Grow your own!
With no Premier League fixtures this weekend and only internationals, it seemed an opportune moment to write about the FA's latest brain wave.
So it would seem the FA have come up with a scheme to deliver us a better, improved England football team somewhere in the future.
Greg Dyke has this week outlined proposals to improve the lot of the young up and coming English players. He wants the rules changed so that we have more home grown players in Premier League Squads.
Currently Premier League Sides are allowed 17 non home grown players and the new rules would reduce this to 13 and at least two would have to have been trained by the club.
All Premier League clubs will have up to 4 years to implement these changes which if they go ahead will start from 2016. Newcastle amongst others, namely Arsenal, Spurs, Chelsea and Man City all currently fall foul of the new rules, but as outlined we would have 4 years to address this.
Greg Dyke was due to meet with Premier League chairman this week to discuss this new proposal and I'm pretty sure he'll face some resistance.
There has been quite a few articles in the press over the last couple of weeks talking about the demise (for want of a better word) of the Premier League. Various journalist have pointed out that the lack of big name foreign stars coming to the Premier League has impacted on it's pulling power and ability to compete in the champions league. They argue that with more and more top stars now favoring a move to La Liga, the Bundesliga or French Ligue 1 or even Serie A in Italy; it means the entertainment of the Premier League has greatly decreased.
In so far as the Premier leagues appeal goes, then it would seem more Johnny foreigners are the order of the day, not less, so where does that leave England? Of course the FA and the Premier League will always be at loggerheads over one thing or another due to the fact that each body has very different aims. But when it comes to what's best for England, it would be nice if they could work together.
I'm not so sure the lack of home grown is the reason for Englands poor performances at Euro and world cups, maybe the long hard season and lack of winter break has some impact. Also, we just don't seem to produce the calibre of player other top teams do, and when we do produce one a whole world of pressure gets put on them. Indeed should they stub their toe, wreck a matertarsal or get a thigh strain the whole team collapses without them!
So if the press have it right about the imminent demise of the Premier league, what will the effect of the home grown quota have on the Premier League? Will fans be happy to see more local lads break in to the first team even if they aren't as technically gifted as their foreign peers? Will it mean that say 10 years from now we have a more competitive England team? Over to you.
By Kimtoon
