CPL's Independent Club League Model (Not Single Entity)

[CDNFootballer]

There's been some confusion on the league model the new Canadian Premier League uses recently among some fans/posters. Admittedly, there hasn't been much info officially on the topic but from whats come out its clear the CPL is not Single Entity (like MLS) or privately owned model (like USL).

Promotion-relegation. Independent-club system. The future of CanPL, as seen by its new commissioner

"The new commissioner of the Canadian Premier League prefers the independent club system."

How will clubs be run: Like MLS (central control, franchise model) or the independent-club model?

“I like MLS. I am a fan of what they’ve done. But the way I see our league operating is very different. I think what MLS has done very well is to create grassroots community-based fanbases. At one time, soccer was very ethnic-based. But I think it has turned a corner where we look at it more like we do hockey in Canada.

“But we are looking at a club-based style. We are not looking at a franchise system. We are looking for each of our clubs to build from the ground up, and we know it’s important what we do at the community level.”

https://the11.ca/promotion-relegation-independent-club-system-the-future-of-canpl-as-seen-by-its-new-commissioner/

Edited January 3, 2019 by CDNFootballer

[Kent]

I don’t doubt it, and in fact it looks familiar, but a link would be nice. Is this from that canpl.ca Q and A article from Armen Bedakian?

[CDNFootballer]

7 minutes ago, Kent said:

I don’t doubt it, and in fact it looks familiar, but a link would be nice. Is this from that canpl.ca Q and A article from Armen Bedakian?

Edited the link from the story in (from Steve Sandor's The11.ca).

[matty]

Nevermind looked at date

Edited January 3, 2019 by matty

[Alex D]

The common mistake people are making is seeing league wide marketing deals and a draft then screaming single entity. That's not what that is however.

Single entity means that the franchises are all centrally owned by the league along with all of the player contracts. Investors are given a market to operate in and allocated players. 

The CPL set up is more similar to the NHL or NBA. Individual clubs combining resources into the league and negotiating deals for all parties. MLSE doesn't own part of the Chicago Bulls but they do have a share of the Chicago Fire. Tom Fath does not own any portion of Cavalry FC and all of his players are contracted to FC Edmonton and not the CPL. 

Edited January 3, 2019 by Alex D

[Watchmen]

1 hour ago, Alex D said:

The common mistake people are making is seeing league wide marketing deals and a draft then screaming single entity. That's not what that is however.

Single entity means that the franchises are all centrally owned by the league along with all of the player contracts. Investors are given a market to operate in and allocated players. 

The CPL set up is more similar to the NHL or NBA. Individual clubs combining resources into the league and negotiating deals for all parties. MLSE doesn't own part of the Chicago Bulls but they do have a share of the Chicago Fire. Tom Fath does not own any portion of Cavalry FC and all of his players are contracted to FC Edmonton and not the CPL. 

Bob Young owns Hamilton and is financing Halifax...

[garmc]

6 minutes ago, Watchmen said:

Bob Young owns Hamilton and is financing Halifax...

Which is unrelated. One guy buying in to two different teams doesn't make the whole league single entity.

[SthMelbRed]

3 hours ago, Alex D said:

The common mistake people are making is seeing league wide marketing deals and a draft then screaming single entity. That's not what that is however.

Single entity means that the franchises are all centrally owned by the league along with all of the player contracts. Investors are given a market to operate in and allocated players. 

The CPL set up is more similar to the NHL or NBA. Individual clubs combining resources into the league and negotiating deals for all parties. MLSE doesn't own part of the Chicago Bulls but they do have a share of the Chicago Fire. Tom Fath does not own any portion of Cavalry FC and all of his players are contracted to FC Edmonton and not the CPL. 

When we're talking about independent clubs, I have to wonder if that means that the owners are free to take their teams to a different league, should they wish. Putting aside any CSA/CONCACAF sanctioning issues, would the CPL have any power to block one of the clubs from jumping ship to USL or some other league which may spring up in the future?

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

10 hours ago, CDNFootballer said:

There's been some confusion on the league model the new Canadian Premier League uses recently among some fans/posters....

Has there or are some people on here more obsessed with the semantics of this than they really should be? There are no doubt some key differences from how MLS is structured, which can be used to claim some point of difference. However, at the same time there is also clear evidence that the league has a salary cap not only for players but also for coaching staff and has mechanisms in place that have steered at least some of the players towards specific teams rather than having them negotiate freely with all seven with salaries set by what the market will bear as would be the case in a league structured along conventional European pro soccer lines.

There have also been press releases over the last few months that have explained how the league is dealing with key revenue streams as a single corporate entity rather than as a set of independent clubs, which is probably a good thing as it should help to keep the weaker franchises more financially stable.

[Cheeta]

In a lot of ways Year 1 CPL isn't going to look like Year 3 CPL simply because its necessary to have some launch vehicles in place to get this whole thing, you know, launched.  Some of those things will stick around, open trials as an example, and others I suspect will not, this "player territory" scheme.   A lot of other bits are going to be tuned as we see how the machine runs.  See where that salary cap is in 2022.

The league side of the business is the league side of the business.  If the revenue streams allocated to the league prove sufficient to cover the leagues operating and marketing costs then all the better.  Individual clubs not getting a bill every spring to top up the league's operating budget sure helps a clubs bottom line let me tell you.  Note that separating the logistics side of business (and it's costs) from the individual owners who share a marketplace, access to that logistic network and the branding that goes with it, isn't an unusual practice.   

 

[Unnamed Trialist]

59 minutes ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

Has there or are some people on here more obsessed with the semantics of this than they really should be? There are no doubt some key differences from how MLS is structured, which can be used to claim some point of difference. However, at the same time there is also clear evidence that the league has a salary cap not only for players but also for coaching staff and has mechanisms in place that have steered at least some of the players towards specific teams rather than having them negotiate freely with all seven with salaries set by what the market will bear as would be the case in a league structured along conventional European pro soccer lines.

There have also been press releases over the last few months that have explained how the league is dealing with key revenue streams as a single corporate entity rather than as a set of independent clubs, which is probably a good thing as it should help to keep the weaker franchises more financially stable.

It is not semantics, it is legal, financial and economically different from MLS. You are being tendentious about the subject.

A salary cap is no evidence of anything, all European leagues at D1 and most D2 and D3 have minimum salaries, control roster profiles, determine who can be an exception and on what terms (academy players). Most all have financial fair-play rules where spending cannot extend beyond revenue, and these are being applied more strictly lately, so that is, in effect, for certain teams, equivalent to a cap. Teams are being told they cannot sign more, they cannot pay more, or that they are spending over what their revenue would justify, in these European leagues you are citing as pure free market.

Then, as for "mechanisms in place that have steered" players to one or another time: cite them please. Are you referring to the university draft? There is nothing at all written, and so legally binding, in this regard, you just made that up BBTB, or at least are repeating a speculation with no basis in fact (though I would not be surprised if there were some agreements being made tacitly, at least for the start-up year). 

In any case, you comparing CPL to leagues that have existed since the early 20th century is pretty silly, all start-up processes have restrictions and rules that are frequently abandoned after consolidation, you can't compare a restrictive launch to an operative model decades old.

Edited January 3, 2019 by Unnamed Trialist

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

56 minutes ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

It is not semantics, it is legal, financial and economically different from MLS. You are being tendentious about the subject...

Really? I was pointing out that there are no doubt some significant differences, but CanPL is still doing many of the same sort of things that MLS does. If you don't tend to see MLS as being the Great Satan where North American soccer is concerned that's actually quite reassuring that they are doing the things they need to do to avoid known league killing issues that have been encountered in the past like an NASL (both iterations) style wage spiral and hang around for a while.

[Ams1984]

5 hours ago, SthMelbRed said:

When we're talking about independent clubs, I have to wonder if that means that the owners are free to take their teams to a different league, should they wish. Putting aside any CSA/CONCACAF sanctioning issues, would the CPL have any power to block one of the clubs from jumping ship to USL or some other league which may spring up in the future?

I doubt Athletic Bilbao could just go play in League 1 in France. Doesn’t mean La Liga is single entity, 

[Kent]

2 hours ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

Has there or are some people on here more obsessed with the semantics of this than they really should be?

This. Maybe I'm over generalizing but I feel like club vs franchise/single entity is shorthand for 3 main topics.

1. Salary cap (franchise/single entity)
2. Pro/rel (club)
3. player allocation/movement (i.e. rules on who can play where, vs letting clubs sign who they want to sign)

So where does CPL stand on these issues?

1. It appears to have a salary cap, or even 2 when including the manager cap.
2. Clanachan says he wants pro/rel someday, but at this point this is moot (although it's fun to speculate and dream)
3. For year 1 at least it appears there is cooperation between the teams. Shared trials, a university draft, players seem to be going to their home towns or places they have a connection to (like Adjei to York 9).

So on one thing it seems "franchisey". On the next it seems to aspire to be "clublike" but only time will tell. And on the third item it seems to be leaning towards "franchisey" and we can only speculate if it will stay that way or move towards "clublike" in the future.

[SthMelbRed]

1 hour ago, Ams1984 said:

I doubt Athletic Bilbao could just go play in League 1 in France. Doesn’t mean La Liga is single entity, 

Not what I was suggesting, nor the point I was arguing.

[ted]

Great! I prefer the club-run model so long as they work together on the business side of things. Clearly they have moved away from the single-entity model they started with which is all that I hoped for.

[Ams1984]

1 hour ago, SthMelbRed said:

Not what I was suggesting, nor the point I was arguing.

I guess I misunderstood your post. 

[Unnamed Trialist]

3 hours ago, Ams1984 said:

I doubt Athletic Bilbao could just go play in League 1 in France. Doesn’t mean La Liga is single entity, 

Although, curiously, French players could play for all Basque Ath Bilbao.

In discussions related to the Catalan independence movement, many argued that Barça might join League 1 on the same terms as Monaco. I found the arguments forced in any case: if you really want independence that much, you can allow your symbolic soccer team to take a bit of a hit playing in a lesser league.

[Ruffian]

Everybody seems to think there are only two possible league models. There are many ways each league can be single entity or club owned. There will be many different financial arrangements to do with team ownership, player ownership, trademark ownership, stadium ownership and many other revenue streams that make either league seem single entity or club owned. Neither MLS and CPL will be completely single entity in every way or club owned in every way.

[Ams1984]

6 minutes ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

Although, curiously, French players could play for all Basque Ath Bilbao.

In discussions related to the Catalan independence movement, many argued that Barça might join League 1 on the same terms as Monaco. I found the arguments forced in any case: if you really want independence that much, you can allow your symbolic soccer team to take a bit of a hit playing in a lesser league.

The Catalan thing was never really on the cards, but I agree -if they were to become independent, Barca shouldn’t be allowed to play in La Liga-

[Unnamed Trialist]

48 minutes ago, Ams1984 said:

The Catalan thing was never really on the cards, but I agree -if they were to become independent, Barca shouldn’t be allowed to play in La Liga-

The Catalan thing is very much on the cards, I assure you. 

 

[Alex D]

6 hours ago, Kent said:

This. Maybe I'm over generalizing but I feel like club vs franchise/single entity is shorthand for 3 main topics.

1. Salary cap (franchise/single entity)
2. Pro/rel (club)
3. player allocation/movement (i.e. rules on who can play where, vs letting clubs sign who they want to sign)

So where does CPL stand on these issues?

1. It appears to have a salary cap, or even 2 when including the manager cap.
2. Clanachan says he wants pro/rel someday, but at this point this is moot (although it's fun to speculate and dream)
3. For year 1 at least it appears there is cooperation between the teams. Shared trials, a university draft, players seem to be going to their home towns or places they have a connection to (like Adjei to York 9).

So on one thing it seems "franchisey". On the next it seems to aspire to be "clublike" but only time will tell. And on the third item it seems to be leaning towards "franchisey" and we can only speculate if it will stay that way or move towards "clublike" in the future.

There is only one determiner to single entity. Does the league own the franchise and player contracts or do individual owners? That's it. All the other stuff has nothing to do with single entity. 

[Ams1984]

4 hours ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

The Catalan thing is very much on the cards, I assure you. 

 

Not really. 

[Watchmen]

21 hours ago, garmc said:

Which is unrelated. One guy buying in to two different teams doesn't make the whole league single entity.

It doesn't, but his quote was "Tom Fath does not own any portion of Cavalry FC", which while true is not true of the league.  Bob Young has financially invested in Halifax and apparently has intentions for a team in the K/W area as well.  The league isn't single entity, but they're factually not completely separate entities either.  David Braley owned both the Lions and Argos for a number of years, and the media at least in Vancouver had an issue with him owning both teams, even if he was doing it with the best of intentions.  

[Cheeta]

Anyone who thinks that Wade Miller of the Winnipeg Football Club (Blue Bombers), an organization which he'd give his right arm for, his wife's right arm for, and the right arm of pretty much anybody else he's ever met (whether they were willing or no) would attach that organization to a scheme which isn't going to strengthen his beloved organization should probably go home, sober up, and give it another think.

Directly or more probably indirectly, I expect Valour FC is going to be infected by an attitude from the HQ of their parent organization which will demand on-field sporting success to help drive off-field financial success.  And if that means some creative thinking regarding the league rules all the owners involved help create, well then so be it. 

And I expect no less of the Faths, or Mr Young, or any of the other parties involved.  Good luck to any league office telling them they can't sign DeRo as a DP after he scores half the team's goals in a season.

They may all be in this together, but single entity my ass.