New Everton Stadium

[Achilles Heel]

I don't really understand all this negativity and suspicion around Moshiri. Sure, I am not naive enough to think that he just suddenly fell in love with Everton from his fancy pad in Monaco because Bill told him about the late, great Cannonball Kid, but I also don't think that he arrived here without assessing the potential of Everton, the opportunity at BMD & a clever plan to make it happen.

As Moshiri said publicly, it was the last big PL club available to buy (probably at a reasonable initial investment level.) If he puts this club back on the map where it belongs, encourages further investment from his contacts (Russian friends/Chinese business contacts I don't care) into the club and the wider regeneration of the Docks to the benefit of the city, before selling it on to somebody even wealthier than him, so be it. I am fed up with thrashing around just under the financial glass ceiling, telling people what a mighty club Everton used to be and struggling to get near the 'orrible spoilt, deluded ***** across the park with all their plastic resources.

To be great again we needed to take a chance and this stadium and Moshiri acting as our guarantor on what we need to borrow is our big opportunity. The Kings Dock still hurts but only 2 years ago I was resigned to Walton Hall Park. I could have lived with that (far better than Kirkby) but it does not compare to Liverpool Waters.

30 years of pain has left many of us seeing the Everton glass as always half empty. We have to change that. Whenever I run into those plastic Reds 'daaarrrn saaaarrf' who have never been to Analfield and bang on about Stevie Me, it never fails to amaze me how they always believe they will win, no matter who the opposition is. Be it Chelski, City, ManU, Real Madrid, Barca, Sevilla, us - they do believe. They pull results out of the bag on the back of that belief I am sure. It can't all be a fluke, can it? By contrast, we always enter a big match fearing the worst, frightened of what might happen. As a collective fan base we need to stop this, get behind the club and believe that it is going to happen. I firmly believe good times are ahead - their will be further pain along the way (all clubs do suffer) but I think the sleeping giant is rising again...

 

[Neiler]

Sorry lads not having it, I'm really amazed here, how low our mentality and self esteem has fallen.

I know everyone would consider what makes a big club differently. But Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool and Utd are our peers for me, I know they have had better recent success. I would except Utd are financially a bigger club but the others, no way.

I also consider Chelsea and City smaller clubs, though they are getting there, if not somewhat unromanticaly and because of that they will never hold the prestige of the afore mentioned clubs.

 

[The binman chronicles]

Sorry lads not having it, I'm really amazed here, how low our mentality and self esteem has fallen.

I know everyone would consider what makes a big club differently. But Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool and Utd are our peers for me, I know they have had better recent success. I would except Utd are financially a bigger club but the others, no way.

I also consider Chelsea and City smaller clubs, though they are getting there, if not somewhat unromanticaly and because of that they will never hold the prestige of the afore mentioned clubs.

City and spurs below us, the rest are bigger. Chelsea is the one that causes the most pain, bought their way to the top table! But soon they will have 6 league titles and have more of every other trophy so unfortunately for now they are bigger.

 

[Eggsyblueskin]

Sorry lads not having it, I'm really amazed here, how low our mentality and self esteem has fallen.

I know everyone would consider what makes a big club differently. But Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool and Utd are our peers for me, I know they have had better recent success. I would except Utd are financially a bigger club but the others, no way.

I also consider Chelsea and City smaller clubs, though they are getting there, if not somewhat unromanticaly and because of that they will never hold the prestige of the afore mentioned clubs.

I understand what your saying but let me ask you this, how big a club do Newcastle fans think they are? And how big do you think they are? It's a can of worms this whose clubs bigger thing.

 

[Achilles Heel]

Historically maybe we can mix it with most, but amongst the current media and fans of other clubs, the perception is that all those clubs are bigger, even Spurs and City now. Big players talk in terms of brand and appeal - our biggest at the moment apparently wants to leave - Lukaku because we were always just a stepping stone whilst he established his credentials and the other (Ross) because...well I am not too sure why.

At the moment I don't see any of the top tier players wanting to force their way out of those other clubs, not even Arsenal. We still have a way to go and paying one or both of them the money they can attract at those other clubs, persuading them to stay whilst investing heavily in a few marquee signings, could be the first step towards returning to the big time and changing the general perception of Everton FC.

 

[Neiler]

I understand what your saying but let me ask you this, how big a club do Newcastle fans think they are? And how big do you think they are? It's a can of worms this whose clubs bigger thing.

Not very in my opinion, I think they historically under achieved in accordance to their potential, infrastructure and geographical demographic. I'm sure every club in the country think they are a big club relative to their situation, Pompey thought they were a bigger club then Southampton, I'm sure Southampton now feel they are a bigger club then Pompey.

The clubs I have mentioned including ourselves as peers, have over 100 years consistently been successful at the top end of the game, there are clubs that wax and wain in between, but the historical consistency of those clubs hit key variables for me. I'm really amazed some of our fans don't feel as if Arsenal, Utd, Spurs and Liverpool are our peers, I wouldn't even put City or Chelsea in there.

 

[Achilles Heel]

I certainly do they think they are our peers, but 1 trophy in 30 years compares poorly with most of them.

Years ago a colleague who is a neutral was talking to me about Chelsea and Everton. I said to him that Everton had always been bigger than Chelsea and only Abramovich's dosh had changed their ability to go from being a club that had never really achieved very much at all to regular PL contenders. He replied that whilst he was aware of Everton's pedigree, trophies and fan base, other clubs were far more 'fashionable.'

It struck a chord with me and I reluctantly accepted that he was right, much as it hurt. We were no longer fashionable but football as an industry certainly was. We had not been fashionable for many years. Chelsea, Arsenal have the glitzy capital location. Man U and Liverpool have more league titles and European trophies - worldwide they are more famous unfortunately. We may be in their peer group domestically but if you visit Africa or Asia, most shirts on the population will belong to those clubs that are fashionable. Media coverage particularly the CL creates fashionable brands, esp. if you are competing in it for sustained periods.

There is work to be done to get there but i think Mr. Moshiri has a proper plan for a proper football club. If him and Mr Usmanov are as clever as developments to date suggest, maybe just maybe together they have decided to hedge their bets for success with an established fashionable southern powerhouse (Arsenal) and a rising northern powerhouse that just needed a bit of a helping hand. .

 

[Tramps_mate]

The bubble will burst and soon.

It's already happening. Major cable companies are already struggling with the rights costs of live sports due to cordcutting. As media moves away from the traditional conglomerates, the way live sports are handled will either change drastically or face reduction in revenues, simply because all the people that DON'T care about live sports are currently subsidizing those massive contracts. As those people filter away to an a la carte service model, the media companies will no longer have the user base to afford the current contracts. It'll be a bit before it starts to affect the PL, due to a global fanbase and thus more places to mine for rights money, but it will happen unless the leagues figure out a way to profit outside of the traditional forms of media.

That said, it's a good reason to build now, and 14 million a season should remain sustainable regardless of the bubble unless everything is broken forever and nothing matters anymore.

Premier league only available on Facebook live.....

 

[kenada_blue]

Not PL, of course, but this informs a lot of my thinking generally about Live sports rights.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...e-reportedly-affected/?utm_term=.212822116ed0

This is because ESPN is struggling to maintain profit margin as their rights debts remain static and their revenue decreases due to cable cutting.

This is just the US though! Developing and emerging markets could keep football going strong for a long time, but generally it's due the model of distributing programming expenses across the entire viewing market - which is in danger due to ala carte services.

I wouldn't be surprised seeing Netflix or Amazon buying NFL games in the next ten years.

 

[rochdaleblue]

I understand what your saying but let me ask you this, how big a club do Newcastle fans think they are? And how big do you think they are? It's a can of worms this whose clubs bigger thing.

It's comes back to the old debate what do you consider a big club and how do you measure it?
You do have to look at the clubs standing in the game, support, success.
Newcastle ticks the box when you consider its support, which is second to none. But then you look at the likes of Leeds United who I still class as a big club, produced players like John Charles and great teams of the late 60s and early 70s. Too much focus nowadays is just on the sky era.
We were considered amongst the big 5 in the early 90s, but not anymore by certain sections of the media. We have the support, tradition and soon to be a new waterfront stadium which I feel will have us 'eating at the top table' again.

 

[RaleighBlue]

I wouldn't be surprised seeing Netflix or Amazon buying NFL games in the next ten years.

I could see it too. And I could see them paying extreme rights fees the first time, just to get their subscriber numbers up. But due to spread competition and viewers feeling more entitled to cheaper monthly subscriptions (Netflix would go bust if they tried to charge whatever cable providers charge), I don't see a sustainable model as profitable as the current one. Right now rights fee's get distributed among an absolutely monstrous viewer base, being charged quite a bit per month.

Netflix can only compare on pure subscriber numbers. They still need to pay for the bandwidth (provided by those same cable companies) and keep their prices down or people will jump to Amazon, Hulu, et.al. Cable is struggling and it had a massive cultural cache and headstart to lose - and it's struggling because the model of subsidized programming is flawed in a world of overwhelming available content. Anecdotally, I love Twin Peaks. It's coming back on Showtime, I'll figure out a way to eventually watch it. What I won't do is sign myself up for 12 months of $50/mo subsidizing all the other stuff on cable just to watch that show on first run. More and more people feel that way about it.

Basically, I don't see a world where one company can charge enough to enough people to make up the ridiculous fees that are currently on display. At least not long term.

It costs every viewer like $5 on their cable bill to carry ESPN. It doesn't matter if you watch it. Historically, people have moaned about that, but their hasn't been a way out. If Netflix upped their prices by $5 to start showing NFL games, do you think it would be an overall profitable move for the company? That model is the main reason cable is hemorrhaging viewers and ESPN is struggling - the large share doesn't want to subsidize that programming.

 

[kenada_blue]

I could see it too. And I could see them paying extreme rights fees the first time, just to get their subscriber numbers up. But due to spread competition and viewers feeling more entitled to cheaper monthly subscriptions (Netflix would go bust if they tried to charge whatever cable providers charge), I don't see a sustainable model as profitable as the current one. Right now rights fee's get distributed among an absolutely monstrous viewer base, being charged quite a bit per month.

Netflix can only compare on pure subscriber numbers. They still need to pay for the bandwidth (provided by those same cable companies) and keep their prices down or people will jump to Amazon, Hulu, et.al. Cable is struggling and it had a massive cultural cache and headstart to lose - and it's struggling because the model of subsidized programming is flawed in a world of overwhelming available content. Anecdotally, I love Twin Peaks. It's coming back on Showtime, I'll figure out a way to eventually watch it. What I won't do is sign myself up for 12 months of $50/mo subsidizing all the other stuff on cable just to watch that show on first run. More and more people feel that way about it.

Basically, I don't see a world where one company can charge enough to enough people to make up the ridiculous fees that are currently on display. At least not long term.

It costs every viewer like $5 on their cable bill to carry ESPN. It doesn't matter if you watch it. Historically, people have moaned about that, but their hasn't been a way out. If Netflix upped their prices by $5 to start showing NFL games, do you think it would be an overall profitable move for the company? That model is the main reason cable is hemorrhaging viewers and ESPN is struggling - the large share doesn't want to subsidize that programming.

It's all down to that subscription base that everything revolves around. Netflix hemorrhages money on the content they license, so they're moving away from it (film selection dwindles each year) to pumping more money into original content.

Once that movie/tv subscription hits a plateau (it is) they'll look to other avenues to attract more subscribers. What better way than sports. Netflix loses more money than it makes, but the turn over is huge due to the subscription. They're very much a cable company but slightly unstable as they're not ran by other conglomerates.

Amazon are the same. But due to them having a foundation based away from streaming, they're more stable to attempt to buy sports rights and not have to worry about increasing fees.

Overall, what it will do is keeping the bids going up and up for all concerned.

 

[AsiaAsia82]

Is it built yet?

No!

Typical Everton that

 

[Eggsyblueskin]

It's comes back to the old debate what do you consider a big club and how do you measure it?
You do have to look at the clubs standing in the game, support, success.
Newcastle ticks the box when you consider its support, which is second to none. But then you look at the likes of Leeds United who I still class as a big club, produced players like John Charles and great teams of the late 60s and early 70s. Too much focus nowadays is just on the sky era.
We were considered amongst the big 5 in the early 90s, but not anymore by certain sections of the media. We have the support, tradition and soon to be a new waterfront stadium which I feel will have us 'eating at the top table' again.

I agree with you. However it's interesting you mention Leeds , I personally perceive Leeds as a 'big club ' but not necessarily Newcastle. Now let me explain, both are obviously big clubs in terms of support. But from when I started watching football in the 60s it Leeds who were winning things , or runners up . The only thing I remember Newcastle winning was the fairs cup which hardly registered at the time. All their success was in the past. So my perception of them was as a well supported but lesser club. Even their brief renaisance some years ago failed to shift my perception since it brought them no tangible reward.
That is the danger we are in , as our successes recede further into the past our stature inevitably diminishes. It is why this stadium and the drive it signifies has to succeed, because as time goes on it becomes harder to overcome people's ingrained perceptions and see you ,once again , as a true' big club '.

 

[Onwards Evertonians]

I find it bizarre that anyone sees Leeds as a big club because they've spent forty eight seasons in the lower divisions and they aren't even 100 years old yet. In two years time, if they're not promoted, they'll have spent HALF of their history in the lower divisions, some of that being the third tier. They've had one good era I think. One team cities should be well supported too and they still fall short of ours.

Have a look at some of the teams who've spent more time in the top division than them, it's laughable really.
http://www.myfootballfacts.com/SEASONS-IN-TOP-FLIGHT----1888-89-to-2009-10.html