Hey everyone, first time poster in this forum, but I have been reading the topics since about April. Had to jump in here because I'm currently writing an Economics thesis on this very topic, a European football salary cap.
Basically under the current transfer system, a hard cap like the AFL's would be useless as transfer fees would still allow major clubs to monopolise the market for the best players. FIFPro, the worldwide players association, wont support a salary cap without a change to the transfer system.
My proposal is rather to abolish transfer fees and instead auction players under the constraint of the salary cap. The main stumbling block is there are 699 clubs in the first division in all of the European leagues. Arranging such a system would be pretty difficult.
One of the biggest problems in trying to introduce a cap would be the threat of a breakaway competition. In 98, Media Partners of Milan proposed a breakaway "Superleague" that was at the time rejected by the G-14, the body representing Europes 18 largest clubs. However the G-14 met with Media Partners in March this year, and have not reported the results of meeting. If a cap was installed, these clubs would be significant losers and would be very interested in the almost unlimited pool of revenues that a season long league (much larger than the Champions League) would generate.
Actually implementing a salary cap would be almost impossible Europe wide, and if it wasn't that wide, leagues that dont introduce a cap would drain the best talent away from constrained leagues.
Sorry for the length of the rant, I would be interested in other peoples opinions on the subject though.
BTW, thanks to all the regular posters in this forum, youre casual comments in here over the last few months have provided me with a lot of food for thought, and its been really helpful.