Apologies in advance for this megapost, but at least I've got it off my chest.
I’ve been trying to understand what’s going on with Big Picture and what the motives and endgame are. As has been said, Liverpool and Manchester United are owned by American sports conglomerates (as is Arsenal, but none of the other EPL clubs are). The model for top-level sports ownership and competitive organisation is fundamentally different in North America from the rest of the world.
Even the sports themselves are different. As team sports, Americans play baseball and their version of football. The rest of the world is mad on our football and in some parts rugby or cricket.
Team sport in our country and most of the rest of the world is organised on a league basis with each team playing the other home and away. The champions are usually the team finishing top at the end of the season. There is usually a pyramid with promotion and relegation. There are usually multiple competitions, e.g. FA Cup, Copa del Rey, T20 Blast etc. Knockout competitions, for example, give each team extra chances of success and enable smaller teams to pit themselves against the top clubs.
In North America, the franchise system operates a closed shop involving a small number of teams who may play each other several times in a season and may not even play the same number of games. A “games better” system decides which teams in each league/division/conference qualify for the play-offs, which can continue the season for several weeks, ending with the Super Bowl or the World Series. A high proportion of teams qualify for the play-offs and of course there is no fear of relegation. Therefore, many if not most matches are meaningless. Each sport has only one competition and lower league clubs don’t get a look in.
It may be no co-incidence that two American-owned clubs are proposing this change. Ultimately, we could end up with the North American model of a closed shop of the biggest clubs, a single completion with each club playing the other several times in a season. It looks like none of the big clubs would be able to be relegated and they are already proposing to drop the EFL Cup. Will the FA Cup be next?
The effect would be disastrous for the lower clubs in terms of aspiration and would be boring even for the fans of the big clubs.
The only thing about our model they would be keen to retain would be European competition. A big benefit of keeping the Big Six at the top of the EPL is the perpetual guarantee of Champions League and Europa League income.
So, in summary, it’s worth bribing the smaller clubs while they are at their weakest. Fortunately, the FA and the EPL management have seen through the proposal. My fear is that many EFL clubs will see this as both a lifeline and a long-term guarantee of stability. However, given that there are no long-term guarantees and the Big Six can vote through any changes they wish, this may prove to be only a short-term benefit.
My fear is that the only sure way to defeat this proposal is for someone to come up with an alternative proposal. Fortunately, the government is threatening to step in. I have been impressed with what Oliver Dowden has been saying. He seems to understand. Maybe he and Mark Palios ought to get together to cook up a better way for football to be governed.