Michel Platini uses Kaká bid to push for wage cap
Michel Platini called into question the morality of Manchester City being able to offer astronomical sums for players as he warned yesterday that the game was in danger of imploding unless it followed his call for caps on spending. The Uefa president pushed his plans for salary and transfer limits in an impassioned speech to the European Parliament and was applauded after calling for US-style regulations to establish financial fair play.
The former France captain, 53, deepened his long-running spat with the Premier League by using the example of City to advance Uefas case for controls, suggesting that club expenditure on wages and transfers should be limited to between 50 per cent and 60 per cent of revenue.
During this years festive season, one club, which had suddenly become very rich, made various astronomical bids in the transfer market, Platini said in a 90-minute presentation, a clear reference to Manchester Citys £103 million offer for Kaká, the AC Milan forward. Of course, there was a tremendous outcry in the football family, people called it outrageous and scandalous. Many people have responded by talking about limiting players wages by introducing a European salary cap.
The European Club Association, which represents 137 leading teams such as Manchester United and Real Madrid, said this month that it did not support salary caps. The Premier League also opposes any Europe-wide financial regulation and has previously told the Frenchman to mind his own business when he scolded English teams for poaching players from around the world. The Premier League did not respond to Platinis comments last night.
The Frenchman has not been deterred, warning yesterday that the game was in danger from the worst financial crisis in nearly 80 years if action was not taken. European clubs are currently telling us that our system is in danger of financially imploding in the medium term, he said.
Uefa has previously been understood to have considered a limit of between 47 and 63 per cent. Revenue would be classed as money received only from ticket sales, sponsorship, merchandise and television income, but not investment by owners or major shareholders.
In the past, Platini has aimed his criticism directly at the big English clubs after they took three of the four semi-final places in last seasons Champions League. He kept his attack more general yesterday, seeing an opportunity presented by mounting public distaste across Europe at the financial excesses of the free market during the recession.
For the past 15 or 20 years, we have grown tired of hearing that there is no need to regulate, that the market regulates itself perfectly, that excesses and imbalances will disappear of their own accord, he said. We now know that none of this is true. In football, as in the economy in general, the market is incapable of correcting its own excesses, and it was not the Uefa president who said so, it was Barack Obama.
Sports in the United States, where salary caps are the norm and cash is rigorously redistributed among successful and unsuccessful clubs alike, have coped with the financial crisis better, he said. He also claimed that Europe could learn lessons from America. The American sports system can certainly give us food for thought, Platini added. It is completely different from the European model of sport in a number of fundamental ways. There are, nevertheless, some lessons we can learn.
Platini also reiterated Uefas call for a ban on transfers of players under 18, citing the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. The European Commission talks of free movement of workers from the age of 16, he said. This might have seemed reasonable in the 1950s, but is that still the case today for most skilled jobs, at a time when many European countries have raised the school-leaving age to 18? I am talking about the protection of children.
Platini, an opponent of video replays, also reiterated his desire to add two extra referees, each stationed near goalmouths, to assist the central referee and avoid questionable goals. He said that he would make a formal proposal on this issue at next months Fifa board meeting.
