New Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca has called for the Premier League to change their financial rules. He claims that clubs currently feel "compelled" to sell academy players. The Chief Executive of the Professional Footballers Association, Maheta Molango, also said the rules were “nonsensical” and “counterproductive”. But what are the rules, and how might they affect you? I had the pleasure of sitting down and talking to Dr Dan Plumley who is a Principal Lecturer in Sport Finance in the Sheffield Business School at Sheffield Hallam University. Dr Plumley's research career has been defined by examining the economics and finance of professional team sports. For example, Dr Plumley is the co-author of The Economic and Finance of Professional Team Sports, regularly contributes to media pieces and is also a Chartered Global Management Accountant (CGMA). He is the perfect person to help unpick this matter.
Chris: Hello Dan and thank you for agreeing to do this.
Dr Plumley: My pleasure
Chris: So to start with, this issue has its roots in Financial Fair Play (FFP) stuff, isn't it? So let's spend some time understanding what FFP is for anybody who doesn't know what that is.
Dr Plumley: Yes. Let's start from there then. So FFP was introduced by UEFA in 2011 as a response to clubs in financial crises across Europe; namely spending outside their means and high levels of debt. FFP was designed, in principle, to force clubs to spend within their means, to become more sustainable.
