Financial fair play is it true to its commitments? – The Equipe.fr

Representatives of clubs, the union of professional or even of the European Club Association (ECA) meet on Monday at the headquarters of the UEFA in Nyon (Switzerland) for a progress five months after the first sanctions imposed under the financial fair play. The system, which prohibits clubs participating in UEFA competitions (Champions League and Europa League) to spend more money than they are earning, is carried by Michel Platini, president of the organization that manages European football since 2008
Today, most clubs support the new rules, like ACE and its chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, while others, as the president of PSG Nasser Al-Khelaïfi (whose club was sanctioned) criticize a system “unfair” that “protects the big clubs’ . Representatives of the PSG and Manchester City, another disgruntled club, will attend the meeting and intend to propose new directions.
Meanwhile whether the financial fair play will continue in its current form or no, another question arises: the current system is like in the original idea of ​​the boss of UEFA? To find out, return on declarations and principles outlined by Michel Platini when the financial fair play was still in draft form distance, and the status of their application.

“Before sanction, it will prevent” (07/11/2009)

FALSE Michel Platini has always presented the financial fair play system as a positive, wanting “help clubs markets” rather than the “hurt “, and insisted on the preventive aspect rather than punishment. Five years after these statements, the nine clubs sanctioned by the trial chamber of the instance of the Club Financial Control (ICFC) may wonder where is the prevention aspect of the system, unless the President of UEFA have had in mind the set regular guard launched for clubs since 2010 to ensure that the penalties would one day become a reality.

“The fair- financial play involves reducing the number of players “(31/12/2011)

FALSE Of Platini grievances vis-à-vis clubs like Manchester City, there is the tendency to stack players that leads to effective sometimes well in excess of thirty players. For the moment, no general measures have been taken to regulate the size of the workforce of European clubs. PSG and Manchester City have just seen the maximum number of players they could sign up for the European competitions from 25 to 21

“The fair- financial play will allow a very detailed observation of the accounts of all clubs “(05

HALF TRUE If UEFA well assesses health clubs through surveys on their accounts, the criteria it uses to calculate their results do not take into account all financial transactions. As recently explained Olivier Richard, president of the National Directorate of Management Control (DNCG) In our paper ( Team of 05/20/2014) “ Financial fair play is distancing pure accounting and its assessments are less objective. “ ” We are in a situation of pretrial negotiation , he continued. But this is due to the fact that UEFA generated assessment indicators somewhat subjective. She has no alternative but to negotiate with the club to see what will give him as penalties. This can not be an objective but subjective negotiation. in thin , it gives an amount to be paid and a series of measures that the club accepts or not. And it may appear as decided at the customer’s head. “
difficult in these circumstances to say that watching club accounts by UEFA is” very push . ” Rather, it is to sort out the “good” and “bad” revenue and “good” and “bad” investments. The long-term investment in stadiums, training centers or training is for example not considered.

“The teams that play in our tournaments have unanimously agreed to our principles” (15/09/2009)

TRUE (at the time) When the executive committee of UEFA has confirmed for the first time the principle of Financial Fair Play in September 2009, a club is clearly in the viewfinder of Michel Platini: Manchester City, bought in the summer of 2008 by an Abu Dhabi investment fund and free-spending since. The club was far from being enthusiastic about the new rules, but not involved in any European competition in 2009/10, which enabled Platini to claim a unanimous support. PSG, meanwhile, has joined the ranks of the enemies of financial after its purchase by the Qatari royal family fair play in the summer of 2011