The FA is the controlling body for football in England. It is the only association recognised by EUFA and FIFA. All players must be registered with the FA or they cannot legally play for any English club or team.
The FA is the owner of the Premier League and although it is not involved in the day to day operation of the league, it is the special shareholder and has a veto over appointments and proposed changes to the rules of the competition. The FA also controls the England team and is the only body authorised by EUFA and FIFA to provide referees and other match officials.
The FA is not irrelevant.
It might be possible for some clubs to break away and form their own league and possibly even strike their own TV deal, but that league, and by extension the clubs that play in it, would then not be recognised by UEFA or FIFA which would mean exclusion from UEFA sanctioned competitions such as the Champions League.
The players who played in that league would not be eligible to play for any national team and would therefore be excluded from FIFA and UEFA sanctioned competitions such as the World Cup and European Championship.
OK... so much for that.
The situation with disparity of prize money between the FA Cup and Premier League is well known, but as usual, you fail to understand the importance that the English place on history, tradition and our treasured footballing / sporting institutions.
The problem doesn't lie with the English people in our game, it lies in the foreign influence. Many clubs are now owned by foreign based organisations / cartels / oligarchs. The club managers are overwhelmingly foreign and most clubs and teams have more than 50% of their regular playing staff not qualified for England. These people have no interest whatsoever in what makes our game "English". They are in it only for the money.
We have a minority stake in the game in our own country and the way we play the game has become unrecognisable from what it was pre-EPL. That rankles greatly with many English fans outside of the elite group at the top of the Premier League who admittedly don't want to go back to crumbling stadiums, hooliganism and inefficient management, but do want our distinctive, "English" way of playing the game back, being reliant on our own talent and not being just a cash cow for foreign mercenaries.
Since EPL, our game has become a hybrid variant of other leagues in Europe. We play a continental style now. Our distinctive style of play has been subsumed. No longer the fast paced, muscular confrontation where physical contact was allowed and willingly engaged in by players on both sides, in a game that had less reliance on tactical formations and players who are constrained by a tight strategic framework.
Traditionally we breed players who are to be able to think on their feet and adapt to a changing situation in a match... we used to breed maverick players who played instinctively and could take a game by the scruff of its neck. No more. Every player has to play within the strategy set down by the coach. Do nothing that will alter the "team shape." Do nothing unexpected or different than that which they are told to do.
The average English fan, of a club not involved at the top end of the EPL actually would like to see a stabilising of our game, realigning the way we play it with traditional values and thus restoring that unique "Englishness" to our national game. English teams, with English players, playing English football. We like the improved emphasis on skill and technique, but there should still be room for the traditional virtues of rolled up sleeves, hard graft in adversity and taking individual responsibility on the pitch when things aren't going well.
As one banner at a Championship stadium said recently "The skills are alright, but show us you can FIGHT"
And if you argue that a return to traditional values would affect our performances on the international stage, let me remind you that before the advent of the EPL, English clubs won the European Cup six seasons in a row in the 1970's and 80's. Since the EPL, we have won Europe's top prize only 4 times in more than 20 seasons.
Pre EPL, England won the FIFA World Cup once and reached the Semi Final in 1990. Since EPL, we have failed to reach the Semi Final at all. We didn't even make the knock out stage in 2014. Our performances in the European Championship have been risible.
England's national team has become a joke and the root cause of our lack of quality players to put on the white shirt is that it is extremely difficult for young English players to get into the top club sides. The top teams simply import foreign superstars to fill their teams. Chelsea and Arsenal have on many occasions fielded teams with no England qualified players on the field at all. This is clearly not good for our national team.
If English football's only purpose is to make money, then it is a highly successful enterprise. UEFA will continue to give England 4 clubs in the Champions League, if only because the television and gambling revenues will justify it. But is that what sport is about..? Not according to my set of values it isn't.
All the time the TV companies are interested, and the gambling organisations rake in vast sums from in-play betting, the EPL will be riding high. All the time the money flows in, the foreigners will come.
But domestically, our sporting values will be fatally undermined, our history subsumed by commercial interests and our young people (as they are already doing) will abandon attempts to make a career in football, choosing other sports instead where they might have a realistic prospect of a future. Rugby Union is rapidly gaining ground on football as a participation sport for young people in England. Athletics, gymnastics, rowing and cycling are attracting young people in huge numbers off the back of recent Olympic success in those areas.
it is probable that in time, the FA Cup will be a dead duck and our national team will slide down the FIFA rankings until it is becomes a third division European nation on a par with Norway, Albania and Moldova. And when that happens, the owners, fans and players at the top EPL clubs won't give a damn.
Some of us don't want that to happen. Football..... indeed, sport itself....... is supposed to be about more than money. That's where I'm coming from.
Feb 18, 2017 @ 04:20:29
