The new Premier League television deal for international rights comes into force next season, and its bias towards the elite clubs is astonishing, and will have a massive effect on clubs like Newcastle.
The new multi-billion pound agreement, as reported in the Daily Telegraph, will see each top flight team receive a guaranteed amount of not less than the £40.7 million they currently get.
But the rest of the money will be on a sliding scale depending on league position — slanted, naturally, in favour of the already mega-rich elite clubs.
The result being, that the champions are in line to receive around £75m more than the lowest teams.
Newcastle fans can rightly claim that it is a ridiculous scheme, plotted by the ‘big six’ clubs, to make them richer, and reduce the chances of their team ever being able to bridge the growing gap between them.
While some people will say it will give the lower clubs more incentive, it is a defunct argument, as the extra revenue for the top sides will simply mean the playing field is a lot more uneven than it is now.
Leicester won the Premier League a few short years ago, and it has obviously not sat well with the big clubs and the Premier League — how dare they!
It is something clubs like Newcastle are unlikely to emulate, as the top six clubs are ring-fencing future titles for their own monopoly.
Newcastle, with their owner keen to starve everyone associated with the club except his own wallet, will never have the means to match the top six — unless an ambitious mutli-billionaire is reading this and fancies having a go, of course.
It will affect Newcastle in a huge way, with Ashley’s public statement that the club needs to be self-sufficient and can use “every penny generated” to help Rafa Benitez build a squad able to compete.
But how can they do that with this new deal?
The lopsided nature of it means the top clubs can just blow any other club out of the water, when it comes to buying players. They largely able to do that now, so after this deal comes into play, it is hardly worth Newcastle bothering.
Add to that the fact that every club across Europe will add a virtual premium onto players’ price tags for English clubs as a result of the amount included in the deal, and it will be virtually impossible for Newcastle to attract talent.
And how long will it be before the same thing comes into force with the domestic rights?
Once they get the taste of blood into their fangs from this deal, the vampires that are the top six, will ensure they line their own blood-banks in every future deal.
What they are doing, is creating a league within a league, and splitting the top flight into a ‘them and us’ division.
Newcastle’s aspirations of the future will be to become top of the ‘outcast’ league. And where is the excitement in that?
To keep with the analogy, they will suck the very life-force out of the game, which will end up with a few alpha clubs, and a host of empty vessels — but that is probably exactly what the are hoping for.
This deal will kill football for clubs like an Ashley owned Newcastle — and he was doing a pretty good job of that on his own!
What do you think of this new deal, Newcastle fans? Will it put you off following your team in years ahead? Let us know your thoughts…