I am a huge fan of American Football, in fact I would go as far as saying the Superbowl last week between New England Patriots and New York Giants was one of the best finals I’ve ever witnessed. Now the NFL this season had a match between the Miami Dolphins and the New York Giants at Wembley, and next season the San Diego Chargers will play the New Orleans Saints at Wembley. These matches are not friendly matches either, they are an official NFL game just outside of North America.
Today all 20 Premiership clubs agreed a proposed 39 game season which would see games being played overseas, similar to the American Football games played at Wembley. This in my opinion would be wrong, everything about it is wrong – the extra game apparently would be picked at random. So imagine if Manchester United pull out Manchester City or Everton pull out Liverpool or Spurs get Arsenal to play in Saudi Arabia. The great thing about those games just mentioned is the rivalry between two halves of one city, derby matches should ALWAYS be played in the town of the teams.
Imagine a scenario where Wigan gets Reading – with the match being played in New York for example. No disrespect to both teams but how many American supporters will want to see the two teams mentioned? Not many I’d imagine. Also, another potentially problematic scenario is if Manchester United get Derby County in this extra game and Arsenal have to play Chelsea in their extra game. How will that be fair? Say Manchester United win (which no disrespect to Derby, they would) and Arsenal and Chelsea draw 0-0 (which is a likely score line) and Manchester United end up winning the title by two points gained over Arsenal in the extra game. Arsenal will claim this to be unfair, just as Manchester United/Liverpool/Chelsea or any other team would do too.
I do not want to see this happen, but inevitably it will happen – and when it does it will be a sad day for English football.
Today all 20 Premiership clubs agreed a proposed 39 game season which would see games being played overseas, similar to the American Football games played at Wembley. This in my opinion would be wrong, everything about it is wrong – the extra game apparently would be picked at random. So imagine if Manchester United pull out Manchester City or Everton pull out Liverpool or Spurs get Arsenal to play in Saudi Arabia. The great thing about those games just mentioned is the rivalry between two halves of one city, derby matches should ALWAYS be played in the town of the teams.
Imagine a scenario where Wigan gets Reading – with the match being played in New York for example. No disrespect to both teams but how many American supporters will want to see the two teams mentioned? Not many I’d imagine. Also, another potentially problematic scenario is if Manchester United get Derby County in this extra game and Arsenal have to play Chelsea in their extra game. How will that be fair? Say Manchester United win (which no disrespect to Derby, they would) and Arsenal and Chelsea draw 0-0 (which is a likely score line) and Manchester United end up winning the title by two points gained over Arsenal in the extra game. Arsenal will claim this to be unfair, just as Manchester United/Liverpool/Chelsea or any other team would do too.
I do not want to see this happen, but inevitably it will happen – and when it does it will be a sad day for English football.
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