According to a senior English soccer executive, a number of the English Premier League’s foreign owners are against the relegation and promotion system.
Currently, 10 out of the 20 Premier League clubs are owned by foreign investors. If the new trend in foreign ownership continues, the Premier League could see the excitement of relegation and promotion battles go right out the window.
“There are a number of overseas-owned clubs already talking about bringing about the avoidance of promotion and relegation in the Premier League,” said League Managers’ Association chief executive Richard Bevan.
“If we have four or five more new owners, that could happen.
“Certainly you’ll find that with American owners and you’ll find that with some of the Asian owners (they have been talking about scrapping relegation),” Bevan continued.
“If you look at sports all around the world and you look at sports owners trying to work out how to invest to make money, you will find that most of them like the idea of franchises.
“If you take particularly American owners, without doubt, there have been a number of them looking at having more of a franchise situation and that would mean no promotion or relegation.
“Obviously if I was an American owner and I owned a football club or I was an Indian owner I might be thinking I would like to see no promotion or relegation, my investment is going to be safer and my shares are going to go up in value.”
As of now, Aston Villa, Sunderland and Premier League giants Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester United are all owned by Americans, while Blackburn are owned by Indians and Queens Park Rangers by Malaysians.
There is no denying that foreign ownership is taking over the Premier League and unfortunately so.
Why Relegation is Essential to English Football
Did you follow the English Premier League last season?
If you did, you know how exciting the battle to avoid relegation can be.
Without relegation and promotion, clubs will have less incentive to go the “extra mile” to compete with the biggest clubs in the league.
As a result, the competition in the Premier League will surely lose some of its intensity due to the “lesser” teams getting more and more complacent.
The current relegation-promotion system allows for the top three teams in the second-tier (English Championship) to be promoted to the first-tier (English Premier League), while the bottom three teams in the Premier League are relegated to the Championship.
The same system is utilized in the third-tier (League One), fourth-tier (League Two) and in most leagues throughout Europe.
This story will definitely get a lot of attention in the next few days, so I want to get your opinion on the potential abolishing of the current relegation-promotion system. Is it a good or bad idea?
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