Best run clubs in Europe?

Plus they reguarly make cl. It's bizarre.

Is it to do with the new stadiums? That's the only one I can think of.

The Dragao
José Alvalade (plus the surrounding complex)
The original Emirates

Did the clubs have to play for all of those themselves?

I suspect not, because these were all done in time for Euro 2004, they must've got some help for the cost. Besides, even the combined cost of the 3 stadia is below €400mil.

Palermo...although their manager situation is dodgy. Saying that, it all is in Italy.

They seem to sell some of their best players for big prices, bring in just as good players for less...and still do well.

In contrast to Sampdoria, who are rich, sell all their best players and spend nothing.

The clubs had to pay most of the stadium (only about 20% was offered to them for the Euro) so they have to pay the banks for many years.

As for porto. Well we do play regulary in CL but make no mistake, we earn much less than the big 4 leagues as the amount is not given in the same porpotions, far from it.

As an example, United earned more in 2004 for losing in 1/8 finals than Porto for winning it. The system of revenues in CL is completly unfair and makes almost impossible for clubs outside the big leagues to give a fair fight.

So the porto solution was this: Buy cheap, sell high. Spend more than you can as the size of your domestic market it is not enough to face the big rich sharks. Porto have done this and while beeing competitive to a certain degree in europe that means he still have to balance the debts and pay the stadium at the same time(ours was the most expensive and the city administration didn´t help much unlike our rivals). Maximize the scouting, use the CL as a "prime shop" for selling star players as it proves the quality.

Things have worked pretty well so far and while we do have debt(less than our rivals but yes we do have it) in sporting terms we have been victorious domesticly and every 15/20 years we win something in Europe

toon h wrote:not sure why people aren't mentioning Barcelona.

Because only c*nts nominate themselves!

owned by 160,000 socios

And yet your stadium is always empty.

we've made a profit during the Laporta years (apparently) of about 100M.

But you had to sell a piece of land just last month in order to balance the books for the 08/09 season...a season where, among other things, you got 50m euro for winning the CL!

we probably have the finest youth scouting and academy in the world, judging from our cantera.

Only in the last couple of years...before that it was Trashorrases and Fabio Rochembacks!

we play with a (generally seen to be) attractive style

Ok.

we don't prostitute our shirt but instead pay Unicef as a matter of social conscience

But before that Laporta was on the verge of signing on with ladbrokes except they pulled out of the deal.

no extremist fans allowed in the stadium

But you let them hang out around the stadium.

and last but not least, one of the most, if not most, successful club team this century.

The century is only 9 years old! And in those nine years we won the CL twice and so has Milan, same as you. And we've won the league 4 times and you've only won it 3 times. So definitely not the most successful.

Sounds like dick-envy, Jaime.

Effenberg wrote:Sounds like dick-envy, Jaime.

Or the truth....

Hope you keep Ribery.

Super Percentage Football wrote:

Everton from England is an obvious one.

No, it's not. We are TOP 6 club in Premiership for last 3 years, we have a decent attendance at Goodison and still we have an empty transfer kitty for 2nd year in row, so the only way for us to get a player, is to get him on free or cheap (like Saha) or fund it with players sold (AJ and McFadden departures made Fellaini's arrival possible) or just take another loan from the bank (like 2 summers ago when we bought Jagielka, Baines and Yakubu - probably "Rooney" money were used there too).

What we have is a very good manager, who knows how to hide our club weaknesses, and most of the times is right with his transfer decisions, with some of his moves proving to be a great steals (Cahill and Arteta in the past, Jagielka and Pienaar in recent years).