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News Thread ... 2018-19 Season

andyt said:
Salford City beat Fylde 3-0 for promotion to the Football League for the first time. They’re 60% owned by members of Man U’s Class of 92; Gary and Phil Neville, Nicky Butt, Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes and David Beckham. Giggs promised Championship level football witching 15 years. It took 5 seasons after they took over to get promoted to the League. They were in the 8th tier of the pyramid when they took over and either won their league outright or made the playoffs every season.
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Couple of others of note, at least to me. Leyton Orient earned the automatic promotion back to the Football League from which they were relegated in 2017 after a 112 year run. Lincoln City are promoted to League One just two years after their run to the FA cup quarters as a nonleague side.
 
Villa took the first semifinal in the Championship playoffs in penalties after West Brom eaked out a 1-0 "win" at the Hawthorns. Regular and Extra time ended in a 2-2 aggregate draw. Derby and Leeds will settle the other slot today.
 
Derby advances to the final 4-3 on aggregate. Arlo White is celebrating another Midlands club in the Prem next year.


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andyt said:
Derby advances to the final 4-3 on aggregate. Arlo White is celebrating another Midlands club in the Prem next year.


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Another big comeback on aggregate in what is rapidly become "the English way."
 
Sunderland punched their ticket to the League 1 playoff final with a 1-0 win over Portsmouth. After consecutive relegations, they have a chance to get back to the Championship. They’ll face the winner of Charlton/Doncaster, who play their 2nd leg today with Charlton up 2-1.

Luton and Barnsley got the automatic promotions from League 1.


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Vincent Kompany is leaving Man City. He signed a 3 year contact to be player/manager for Anderlecht, the club he started his career with, coming out of their youth program and making 103 appearances over 3 seasons. Anderlecht finished 4th in the Belgian 1st Division then finished 6th in the championship playoffs and did not qualify for European competition after playing in the Europa League in 2018-19. Anderlecht finished the season with a caretaker manager, having sacked their manager in December and his replacement in April.

https://www.skysports.com/football/...kompany-leaves-manchester-city-after-11-years
 
Brighton have hired Graham Potter as their manager, replacing Chris Hughton. Potter spent the past season at Swansea, his first year managing in England. He had spent the previous 8 seasons at Östersund in Sweden, guiding them from the 4th division to a Europa League place, where they lost to Arsenal in the knockout round in 2017-18. He had over 300 appearances at all levels of English soccer. Brighton will reportedly pay Swansea £3 million for Potter and his backroom staff.


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The 3 playoff finals are this weekend.

Today - League 2
Newport County v. Tranmere Rovers

Tomorrow - League 1
Charlton Athletic v. Sunderland

Monday - Championship
Aston Villa v. Derby County
 
Tranmere and Charlton win their matches.

Today’s Championship Final is worth about £190 million. Huddersfield received about £95 million after finishing DFL in the Prem and the first year parachute payment is about £75 million if they’re relegated after next season.
 
VinatieriDefinesClutch said:
Our long national nightmare is over, ASTON VILLA ARE BACK IN THE PREMIERE LEAGUE!!!!!!!! Eat it haters!!!!
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Welcome back. Hope your stay is another long one, at least as long as the last one.

Now 6 clubs in the Prem with American owners.


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VinatieriDefinesClutch said:
Our long national nightmare is over, ASTON VILLA ARE BACK IN THE PREMIERE LEAGUE!!!!!!!! Eat it haters!!!!
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True this ... although I'm fairly certain that any haters are pretty much located on the blue side of Birmingham.

Interesting to see just how much room to move this will buy them relative to their perilous position with regard to financial fair play regs. They'll get the big promotion windfall and the guaranteed TV cash for next season, but the books are still in fairly bad shape and they've got a LOT of key talent in on loan. Mings (Bournemouth), Abraham (Chelsea ... Championship team of the season) and El Ghazi (Lille) were all bedrock players for Villa. They've got a purchase clause on El Ghazi, and have been reported to have held talks with Chelsea about making Abraham's move permanent but I'm not sure how much free cash they actually have to play with and they'll need to spend another summer fending off offers for Grealish. Plus, that midfield will need upgrading and they need to upgrade at goalkeeper.
 
andyt said:
Welcome back. Hope your stay is another long one, at least as long as the last one.

Now 6 clubs in the Prem with American owners.


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Lerner's gone Anj (thank God) ... new controlling owners are Egyptian.
 
jeffbear said:
Lerner's gone Anj (thank God) ... new controlling owners are Egyptian.
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I stole that from either Arlo White or Men in Blazers. They’re considering Edens an owner.

Nobody has called me Anj in years, it was more acceptable to my family than Andy. Now I’m Andy to everyone but my family.
 
andyt said:
I stole that from either Arlo White or Men in Blazers. They’re considering Edens an owner.

Nobody has called me Anj in years, it was more acceptable to my family than Andy. Now I’m Andy to everyone but my family.
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It's a relic from too many afternoons watching the Andy Griffith Show. I end up calling everybody named Andy, Anj at some point ... like most Southerners of my vintage.

As for Edens, I guess he counts. It's supposedly been the Sawaris family that has actually provided the bulk of the operating cash, while Edens is the minority voice in the partnership they put together to buy the club. But who ever really knows with these things? Dr. Xia is still somehow a minority shareholder (40-ish percent) despite not having participated AT ALL in club operations since Sawaris took over control of the Board. There are rumors that he's banned from the board room, although he's still welcome in the owner's box for games.

Weirdly enough, as a leftover part of Xia's purchase agreement with Randy Lerner, Lerner is due a $30 million payment upon promotion ... supposedly from Xia, but I think it's safe to say he'll be collecting from the new owners since that shady bastage would probably just take out another loan. That's all he was ever good for ... a huge credit limit. Best as I can tell he never was able to get a significant amount of his supposed money out of China.

Note ... I just did a quick Google and apparently Sawaris has bought a controlling interest in Xia's holding company (Recon) that he set up to hold and operate Villa. That means that Xia's connection to the club is now very minor indeed. Sawaris has also positioned himself as sole controlling partner in the company that owns Villa's stadium and training grounds ahead of a potential sale, which is a ploy that several clubs have used to get around Financial Fair Play restrictions on owners simply throwing their own cash at operating losses. Derby's owners bought their stadium last year, and provided the capital to fund their run at promotion. Sounds like high powered financial doings are afoot so that Villa can actually afford a Premiere League roster going forward while they shed some of their dead contract weight.
 
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Sky Italia reports that Maurizio Sarri will be released from his contract at Chelsea so he can take over at Juventus.

How many of Abramowich’s 86 managers have left on their own terms? Is Sarri the first?


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andyt said:
Sky Italia reports that Maurizio Sarri will be released from his contract at Chelsea so he can take over at Juventus.

How many of Abramowich’s 86 managers have left on their own terms? Is Sarri the first?


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And if he is, is it REALLY on his own terms considering the rumors that he was encouraged to go find another situation if he wanted to.
 
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