[amancik]

UEFA president Michel Platini is ready push through his scheme to wipe out mass debts in football, revealing he hopes all clubs across Europe will be licensed within three years…

Platini is determined to introduce a licensing system that would see clubs who continually spend above their means removed from European competition.

Many view the Frenchman’s plans as an attempt to curb the influence of English football, as he has been far from secretive regarding his distaste for the spend-happy approach of the Premier League’s biggest clubs.

His stance is not totally unwarranted, given Chelsea and Manchester United collectively boasted some ₤1.5billion in unpaid debts according to the recent figures from Companies House.

But Platini insisted the move will affect Spain and Italy as much as England, saying: "In three to five years I want to resolve the situation of debt, which does not apply only to England. It's the second part of my programme."

Some observers believe the ongoing saga surrounding the future of Manchester United winger Cristiano Ronaldo is indicative of football’s current financial folly.

Real Madrid are prepared to pay ₤70million for the Portuguese superstar, a fee that would smash the previous world-record of ₤46million, which los Merengues paid Juventus for Zinedine Zidane in 2001.

But Platini, who has been so critical of England’s penchant for exactly this type of transfer activity, believes such a transaction is only problematic if the Spanish capital club do not have the funds outright.

"If Real Madrid pay €100m for a player that's OK if they have the money," he said. "If they don't it's a worry."

Mike Maguire
Goal.com

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I totally agree 100% cuz that's what I think Milan's doing.

[morgoth]

This a good idea, but I can't see it happening unless ...

Kurt, there's debt and debt! A 500M€ debt and a 10M€ debt is quite different, don't you think? Of course if this scheme goes though the EPL is going to crush simple as ... but this hole stupid crazy money in football has to reach it's limits, so I'm all for it!

[kurtsimonw]

This a good idea, but I can't see it happening unless ...

Kurt, there's debt and debt! A 500M€ debt and a 10M€ debt is quite different, don't you think? Of course if this scheme goes though the EPL is going to crush simple as  ... but this hole stupid crazy money in football has to reach it's limits, so I'm all for it!

The reason it will never happen is because UEFA can't really say how much teams are allowed to spend. Unless they were to put some sort of salary cap in football and a transfer maximum, but then the league would be too even, the likes of Liverpool, madrid and even Milan would just become no bigger than the likes of Fulham, Betis and Empoli, it would create equality.

Yes, it would hurt the EPL, which is why it doesn't surprise me that Platini is the one that's come up with it. I don't care either way. If it doesn't go through, great, I'll get to see some of the greatest players in the World play at Villa Park. If it does go through, well, I can assure you Villa's debts are minimal at best, so we'd be fine.

But I don't think anybody really knows the finances of a club. I'm still of the opinion that most teams are in 'debt'. Any incoming transfers made through means other than income generated by the club itself can be considered 'debt' as the club hasn't actually paid for it themself, they're using money it from another source. Like Chelsea with Abramovich, United with the Glazers and Milan with Silvio, it's very difficult to define and would certainly put too many teams in danger in my opinion. So I believe there would be very few major European clubs remaining.

[morgoth]

The reason it will never happen is because UEFA can't really say how much teams are allowed to spend. Unless they were to put some sort of salary cap in football and a transfer maximum, but then the league would be too even, the likes of Liverpool, madrid and even Milan would just become no bigger than the likes of Fulham, Betis and Empoli, it would create equality.

Yes the uefa can't say how much a team can spend but they can accept in their competition a however they want ... and the likes of Milan are not figger because they have more money but because they won more, of course the two are related but trophies are more important than the money otherwise Chelsea would be the best club ever (IMG:http://cyrus.medialayer.net/~m1ke/milanfan.com/forums/style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)