The "39th" game...for the color of money

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/eng_prem/7254528.stm

The drama continues with the proposed "39th" game for the English Premiership, one to be played outside of England. When I first heard this, I said to myself, no surprise - this is all about the money. The powers that be that run the BPL saw the opportunity to stretch their season by one game and to take that game to soccer poor but sponsor money rich places such as Dubai, Los Angles, Hong Kong, and a host of other exotic sites.

I understand that the prem looked at the NFL staging games at Wembley, or the MLB starting their season in Japan.....but these involve 2 teams and are not extra games....and I am not convinced they are worth the travel and perceived heartache it gives the players who have to schlep to these distant sites. That is a far cry from having your entire league dispersed to play one more game to an already overstuffed schedule.

Let's be honest here, outside of seeing Arsenal, Manchester United, Chelsea and Liverpool....who are the other big headliners? Maybe Newcastle...maybe Tottenham....Aston Villa? But do you think the fans in LA are going to turn out to see Middlesbrough v Reading??? Maybe the first year fans will turn out for the novelty of it, but after a while it will grow stale. This reminds me of interleague play in MLB. Baseball did this because they wanted to allow fans to see Mets v Yankees, Angels v Dodgers, or Cubs v White Soxs. And yes the first few seasons there was some interest but now it is just another game on the calendar (outside of those rivalries), but does anyone really think that Red Sox v Phillies is a rivalry game worth more than watching the Red Sox play the Mariners???? Again, these are not ADDITIONAL games, involving abnormal travel. I would also argue, that the US teams are doing so because their game remains a very US centric, while the Premiership and football are global entities already.

The ability to see foreign teams is one of the by products of both European Cups, allowing fans in different nations see foreign clubs come and compete with their domestic teams. European clubs have also taken to scheduling their preseason training in foreign lands to expand their reach. In addition the reach of cable networks, the web and overall sports programming has made game watching accessible to all four corners of the globe. So I can see why the league wants to take advantage of this by staging some actual games in these regions. However I think that the desire to expand the already fat coffers, will reach a tipping point with an expansion of the season and the additional travel. Forcing teams to play an extra match and making that game abroad will become more of a burden than an advantage for the league. There is too much strain on the individual players. There are too many fixtures. Domestic footie is just that...played domestically.

The FA needs to address some bigger issues - the number of matches players log and the growing disparity between haves and have nots.....okay I am not sure it is growing it has been apparent for over a decade!