Can someone explain the Premiere League?

[hrhomer]

I understand that there are 16(?) teams in the English Premiere League. But there are other teams, right? And isn't there an international competition with the winners of each country's League represented, like Arsenal (or whoever) versus the best Italian club versus the best German Club, etcetera?

Basically, I wanna know how the whole thing works.

And while we're at it, how do the World Cup teams get chosen? Do they have a big tournament with EVERY country represented?

Joe

 

[Dell19]

There are 20 teams in the premiership. Pretty much every country has their own domestic leagues that have several levels however the quality varies dramatically. The top three leagues are generally regarded as being the English, Italian and Spanish top leagues although you could include France and Germany. Each domestic competition has several layers so that England has four professional football divisions with promotion and relegation between them. Then there are many semi professional divisions that theoretically extend to sunday league football.

There are then European competitions organised by UEFA (The European Football organisation) such as the UEFA cup and Champions league. Qualification for these competitions is gained by finishing in particular positions in the domestic leagues. Generally the better leagues have more qualification places so that England, Italy and Spain have four qualification places whilst Scotland has one. There is an equivalent competition for South American teams and the winner of the South American cup plays the winner of the Champions League.

International football is split into continental groups and these groups are sub divided based on a provisional ranking. The style varies depending on the continent. South America has one big league with the top five teams potentially qualifying whilst Europe has several groups (around 8) with generally the group winners qualifying automatically and then the runners up playing playoffs to decide who else qualifies. This year the top two runners up qualified automatically.

 

[RickFGS]

www.uefa.com All doubts cleared.

 

[Smokey_Monkey]

Technically every country is in the World Cup (it started in 2004), just not in the finals (the bit that's going on right now).

 

[Marla_Singer]

197 nations have participated to the World Cup qualifying round. That's actually more countries than those being represented at the UN (191 countries in the UN).

Qualifications are played by confederations representing continents :
- UEFA : Europe (including Kazakhstan, Russia, Turkey and Israel)
- CAF : Africa (including Western Indian Ocean islands)
- CONCACAF : North America, Central American and the Carribeans (including Guyana and Suriname).
- CONMEBOL : South America (except Guyana and Suriname).
- AFC : Asia (from Palestine to Indonesia).
- OFC : Oceania (Pacific Islands, Australia and New Zealand).

Each of those confederations have a number of attributed seats, some being disputed in intercontinental playoffs. For the 2006 World Cup, Europe is represented by 14 countries, Africa by 5, Asia by 4, Concacaf by 4, Conmebol by 4 and Oceania by 1.

 

[woodelf]

Very helpful info.

 

[BCLG100]

hrhomer, where are you from if you dont mind me asking?

 

[hrhomer]

hrhomer, where are you from if you dont mind me asking?

USA. I was never a soccer fan at all. Frankly, not much of a sports fan until I hit age 20 or so (I'm now 32). But I am quite enjoying the World Cup matches going on now. I wish American sports had the sort of rabid team loyalty I'm seeing now.

Joe

 

[hrhomer]

197 nations have participated to the World Cup qualifying round. That's actually more countries than those being represented at the UN (191 countries in the UN).

So any country out of those 197 could theoretically participate in the World Cup we're seeing now? That's a lot of competitors

Joe

 

[hrhomer]

There are 20 teams in the premiership. Pretty much every country has their own domestic leagues that have several levels however the quality varies dramatically. The top three leagues are generally regarded as being the English, Italian and Spanish top leagues although you could include France and Germany. Each domestic competition has several layers so that England has four professional football divisions with promotion and relegation between them. Then there are many semi professional divisions that theoretically extend to sunday league football.

So a (relative to the USA) tiny-ass country like England has that many competitive, well-supported-by-fans teams? How far apart, geographically, are the fan bases of some of these teams? I presume there are rival teams with stadiums quite close together...

Joe

 

[kingjoshi]

A while back, I was interested in this and looked it up myself. It's quite different from US systems.

In a few cases you see rabid fan loyalty, but the closest thing in the US would be college football. But you have to grow up in that environment (in Columbus, Ohio, there are only three seasons: training, recruiting and football season, Go Bucks!).

In the professional leagues, there is some resemblence to fan loyalty, but mostly fair weather fans (of which there are plenty in the EPL as well). However, the minor leagues get no notice and there is different interactions between the majors and the minors (compared to EPL and other soccer leagues in the world).

In the MLB, the major league club and minor league (Triple A) affiliations where they can send their players to get better or test them out. The NBA recently bought out the NBDL to try something similar. But it's never had any affiliation with the CBA or other pro basketball leagues (except the merger with the ABA). The NFL is the only league in town (merger with AFL long time ago) and Arena football is completely separate. I don't know much about the NHL with the minor leagues, but nothing like the EPL.

It's completely boggles my mind how one city can hold so many teams in the English leagues. I mean, we're not even talking about all of the UK, just England! Again, in Ohio, we have 11 million people and about 9 million root for the Ohio State Buckeyes in college. Sure, we have some other college teams in the top division (6 others), but we are The Ohio State University for a reason

Yet there is a market for all of those teams in the EPL (it's actually Barclay's league or something). So many suburbs have teams! And the fact teams can get relegated and promoted from one level to another is just wild. For someone who grew up with it, that's normal. But from the American perspective, it's completely foreign!

In the US, that would never happen in any of our current leagues. The MLS itself is radically different in its design. The most popular sport (football) is 'maxed' out at 32 teams and chances of expansion in the future are slim-to-none because none of the owners want to split the revenue. Chances of being relegated would just be unthinkingable.

 

[willemvanoranje]

So a (relative to the USA) tiny-ass country like England has that many competitive, well-supported-by-fans teams? How far apart, geographically, are the fan bases of some of these teams? I presume there are rival teams with stadiums quite close together...

Joe

Just take a look at London. Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspurs, West Ham United, Charlton Athletic, Fulham and Chelsea... all London teams in the Premier league. In the lower professional leagues there is Millwall, Queens Park Rangers, Leyton Orient, Crystal Palace and Brentford and I just might be forgetting one.

Fulham and Chelsea are rivals, and their stadiums are almost right next to each other if I remember correctly.

 

[Lambert Simnel]

So a (relative to the USA) tiny-ass country like England has that many competitive, well-supported-by-fans teams? How far apart, geographically, are the fan bases of some of these teams? I presume there are rival teams with stadiums quite close together...

Joe

The fan bases are intermixed in many cities. Not London so much, where the support tends to be on a geographical basis, however the split of supporters in Liverpool is principally on a religious (protestant vs catholic) basis - the two football grounds are less than a mile apart.

Dundee has the two closest rival home grounds in the world - Tannadice (Dundee United) and Dens Park (Dundee) are only 200 yards apart.

 

[classical_hero]

197 nations have participated to the World Cup qualifying round. That's actually more countries than those being represented at the UN (191 countries in the UN).

Qualifications are played by confederations representing continents :
- UEFA : Europe (including Kazakhstan, Russia, Turkey and Israel)
- CAF : Africa (including Western Indian Ocean islands)
- CONCACAF : North America, Central American and the Carribeans (including Guyana and Suriname).
- CONMEBOL : South America (except Guyana and Suriname).
- AFC : Asia (from Palestine to Indonesia).
- OFC : Oceania (Pacific Islands, Australia and New Zealand).

Umm, Australia is now part of the Asian qualification zone.

 

[willemvanoranje]

Dundee has the two closest rival home grounds in the world - Tannadice (Dundee United) and Dens Park (Dundee) are only 200 yards apart.

Except for the Milan and München derbies for example.. since they play in the same stadium

 

[Rhye]

So a (relative to the USA) tiny-ass country like England has that many competitive, well-supported-by-fans teams? How far apart, geographically, are the fan bases of some of these teams? I presume there are rival teams with stadiums quite close together...

Joe

In Italy as well as England and other European nations, every tiny town has its own team.
Of course at regional/province levels nobody cares except the actual players,
But when you come to national level (that is, the first four divisions) things get serious.
You'll see then every city, either tiny or big, having a large fan support, a part of which are actual hardcore hooligans who can't wait to fight some rival teams ones, and that will follow the team everywhere, to see away games.
Rivalries are spread all across the country and sometimes get some political connotations (some are fascists, some are communists). In lower levels, rivalries are more between close cities or between a big town and the city that owns it in its province.
When your team gets promoted, you'll see your old opponents from above, with huge satisfaction The opposite is true for relegation.


I'm sure that in America this system is potentially possible to create.
When every little town has its own field ("stadium" is too big word) and the leagues are arranged like a christmas tree under the same federation, everything's done. City size will influence the money the team has and the amount of youngsters and this will eventually lead in climbing the ranks.
I guess in other latin America countries it's more or less the same.

 

[Marla_Singer]

Umm, Australia is now part of the Asian qualification zone.

I know that Classical, but I had in mind the 2006 qualification round. There are 203 members of the FIFA, 197 is the number of teams having partticipated to the qualifyers, not the number of teams affiliated to the FIFA. As for 2006 World Cup, Australia qualified through the Oceanian zone, not through AFC.

 

[willemvanoranje]

I'm sure that in America this system is potentially possible to create.
When every little town has its own field ("stadium" is too big word) and the leagues are arranged like a christmas tree under the same federation, everything's done. City size will influence the money the team has and the amount of youngsters and this will eventually lead in climbing the ranks.
I guess in other latin America countries it's more or less the same.

Yes. What the USA needs is promotion/relegation and lower leagues that are not controlled by the teams in the upper league (eg major and minor league).

And about the political connotation.. it is rare. In Holland we don't have it, in Italy it's the communist Livorno and fascist Lazio.. and Rhye should be able to give more details.

 

[Rhye]

As in Britain some teams have religious connotations, here it's politics.
Every team is either aligned to left/right, or it's neutral (but it doesn't always mean that they're kind with rivals, heh)
Lazio and Livorno are just the most common example in the last years because of sad incidents, but I could name a lot of other teams.

Pisa, Ternana, Empoli, Ancona, Modena, Pescara, Genoa are examples of "minor" teams aligned to left
Como, Ascoli, Triestina, Verona, Piacenza, Udinese, Treviso are aligned to right, just to name a few

 

[Marla_Singer]

Yes. What the USA needs is promotion/relegation and lower leagues that are not controlled by the teams in the upper league (eg major and minor league).

I do agree with this. Not only its fairer and make the league keep breathing, but also it creates more suspens and more life to the league.

And about the political connotation.. it is rare. In Holland we don't have it, in Italy it's the communist Livorno and fascist Lazio.. and Rhye should be able to give more details.

We don't have political connotation over here either. There are some in Spain though between Barça and the Real Madrid (Real Madrid was the club of Franco when Barça was the rebel supporting the independence of Catalonia), however, it's not merely about left and right. Independantists are often represented through their teams. That's also the case of the Athletic Bilbao (supporting Basque independence), or in Croatia, it was the case of the Dinamo Zagreb (supporting the Croatian independence) and which became later the Croatia Zagreb IIRC.

As for France, we have teams with solid identities too. There's generally regional opposition between the industrial city club and the traditional bourgeoisie city club. You can see this for instance betweeen Le Havre (an industrial harbour) and Caen (an medieval city) in Normandy, between Metz (a steel industry city) and Nancy (another medieval city) in Lorraine, between Lens (a coal mine city) and Lille (another bourgeoisie city) in Northern France, or between Saint-Etienne (another mine city) and Lyon (the former capital of the Gauls).

Afterwards, you have national rivalries, the most important one in France being between Paris Saint-Germain and the Olympique de Marseille. Paris which dominates the country (18% of French people live in Paris area) and Marseille which represents the regional resistence to Paris hegemony.

By the way, it's interesting to see that Parisian clubs don't succeed to do well in the French league as opposed to the Londoner clubs in England. We have only 1 team for the 10 million people living in the Paris area when London has at least half a dozen in premier league. I don't believe that's at random. In France, it's always very special for a provincial club to beat a Parisian club. It's considered as a kind of revenge from History. It's less true in England, where the domination of London is more assumed by Englishmen.