h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Now I don't often start threads here because I normally don't know what I'm talking about, but a news story over the last couple of days has been really bugging me.

Apparently a few days ago Arsenal played, only there were no British players on the pitch at all, and this seems to be being seen as A Bad Thing - they kept saying if it continues we'll be as bad as Scottish football. ()

Knowing nothing about football, I think that they should only be able to use players from the team's home town. So all Man U and Man City players should be from Manchester, Chelsea players should be from Chelsea, you get my drift.

Obviously the England team should *all* be totally English as well.

I suppose I'm saying that what is the big deal on this one? What are the issues that make this an issue?

Here's a link for those who have missed this story.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/s/sheff_utd/4271709.stm

Well I can't really see why this story has been so big, and I am a football fan...

I suppose the point is that, if the big clubs in England have no/few English players, the England team will have to be picked from lesser teams whose players have no experience of playing against top-class opposition, playing abroad etc. This means that the England team will only get worse and continue to fail to win anything.

The parallel with Scotland is that the only two teams perceived to be 'big clubs' north of the border, Rangers and Celtic, use a high proportion of non-Scottish players, and it is assumed that this is the reason why Scotland have such a bad record in international competitions.

Like I said, why this is a major news story to anyone other than sport/football fans, I don't know...

That simply wouldn't be allowed under EU employment rules. A person's employment within the EU cannot be restricted. It's under this basis that UEFA's idea that there be a minimum number of home grown players within any squad will fail.

The simple truth is that the English Premiership is the richest league in the World - 8 out of the top 20 richest clubs. Therefore these clubs are able to compete in the market place for the bezt players in the World, regardless of their country of origin. The fact that one team has now managed to field an entire team, plus subtitutes who are all foreign is an anomally. It's so uncommon as to be raised as a news item in and of itself. In any other team, including Arsenal when Cole and Campbell aren't injured, you'll see plenty of English players.

As to the detrimental effects upon the international team. That's simply not the case. Scotland folded because Scotland is actually a very small country who for a few years in the 1970s and 80s punched well above its weight in terms of the talent that it had available to it. Most of these players played 'abroad' in England during that time and that fact didn't seem to have a detrimental effect on the Scottish team. Further examples of successful national sides whose players play abroad are Wales, Holland and most obviously France.

Not that any of these last points are particularly relevant, as it is not international football that is important in the grand scheme of things.

Grey, the new rule has taken the EU employment laws into account. A team can have any number of foreign players. The restriction is just that a certain number of players have to come from the team's own youth programme, or from that of a club within the same league.

They can come from any country, though.

I think it is a good thing. Checkbook teams make for boring leagues. You get two, maybe three teams at the top, and beyond that nothing matters much.

How can it be right for Chelsea to buy up first and second string talent ? - just so they can't play for anyone else - except they'll then lend them out to 'lesser' teams - providing then don't play against Chelsea.

Tantamount to buying the league if you ask me.

I fink you'll find that that's called Capitalism and the Free Market, red in tooth and claw.

What interests me is what happens when Abramovich either loses interest in football, or more likely falls foul of the Russian government and loses his money. We'll see a collapse in Chelsea that will make the fall of Leeds look like a kid dropping his pocket-money in the street.

Not good for football; certainly not good for Chelsea; but interesting from a market point of view.

Especially when most of the players are signed to Abramovich and not Chelsea. Which is another thing I don't agree with.

Indeed - and not for nothing have so many people come to the conclusion over the centuries that capitalism and the market are best regulated to some degree.

I was making your point about Abramovich to someone yesterday as it happens - almost in exactly those terms too. Not sure about falling foul of the Russian government mattering though - I'm sure he has a tidy little stack invested in Switzerland or the Cayman Islands. I do wonder how long the bubble can last though.

"signed to Abramovich and not Chelsea?" does this mean he could sell chelsea and keep his stars to either sell or start another club?

isn't there also the question of some kind od player registration card, which must specify a club recognized by the FA and be kept on file at the club?

this all intrigues me, anyone able to light my lamp?

i forgot the real reason i wanted to post here: in the beginnings, up to 1910 or so, didn't FA rules require that players live within 6 miles of their home pitch?

They are signed to a holding company but technically yes - if he bought say Milan he could swan off with the squad. (Allegedly)

it almost sounds like the NFL!

Hardly. The NFL is rigidly controlled in terms of salary caps and attempting to balance the worst vs best apects of the league. (Except for the Arizona Cardinals, but there's no accountuing for them...)

Franchises do move cities, but it has to be agreed by the league and fellow owners and is generally the last resort of a team that is getting no support.

Ambramavich could move his entire squad tomorrow without consultation or agreement from anybody. Least of all the rather toothless FA.

i'm not sure you could classify the old cleveland browns as getting no support. and the hopscotch al davis played between LA and oakland wasn't exactly a last resort... it was more like shameless blackmail!

Just skipping back to the original post, sorry, but wasn't it the first time an English team had named 16 players (11 starting and 5 subs) that didn't contain one Englishman?

I'm pretty sure that is why the press latched onto it

Chealsea a few seasons back ha the first starting eleven without an English player.

There is no ready way around it.

Its cheaper for a club to spend on known foreign talent than to speculate in academies that *might* bring through homegrown talent. So the only answer is that the top club's earnings should be taxed to put money bak into the grass roots game. This would have to come through governemtns and FIFA because if one country did it unilaterally its home clubs would suffer financially while other nations clubs had more to spend on new talent and therefore won more European games reaping them more cash.

one love

Checking my home clubs stats we have only once had 4 'home-grown' players on the pitch (ie from Cov) This Saturday we could have 3 Coventry born players on the pitch and one player who came up through the youth - but is a brummie - on the bench.

So damn what. I say let the market decide.

The best players in the world are going to be attracted to where the best salaries in the world are being paid. If that means that the best of the local talent don't get to play in the best of the local teams, well then so be it. They will still be able to play in other teams, just not in the best of teams, because, well, they're just not good enough.

The idea that that will have a detrimental effect on the quality of a national team - as if that actually mattered - is total non starter. The national team will pull in the best of the players that it has available to them regardless of where they play. Witness the success of France, Brazil and Greece in recent international competitions.

As for the franchising argument; that club owners will move their team to wherever they perceive that they can generate more profit. Well, I think that Wimbledon saga will put a dampener on any plans for a good while yet.

arsenal doesn't have english players precisely because its budget is smaller than other clubs with the same ambition. they can't just latch onto the biggest names at the biggest salaries like chelsea, they have to do some discovery, and the big english stars are already discovered.

"growing" your own players is not an expensive proposition, but it is slow, painstaking, and when you're looking for the "crème de la crème" with a view to winning big silverware (CL), insufficient. you have to rake through EVERYBODY'S youth programme to get that sort of club together.

meanwhile, european clubs with ambition have to search even farther afield. olympique lyonnais has basically 2 kinds of players in their 25: real homegrown players on their first pro contracts, and non european players they scouted out in their home countries, with an aging star thrown in that no one else really wanted. the idea of signing away big players from other clubs, or even keeping their own players once established, is an impossible dream. and look at ajax: famous as a hotbed of young players, they are one of the clubs that would NOT qualify under the new UEFA rules because they simply can't keep their players. meanwhile auxerre, cruzeiro, and cotonsport de garoua have only one solution: beat the brush for 10 year olds!

but really, this is not new. a century ago it was preston north end and derby county signing away players from neighboring towns. in the 50's real madrid signed kopa and puskas; as football becomes a global village, the situation escalates.

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The market makes an interesting FTSE 100, but it makes boring football.