The Premier League - A Lack Of Competition?
Mark Palios (former Chief Executive) has praised the growth of the Premier League - but has called for them to address the overwhelming dominance of a few select teams.
Palios said;
If you’re talking about the Premier League as a commercial operation, I think they have done a fantastic job. They have had a free market in terms of television rights, and equally what they are trying to do here is to protect the international television rights, which have been very lucrative this time around.
But one concern for the Premier League is there is not enough competition and, love him or hate him, Sepp Blatter did deliver one point, although he delivered it in a churlish way as a snipe at the Premier League, and that is the lack of competition.
That is the lifeblood of sport and if you don’t protect that you do have an issue.
According to the interview published in British Football Week Palios also believes that better coaching should be English footballs priority, and not limiting the number of foreign players.
Mr Blatter has been trying to introduce a rule that forces clubs to field a minimum of 5 ‘home grown’ players in matches - however, as this is currently against EU law I can’t see that happening any time soon.
Palios said;
The more difficult solution (to our failing national team) is to address the coaching issues in this country. We need to train coaches to train kids.
It isn’t a question of just putting a National Football Centre in place because bricks & mortar never made a player. It’s about coaching the coaches and that’s something that takes a long time.
In terms of looking at the numbers of foreign players, at this point I don’t think it’s an issue but it’s something to keep an eye on.
Do you agree with Palios? Or do you think that Sepp Blatter has got it right with regards to too many foreign players?
What single reason (if you could only pick 1!) do you think resulted in our failure to qualify for EURO 2008?
