Mark Langdon: Multi-club ownership a miserable existence

The game's gone. You ludicrously hear it all the time - usually after a perfectly legitimate red card is dished out following a challenge that hasn't been acceptable for 20 years - but even I felt like uttering those words following the laughable scenes at the end of Argentina versus Morocco Olympics clash earlier this week.

Argentina equalised in the 16th minute of injury time to make it 2-2 which led to a pitch invasion from a number of Morocco supporters. The riot police came out, the referee took the players off and it appeared the match had finished with even official websites reporting the match had ended in a draw. However, the players returned the best part of two hours later in an empty stadium and before the play resumed Cristian Medina's leveller was ruled out for offside by VAR.

Argentina's coach Javier Mascherano took it as well as you would expect, calling the events in Saint-Etienne "a circus" "pathetic" and a "disgrace" but this was only the Olympics. Imagine if that had happened at a Euros or World Cup. It's hard to comprehend an apparent match result changing after you've gone home.

Unfortunately, it was not the most depressing football story in France this week, and while the game might not have gone, renowned club Bordeaux have gone, filing for bankruptcy and abandoning their professional status after takeover talks with Fenway Sports Group, the owners of Liverpool, collapsed. 

Bordeaux have won Ligue 1 and both French domestic cup competitions in the past 15 years, so their demise should be a warning to everyone and, while it's not quite as sad as going out of business, the fact that their last remaining hope appeared to be becoming part of a multi-club ownership at FSG highlights a depressing part of football.

Multi-club ownership makes sense in that you can share resources, farm out players on loan easily and navigate different permit rules in certain countries but somewhere in the food chain there is a club at the bottom being treated less than perfectly for the good of the primary team.

It became famous or infamous depending on your view in English football when the Pozzo family owned Udinese and Watford and the biggest "success" story in European football if that's the right word is the way Red Bull have managed to use the system to get Salzburg and Leipzig into the latter stages of Uefa competitions.

There was almost a novel approach to it when Watford and Udinese swapped players regularly - depending on if the yo-yoing Hornets were relegated or promoted - but it has now reached an unacceptable level across the continent with the likelihood of things getting worse.

"We can show pathways for our young superstars to get on to the Chelsea pitch while getting them real game time,” said Chelsea owner Todd Boehly shortly before the club bought Strasbourg in Ligue 1. Liam Rosenior has just been named as Strasbourg's new manager and reports have suggested his appointment came about because BlueCo, the group behind Chelsea, believe his style of play is closely matched to that of current Stamford Bridge boss Enzo Maresca.

Strasbourg are their own team with their own history and heritage being treated like a feeder club, but BlueCo have a long way to go to match the brazen efforts of City Group that owns Manchester City, New York City, Melbourne City, Yokohama F. Marinos, Montevideo City, Girona, Palermo, Troyes, Lommel, Mumbai City, Shenzhen Peng City and Bahia. There are also partnerships with other teams in South America, Asia and Europe.

Manchester City's new signing Savio was a record signing for Troyes but never played for them. Instead last season he helped Girona to qualify for the Champions League and has now arrived in England.

It's clearly not against the rules, but if it's totally right the game's gone.

Read more from Mark Langdon . . .

Mark Langdon: Euro 2024 review of the tournament 

Mark Langdon: Euro 2024 Team of the tournament 

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