little more rational regarding salaries and transfers. But Chelsea have buried the market. You could see Abramovich was willing to pay anything to get [Andriy] Shevchenko."
Rummenigge is almost as blunt when turning his ire on Fifa's "exploitation" of club players at the World Cup. "Fifa's behaviour is unacceptable. They expect to make a profit of €700m (£483m) from the tournament, which is incredible. I don't have problems with people making profit but I can't have a situation where we give up our players for nearly two months, paying them totally, and in exchange we get nothing. The best case is that you take them back tired. In the worst case they came back injured. That's why we now have some legal cases against Fifa and I think the courts will persuade them to pay the clubs compensation. I always say the same thing to Blatter: 'please follow your own words, Sepp, the words that are there in your office - 'Fair Play'."
Rummenigge pauses to take a breath and then folds his arms in happy defiance. "So," he says, "now you know. We won't just give up. We will keep fighting for the good of football."
I love this guy, and it's great to see members of G 14 speaking out on the situation with Chelsea. They will ruin the game we love eventually. With the money they're spending the Premier league will become as pre-determined as the SPL used to be. Players wont want to stay in a league they can't win.
Karl-Heinz Rummenigge - Byern munich president, member of the G 14 and avid Chelsea hater!
Rummenigge snorts when asked to relive the moment he knew for certain that Ballack would leave Bayern for Chelsea. "To tell you the truth no one informed us officially. Not Ballack. Not Peter Kenyon. At the end of April Peter sent me a fax but, by then, the story was well known on the street. I know Peter Kenyon but for what reason does Ballack behave like this? You saw the consequence. Bayern's goodbye to Ballack was not very happy because he avoided saying the truth. When I left Bayern for Italy I was open with the club. I met with the fans and offered them beer and bratwurst and the goodbye was fantastic. And that's why, when I came back, I was welcomed. That won't happen for Michael."
His disdain for Abramovich and Chelsea, however, is even more scathing. "Chelsea have shown that football is no longer rational. Bayern had a profit last year of €35m (24m). Chelsea had a loss of €204m (£140m). We would be bankrupt if that happened - but nothing happens to Chelsea. They just spend another £100m on new players. It is legal, what they are doing, but only from Chelsea's point of view. For the rest of us it is not acceptable or fair."
As an increasingly vocal representative of the G-14 elite of European clubs - which excludes Chelsea - Rummenigge fears that the Champions League could eventually become as much of a procession as the Premiership. "The feeling of people who love football is that Chelsea go against everything we believe in. I understand why there is such negative feeling towards Chelsea in England. We feel it too. And of course if this continues Abramovich will win the Champions League. But what will it mean?"
With their magnificent record, having won Europe's premier club competition on four occasions and losing three additional finals, Bayern loathe being swamped by Chelsea. Rummenigge, who played his part in Bayern's three consecutive European Cup victories in the mid-70s, argues that "while we might keep on winning the Bundesliga and the German cup it is not enough. We still dream of European glory - our fans expect it - but it becomes more impractical every year. We are not the only big club to feel this way and so I have asked Uefa to find a way to make football fair again."
Bayern's own reputation, as Germany's least loved and most oppressively powerful club, lends his words a certain irony. But Rummenigge is right to point out that there is still a belief in Germany that football "belongs to the people". And so Bayern are compelled to share German television income more fairly with other Bundesliga clubs than is the case for either their English or Spanish counterparts. The refusal of German fans to pay the same kind of cash for televised football or season tickets, which only cost £82 at Bayern, also means that the Bundesliga lags behind the Premiership and La Liga.
In an effort to rein in his continental rivals, Rummenigge is "a great believer in the salary cap. I'm not saying give Mr Ballack less than he will be getting at Chelsea. But, to make it more fair, Chelsea would have to adjust their payments to other squad members. I really don't believe any club should be allowed to spend more than 50% of its income on salaries. If you spend more than 56% of your income on salaries you end up in the red. Eighty-five per cent of clubs in Europe are losing money but only one of them has a Mr Abramovich. That can't be allowed to go on. We have to find a time-frame to honour existing contracts, but by 2010 no club should be allowed to spend more than 50% of its footballing income on wages. Some members of the G14 are in favour and others are not. But it's in Uefa's interests and there is a growing feeling for a salary cap because football is a runaway car and somebody has to dive inside and stop it. Until Abramovich, we were becoming a little more rational regarding salaries and transfers. But Chelsea have buried the market. You could see Abramovich was willing to pay anything to get [Andriy] Shevchenko."
Rummenigge is almost as blunt when turning his ire on Fifa's "exploitation" of club players at the World Cup. "Fifa's behaviour is unacceptable. They expect to make a profit of €700m (£483m) from the tournament, which is incredible. I don't have problems with people making profit but I can't have a situation where we give up our players for nearly two months, paying them totally, and in exchange we get nothing. The best case is that you take them back tired. In the worst case they came back injured. That's why we now have some legal cases against Fifa and I think the courts will persuade them to pay the clubs compensation. I always say the same thing to Blatter: 'please follow your own words, Sepp, the words that are there in your office - 'Fair Play'."
Rummenigge pauses to take a breath and then folds his arms in happy defiance. "So," he says, "now you know. We won't just give up. We will keep fighting for the good of football."
I love this guy, and it's great to see members of G 14 speaking out on the situation with Chelsea. They will ruin the game we love eventually. With the money they're spending the Premier league will become as pre-determined as the SPL used to be. Players wont want to stay in a league they can't win.
We will have to see who we sign before we will know if we can match their first 11!
