English Premier League wants to take its show on the road

Published 10:49 pm Saturday, February 9, 2008

LONDON — Fans oppose the English Premier League’s plan to play games across the world. FIFA is hardly on board and could give the plan a red card.

Yes, the Premier League already has a strong international flavor and the influx of overseas sports is well under way. But this latest stab at globalization might not be such a good idea.

England’s national team has a squad of Italian coaches under Fabio Capello and not a single Englishman has won a major domestic soccer title since 1995. The NFL will continue playing at Wembley and the NHL this season opened in London.

Is the next inevitable step this? Premier League teams competing for three points in the United States, Japan, China, Australia, South Africa and Dubai.

Maybe not.

While the 20 owners were unanimous in saying the plan was a great idea to make the league a truly worldwide brand, fans are united against it and most of the managers want to wait before making a decision.

“My instinctive reaction is not to be against innovation,” Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger said. “This league is at the moment acknowledged as the best in the world but only 10 percent of people who love the clubs have access to the games and 90 percent don’t.

“But it can only be valid if you respect certain criteria. The first is to respect the competitive side of our game. The second is respect the quality of the organization you have inside the game and the fairness of the game.”

Portsmouth manager Harry Redknapp said there was a danger of English clubs playing regularly around the world instead of in front of their own fans.

“I said months ago I could see us playing abroad. I could see them all taking their teams, getting more and more foreign owners,” he said. “We will probably end up playing one game a year in England and the rest around the world. It would be like the Harlem Globetrotters.”

FIFA is campaigning to stop the big clubs from in effect taking over the game. The world governing body was quick to announce an investigation into the plan.

A day after Premier League chief executive Peter Scudamore came up with the idea, FIFA said it expected the English governing body to send it something official on the plan so it can make up its own mind.

So far the Football Association sounds guarded.

“We understand the Premier League’s desire to raise interest in English football around the world,” it said in a statement. “We look forward to discussing the detail with the league and looking carefully at the implications to ensure that the proposal fits well alongside the existing fixture list, including our domestic cup and league competitions and our national team games. We know that the Premier League are equally conscious of these issues.”

While Japanese fans may welcome seeing Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal or Chelsea play competitive games, their soccer federation may object.

“It sounds problematic,” JFA vice president Junji Ogura said. “We are, in principle, opposed to having their Premier League games in Japan as we have to protect our league and clubs. In Japan, we don’t allow anyone to play a match that involves only foreign clubs and no Japanese clubs.”

The opposition from the fans and the media was loud and clear.

The Football Supporters’ Federation, which represents fans from the top clubs, already has launched a “No to Game 39” campaign.

“No doubt, there will be some supporters who naively assume this will generate funds for their clubs. But, of course, in reality all extra revenue goes straight out of the clubs into the owners’ pockets,” said Duncan Drasdo of the Manchester United Supporters Truat.

“Just look at Manchester United for example. Record sponsorship and record TV revenues and yet still the ticket prices are increased by record amounts (50 percent in three seasons).”

The Daily Mail described Scudamore’s proposal as a “grubby plan for a global gravy train,” and the Mirror ran a front page headline “For Sale, our national game”.

While the top clubs will become richer by playing abroad, there’s little sign the Premier League globalization will filter down to the poorer clubs of the Football League.

On the day Scudamore announced the venture that would add some $10 million to each club’s income just by playing an extra game in Los Angeles, Beijing, Tokyo or Johannesburg, Bournemouth almost went out of existence.

The cash-strapped League One club went into financial administration Friday. That automatically brought a 10-point deduction, sending the club to last place in the standings.

The third League One club to go into administration this season, Bournemouth was on the brink of extinction a few days ago and isn’t planning any flights to Luton, let alone Beijing.