NEW “FOREIGNER” RULE IN THE OFFING
Top Premiership clubs such as Chelsea and Arsenal may be forced into a radical overhaul of their squads and transfer policy next summer if UEFA push through new rules to enforce quotas of 'home-grown' players next season.
The UEFA executive will meet in Vienna on Nov 11 to finalise plans which would force all clubs in Europe to have between six and eight players in their squad who are `home-grown'.
The criteria for this will not be based on nationality, but on whether a player was developed at any academy in this country.
The criteria for this will not be based on nationality, but on whether a player was developed at any academy in this country.
UEFA are aware that top clubs would try to get around the rule by increasing their squad size, and another radical rule would limit squad sizes to 25 registered professionals. This will force the bigger clubs to drastically cut down the number of players in their first-team squads.
Chelsea - who have spent almost £200 million on mostly imported talent since Roman Abramovich bought the club 18 months ago - are known to be opposed to the plan. Manchester United and Arsenal - members of the powerful G14 group of top European clubs - are also thought to be against it.
But UEFA are confident they can push their plan through with the support of smaller clubs largely because they do not need European Commission approval. The criteria for specifying who is 'home-grown' are not based on nationality so there is no breach of the Treaty of Rome, which stipulates that any rule that seeks to limit the right of clubs to employ a player from another EU country would be illegal. The G14 would therefore have no legal grounds for objecting.