Would England's football team do less badly if league clubs were restricted from so many foreign plyers?

Question

The day before England were humiliated yet again in Tel Aviv, Steve Coppell said in a newspaper in Reading, "England will continue to struggle unless top Premier League clubs produce more home bred players". At start of current campaign, there were 340 registered foreigners playing in top flight and only 11 English born players starting last fixture before Israel V England match. Manchester United and Chelsea had 4 each, Liverpool 2 and Arsenal 1. Would some such rule like in County cricket (say) that no more than two non British born players in any English league club be allowed in any League or Cup match help England to do less appalingly in international matches in future as Coppel contends?

Answer 1

I don't think it would make a world of difference. The problems with England go much deeper than the demographic make up of the Premiership. For a start England are too rigid in the way they play. Where is the fluid, free-flowing football? The Dutch are known for Total Football where every player on the pitch can slot into another player's position and happily sit there for five, ten minutes each game. England's players can't play like that, every player has his set position and that is it. England's tactics are all wrong. The mindset is get it to Rooney, Owen, Crouch or whoever else is upfront and let them score. Other teams see through that and it becomes easy to defend against that kind of play.

France only became a World Class team after setting up national academies across the country to bring youth players through the system and to get them to play the way France wanted them to play. When you rely on individual club's to bring youth players through the results are never going to be what you want. Arsene Wenger has always said that a player's passport means nothing to him because results on the pitch mean more to him. Same applies to Liverpool, Man Utd and Chelsea, none of the big four care how England perform because it has no bearing on how well they as a club do. I mean what is the point of the FA other than sponsoring a good cup tournament once a year and wasting millions on a stadium that isn't really needed when there are so many world class stadiums already built across the country?

Furthermore, Wenger has always said that English players cost too much for a club of Arsenal's financial power. Why do you think Arsenal has so many African players on the books? Because ten grand a week is more than enough for the likes of Toure and Eboue but for the likes Lampard and "Cashley" Cole it isn't nearly enough. So you can blame the English players for their greed mentality as well. The opportunities may be fewer for them in the Premiership because they price themselves out of the game with their ridiculous wage demands. Clubs can only afford so many Rooneys and Terrys before they have to look elsewhere to fill the team. It is therefore clear that English players think of the money first, club honours second and national pride a distant third, in terms of priorities.

Answer 2

I personally be live it will help,they need to put a limit on foreign players,maybe between 2-3 players per team that way they will give an opportunity to the young talent,If you take a look at the Brazilian League its very rare that a club has a foreign player,you just don't see over there and I think that's is why the produce so much talent,now on the other hand look at the Spain National team,they've struggled lately and I think is because the have tooooo many foreign players playing in their league and that takes an opportunity to the young guys,there are some leagues that have a limit of foreign players already,for example Mexico has a limit of 4 per club,Argentina has a limit of 3 per club,I strongly be live they should implement a similar rule if they don't already have it.

Answer 3

The english youth players don t have a chance these days look at the reserves and youth teams of most premiership sides they are full of foreigners aswell as the first team.

The clubs realy do need to do something about it you look at years ago there was a rooney or gerrard at every club but now we are lucky to get one promising english player come through the ranks a season.

Then the problem when we get a good prospect the media hypes them up so much that they can never meet the expectations put on them ie Rooney.

I think that every team should have a limit of three foreign players in each match then we can get a better idea of who is playing well enough to get a call up.

Answer 4

Well if that's the case why didn't we win the cup in the seventies or the eighties when there were'n't loads of foreigners here, if you remove Ronaldo Henry Drogba etc you won't see our teams competing on the best stages in europe as apart from an handful of English players the foreign one's are far better and the English players are too overpriced.
Ferdinand 28 mill ? SWP 20 mill Carrick probably more then the entire Arsenal team so there's your answer English players too overpriced and overrated as well. If a player has class he come through no matter where he was born.

Answer 5

Because of the large amounts of foreign players in the Premiership, none of the youth players are being able to break into the first team squads. There are only a few who have been able to get into the first team squads. We dont have any real world class strikers for England because of people like Drogba and Henry.
If England doesn't sort it out somehow we could end up like Northern Ireland and Scotland, who used to have great players like Best and Andy Gray, who have players in the championship and lower.

Answer 6

No not at all. England have the best sqaad in the world, they have superstars in nearly every position. All half decent english players play week in week out in the premiership and the ones who dont obviously arent good enough for top international level.

The problem they have is that there is intense rivalry within the camp regarding utd liverpool and chelsea players wh are the spinse of their starting eleven. If the put their differences aside and could bond well together as a team, they would win international competitions.

Look at who they have

Defense: G. Neville, wes brown, terry, ferdinand, a.cole, carragher,

Midfield: becks, lennon, stevie G, lamps, J.cole, jenas, reo-coker, carrick, hargreeves,

Forwards: Rooney, andy johnson, owen, bent, defoe

thats a top squad with alot of depth

Answer 7

That's all backwards. You are saying that english players arn't good enough because they don't get to play in the premiership. Instead, England players don't play in the premiership because they arent good enough. They can play in any of the other divisions, or in any other country, but it is the English STYLE of play that doesn't work - all long passes and physical tackles, instead of short passes and skilled footwork. England-style soccer is very entertaining, and English fans are the the greatest, but it won't win many championships.

Answer 8

Yes i Agree There are to many foriegn players over here now and our own guys are not getting a chance.Also why do the players have to come from the premiership?lots of good players in the lower divisions who could do a better job than these so called stars,who don't deserve to be paid.

Answer 9

It wouldn't make any difference restricting foreign players.If the English lads where good enough they'd come through anyway.

Answer 10

Yes