.png)
In soccer, an open system is the most crucial part of how our game is ran. There's components of an open system that help to make it all the more special. Any club can dream of going to the highest level possible, and clubs can come from anywhere. An open system is the perfect part of soccer, and helps to run a group of leagues in the most organic way possible. In this post, we're going to go through and talk about some beautiful components of this, from pro-rel, to solidarity payments.
Promotion and Relegation
The best part of an open system would obviously be promotion and relegation. For those that don't know, promotion and relegation is a way for clubs to be transferred from different league to different league based on their performances in the season. For example, if a club places in the bottom 3 places of a league, they'd be relegated to the league below that. This is a concept that is crucial to giving clubs the opportunities to dream. If they play well, they are rewarded, and they can go higher up the pyramid of a federation.
Clubs in Small-towns
All across Europe and the rest of the world, there are clubs in the top divisions of leagues that hail from small-towns. This is beautiful because it emphasizes that any club can come from anywhere, and be able to have the opportunity to compete at the top. TSG Hoffenheim, a club in the Bundesliga is based in the German village of Hoffenheim, with a population of 3,191. Clubs like Villarreal CF are based in the Spanish city of Villarreal, with a population of 51,000. Villarreal won the 2021 Europa League Final against Manchester United, and Manchester has 10x the population Villarreal does!
Fan Ownership
In one of our recent posts, we touched on fan ownership in soccer. Fan ownership is another very important component of the open system, and we've seen it across the world. One of the most notable being Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund, and really the entire Bundesliga. The Bundesliga has the "50+1" rule, requiring clubs to have 51% of their shares owned by the fans! Barcelona in La Liga are run by what they call "Socios," people who buy membership in the club. Barca is solely owned by their fans.
Solidarity Payments
Solidarity payments are very important, and they help to reward clubs involved in a player's development. Solidarity payments can be payed when a professional clubs signs a player that is just going pro, and they can pay the club that player came from and reward them for their development. This helps to balance out football development, and it gives clubs the opportunities to reinvest in their player development after it pays off. To see more on solidarity payments, click here.