West Ham manager Sam Allardyce has told The Times that he does not necessarily support the new Premier League spending rules that his chairman, David Gold, voted for on Thursday.
Under the new rules, clubs have to break even over a three year period and within this period, cannot register losses of more than £105 million and will also face limits on increasing their wage bills. The Hammers boss fears that unless other leagues in Europe adopt similar rules, English football will see a mass exodus of top players.
Big Sam told the newspaper, "I fear it may be a problem for us in the Premier League- players today will travel anywhere, and if it's not the same financial restrictions somewhere else and money is greater somewhere else, players will move. We have seen top players moving to Russia and China and it's not about the football there- it's about the money."
Whilst some people will accuse the gaffer of being overly-cynical here, it cannot be denied that he does have a point. When the new rules come in, if the other world leagues paying comparable wages do not adopt the same sort of principles, then inevitably, top players will leave.
However, this situation of top players putting money over footballing pedigree and chasing huge contracts at clubs in Russia or China is surely part of the motivation for the new Premier League spending rules; football is centralised around money and much of the time, that is not a good thing and something which has sorely needed reform for many years. At any rate, it's good to see that we have a manager who is prepared to stick his neck on the line and openly say something which contradicts what the official club line is.
By Alex Shilling
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