Karl Heinz you are starting to bore me

If Karl Heinz Rumminegge was in charge of UEFA and FFPR (Financial Fair Play) then he would bring a heavy hammer down on clubs that were ever to spend more than they had earned through their own commercial efforts.

In stark and simple terms our Teutonic cousin is making it clear to Platini (he of the Gallic shrug) and the rest of the FFPR team that for them to retain any reputation, or indeed for UEFA to hold any currency in future negotiations with the top clubs of the ECA (headed by KHR himself funnily enough) then they simply have to clamp down on the over-spenders.

I must point out of course that KHR and others from the incumbent wealth mongers of European football such as Barcelona, Real Madrid or Manchester United are NOT trying to limit competition and therefore close of any opportunities for smaller clubs to become successful. In fact such a suggestion is too awful to even consider. 

But there are a few storm clouds on the horizon for the big earners in clubs such as Manchester City, Paris St Germain and Anzhi Makhachkala who could, if need be simply ignore the losses and plough on with their spending and squad building.

City have been the most successful of the new bunch in their pursuits of top players but the fact that Samuel Eto’o now plays in Russia and Javier Pastore chose Paris as his latest club is significant.

It is UEFA’s challenge to make the Champions League the pre-eminent club competition in world football and it might ring a little hollow if they kick out clubs who happen to have squads chock full of top talent. Especially is those clubs were to then set-up an invitation only tournament to replace the revenues lost to the FFPR lovers.

Imagine a series of games played at the same time as the CL group phase where many top players take each other on in perfect conditions in Abu Dhabi, which would you want to watch and where would sponsors want their name to be seen?

And of course if clubs like City, PSG, Anzhi and any others who were to decide to be non-FFPR compliant were to spend really freely how long until the squads of Barca, Bayern, Real and United were stripped of their best players?

So it might just be wise for KHR to pause and think what his world of FFPR or nothing might look like.