Football much cleaner says Wenger

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger believes the increased television coverage of football has made the game much cleaner.

The 62-year-old also said the globalisation of the sport has helped foreign players integrate better and has therefore reduced ill-feeling towards players of different nationalities.

“The cameras have done a lot of good work for the game,” Wenger told Arsenal’s website.

“Football has cleaned up its act because it was dirtier 25 years ago. It is much cleaner today because everything in Europe is checked.”

“I remember having played some games in Europe 25 years ago and away from home it was not all clean because it was not filmed.”

“Football is much cleaner and the players know each other better.”

“When I was a young coach football was more localised and less global. People didn’t know each other so well and they hated each other much more because we were from one place and not from another.”?

“Today even in the hardest derbies you have people greeting each other before a game – you couldn’t see that 25 years ago. The tank of hate was much bigger than it is now before the big games. That has changed.”