'Copa Argentina' announced.

[Athe~]

AFA President Julio Humberto Grondona has revealed yesterday that, as of August this year, there will be a knockout competition using a concept similar to the FA Cup. Teams from Primera División (First tier), Nacional B (Second tier), Primera B Metropolitana (Regionalised third tier), Primera C (Regionalised fourth tier), Argentino A (Regionalised third tier) and Argentino B (Regionalised fourth tier) will enter the competition at different stages, in a one-match tie. The winner will enter the following year's Copa Sudamericana.

Hopefully they'll also go back to direct relegation and season-long championships...

 

[PalestrinoSEP]

Great! Any chance CONMEBOL will make a super cup, with The winners from all national copas playing?

 

[curtis290]

They do this and nothing to make it into a year long tournament? I like the fact that Argentina doesn't have a domestic cup: it prevents fixture cluttering and it would be a rather meaningless competition because of how much parity there is. I like the promotion/relegation system as well, but having two 19 game seasons is awful. Especially with the amount of parity there is form is too unpredictable. There are no easy games, and all it takes is a couple of losses and the season is ruined and the team's self-confidence destroyed, meaning you have to rebuild. The short season puts a tremendous amount of pressure on the club for each game, and the managers are fired right and left and they constantly change their rosters because of how temporary form is. It's ruining Argentine football. They said they'd "look into it" but that was a few years ago...now they're doing nothing but adding in a domestic cup? The AFA is so poorly run.

 

[PalestrinoSEP]

The AFA is so poorly run.

I have the impression that all South American ferederations and the CONMEBOL itself are poorly run. There is too corruption, but professionalism seems nowhere near possible. We see the UEFA Champions League and the Europa League with great marketing, symbolic anthems(DIE MEEEISTER! DIE BEEEEEESTEN! LES MEEEEILLEURS EQUIIIIPES! THE CHAAAAMPIOOONS!<)), while Libertadores has nothing*. You've probably been in discussions about the real level of South American football. Is it realy bad today, or are the European leagues overestimated? I'm not saying Barcelona would never win a Libertadores or that Porto wouldn't even reach the finals of the Copa Sulamericana/Sudamericana. But we look at the Intercontinental Cups and the FIFA World Cup, and we see an almost perfect balance(and an African team reached the final!) between the continents. What we don't see are ideas that make the Libertadores, the Copa Sulamericana, the Recopa and the national competition look like great events ans shows. We're "fueled by passion", and nothing more. I dunno about Argentina, but in Brazil, nobody knows the *Libertadores anthem. Here, the most famous version of a song alike is a parody of the Champions League Theme. I wonder what would happen if the presidents of the confederations really worked for the good of the sport. I'm sure South American football would keep its players and be as watched as many European leagues...

Spoiler

[video=youtube;vRQr_oMFxSk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRQr_oMFxSk[/video]

 

[Athe~]

They do this and nothing to make it into a year long tournament? I like the fact that Argentina doesn't have a domestic cup: it prevents fixture cluttering and it would be a rather meaningless competition because of how much parity there is. I like the promotion/relegation system as well, but having two 19 game seasons is awful. Especially with the amount of parity there is form is too unpredictable. There are no easy games, and all it takes is a couple of losses and the season is ruined and the team's self-confidence destroyed, meaning you have to rebuild. The short season puts a tremendous amount of pressure on the club for each game, and the managers are fired right and left and they constantly change their rosters because of how temporary form is. It's ruining Argentine football. They said they'd "look into it" but that was a few years ago...now they're doing nothing but adding in a domestic cup? The AFA is so poorly run.

The year-long season appears to be on the cards, too - but the AFA is still very, very poorly run. And I agree with Palestrino, it seems to happen in all of SA federations.

However, I disagree with you on the relegation system. Recently promoted teams, even if they achieve a mid table finish, which would be a good achievement in pretty much any league (Bar ours - oh, and the bolivian league...), get relegated. The average system was introduced when 'big' teams were in danger of being relegated, because, since they had had good seasons in the past, their sorry ***** would be saved. And this is what happens in practice, basically:

Let's suppose Instituto get promoted next year and Boca are champions this year. Next season Instituto gets relegated after achieving a midtable finish, while boca have a **** season, end up last, but their better average record saves them from relegation. Now - a bad season would lower said record, right? But, as they're a big team, they fill their stadium consistently, get the best sponsorship deals, and attract the most promising youngsters, something smaller teams can't do (Which is not saying they don't have youth products of their own, even we do!). That gives them a 3 year margin to save their *****, while having all of those advantages.

The only thing that endangers larger, more established clubs is financial mismanagement - During the Aguilar era, corruption was rampant in River and you can see it now - they've barely signed anyone. The team isn't getting paid since the summer. Same with Independiente (Regarding wages), players haven't been paid in 3 months, and they didn't get the cup bonuses from last year.

 

[curtis290]

I have the impression that all South American ferederations and the CONMEBOL itself are poorly run. There is too corruption, but professionalism seems nowhere near possible. We see the UEFA Champions League and the Europa League with great marketing, symbolic anthems(DIE MEEEISTER! DIE BEEEEEESTEN! LES MEEEEILLEURS EQUIIIIPES! THE CHAAAAMPIOOONS!<)), while Libertadores has nothing*. You've probably been in discussions about the real level of South American football. Is it realy bad today, or are the European leagues overestimated? I'm not saying Barcelona would never win a Libertadores or that Porto wouldn't even reach the finals of the Copa Sulamericana/Sudamericana. But we look at the Intercontinental Cups and the FIFA World Cup, and we see an almost perfect balance(and an African team reached the final!) between the continents. What we don't see are ideas that make the Libertadores, the Copa Sulamericana, the Recopa and the national competition look like great events ans shows. We're "fueled by passion", and nothing more. I dunno about Argentina, but in Brazil, nobody knows the *Libertadores anthem. Here, the most famous version of a song alike is a parody of the Champions League Theme. I wonder what would happen if the presidents of the confederations really worked for the good of the sport. I'm sure South American football would keep its players and be as watched as many European leagues...

Spoiler

[video=youtube;vRQr_oMFxSk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRQr_oMFxSk[/video]

Before the 90's the Argentine and brazilian leagues were the best in the world and as a whole I would say South American football was better than European football. Of course that's changed, but the difference is less than people think. South American sides would obviously struggle if they played in Europe with the fields, stadiums, etc. but if European sides came to play in South America, they would struggle a lot more than people would think, partially because of the fields and stadiums, partially because of how insane the fans are, and partially because of the quality of the players. I do agree that the federations are poorly run, but aren't the ones in Europe poorly run too? People constantly complain about the FA in Britain. One thing they missed out on was marketing. Back before a few European leagues starting buying all the best players and ruining football for everyone else, the on-the-field product in South America was amazing, much better than in Europe at the time. Had they marketed that leagues effectively (to Asian countries in particular), right at the turn of the 90's, maybe they could have brought in enough revenue to be able to pay their players enough to stay home. But could South American teams have afforded to do that? I don't think so, and even with marketing there is just more money in Europe, look at what Prem teams charge for tickets, it's literally a fraction of the cost in Argentina because if the prices went up no one could afford to go to the games.

The year-long season appears to be on the cards, too - but the AFA is still very, very poorly run. And I agree with Palestrino, it seems to happen in all of SA federations.

However, I disagree with you on the relegation system. Recently promoted teams, even if they achieve a mid table finish, which would be a good achievement in pretty much any league (Bar ours - oh, and the bolivian league...), get relegated. The average system was introduced when 'big' teams were in danger of being relegated, because, since they had had good seasons in the past, their sorry ***** would be saved. And this is what happens in practice, basically:

Let's suppose Instituto get promoted next year and Boca are champions this year. Next season Instituto gets relegated after achieving a midtable finish, while boca have a **** season, end up last, but their better average record saves them from relegation. Now - a bad season would lower said record, right? But, as they're a big team, they fill their stadium consistently, get the best sponsorship deals, and attract the most promising youngsters, something smaller teams can't do (Which is not saying they don't have youth products of their own, even we do!). That gives them a 3 year margin to save their *****, while having all of those advantages.

The only thing that endangers larger, more established clubs is financial mismanagement - During the Aguilar era, corruption was rampant in River and you can see it now - they've barely signed anyone. The team isn't getting paid since the summer. Same with Independiente (Regarding wages), players haven't been paid in 3 months, and they didn't get the cup bonuses from last year.

I agree with you to a certain extent, and it is true that they instituted the 3 year averages rule to prevent big clubs from getting relegated, but as long as they have a two-part season I think they need it. There would be too much pressure on the clubs for every single game, not only are you fighting for a 19 game season you're also fighting for a one-year relegation battle. The idea of averages is also good because in Argentine football form is so temporary (for the reasons described above, parity and the 19 game season), so a great club could simply have one bad season and get relegated...I kind of like the fact that it's based on performances over three seasons: if you're consistently bad, you get relegated. If not, than you stay up. If they moved to a system of one-year relegation good teams would get relegated from one bad season, and you'd have crappy teams staying up because they managed to barely avoid the drop every year. Also, your Instituto example is completely off, if they had a mid-table finish of course they wouldn't get relegated, relegation is based on average points, not total points. If you are only in the Primera for one season and have a good year there's no way you'd get relegated because the average points would be much lower. I guess the fact of the matter is that I don't really see teams getting relegated that don't deserve to be relegated under this system, and I love the play-off! What a great idea! To be in the Primera you have to beat a team to be in the Primera, it's a fantastic idea.

The financial mismanagement amazes me, I hear stories about Boca and River having money problems, how could either of those two clubs have money problems???? Almost all Argentine football merchandise comes from either of those teams, they must have a large income. I don't know what's going on at Independiente because I keep missing their games (time zone difference and now rojadirecta never has downloadable games unless it's the Libertadores, and even then sometimes it doesn't happen), but not paying the players is appalling and bad for morale at a time like this when we're trying to avoid being in the relegation zone. I remember the Estadio Libertadores was supposed to be completed while I was in Argentina and I was really looking forward to watching a game there, but right before the end they had a disagreement with the construction company and it was delayed for months. In fact they still haven't finished it yet. Unbelievable, you'd think at this level they'd hire consultants or something. I have no idea what they spend their money on.