Im just getting into soccer more lately. Ive always loved the world cup but now im trying to go well beyond that. The rules are a bit tricky to me especially offsides but im starting to figure it out. What i dont understand is the different levels of leagues. I dont know what is the top leagues and how the mls and fc Cincinnati team fits into that. I also dont understand players being on loan from other teams. Is the premier league the best league? I just dont understand how teams dont want to finish in the bottom standings because they get eliminated eventually and the top teams go to another bracket. Just strange to me but im very interested. I know this post is jumbled to say the least but any clarity to some of this stuff would be awesome
Ok, Im your man because I just went through this. Soccer in every country outside of the US is set up kinda like MLB baseball is. You have MLB then AAA, then AA, then A.
So in the US the top league is called Major League Soccer. The AAA version of that league is the NASL. the "USL" is essentially the next down. Think of it as a tier system... In the US its like this:
MLS
/
NASL
/
USL
FC Cincy is in the USL. The Chicago Fire are like 2nd place in the East division of the MLS. What happened last night would like if the Lexington Legends beat the New York Yankees.
Now the premiere league in Europe goes like this:
Premiere League
/
Chamionship Flight
/
1st Division
/
2nd Division
etc...
So everyone in Europe has whats called Promotion and relegation. What this means is that the teams that come in the bottom 3 places ( 18th, 19th and 20th in the Premiere League) are bumped down to the Championship Flight. The same thing occurs in all 7 divisions of the league. Then, the top 3 teams in the Championship flight move up to the premiere league. So this year Hull City, Middlesobrough, and Sunderland all got "relegated" to a league down while Newcastle United, Brighton, and Huddersfield Town all got promoted to the Premiere League. Why is this important? MONEY!. Due to media deals each team in the PL gets a check for about 100 million dollars. That makes soooo much of a difference for smaller clubs. This same thing happens in ever domestic league in the work except the US. So there is no "tanking" in soccer.
Basically how loans work is like this. If a team has a player that either isnt good enough to break into the starting rotation what that team can do is put him up for loan. This often happens to really young players with promise that arent good enough to play for a big team like Chelsea FC. So Chelsea doesnt want to sell the player, but they want him to get experience so they will loan him for 1 year or 2 years to a club the player can get more playing time. During that year or 2 years, the team that receives the player pay his weekly wage bill. So if I played for Chelsea and was loaned to Crystal Palace, Crystal Palace pays my wages for the time I am with them. When that expires, I go back to Chelsea.