About the beautiful game / Dan Fitch / 12 May 2009 / Leave a comment

The argument that Chelsea's elimination at the hands of Barcelona was all a Michel Platini-inspired conspiracy doesn't wash off with Dan Fitch. But there might however be some truth in the fact that Platini doesn't much care for the Premier League...

You would like to think that the age-old resentment between the English and the French would have died out by now.

When I visited Paris earlier this year, my wife and I were having breakfast at our hotel, pretending that an assortment of bread and some black coffee were really preferable to a decent fry up.

We overheard a South African couple at a nearby table ask the hotel manager how their business had been affected by the economic downturn.

The manager then went into a diatribe about how she thought it was a good thing, because it had devalued the pound and to quote: "Stop the English thinking they are better than us".

Our French host then remembered that we were English and looked over at us in a state of embarrassment. Naturally though, due to the fact that the English are the inventors of embarrassment, we were more embarrassed than she. It's as if we'd tried to out-shrug her.

It's not just the proprietors of over-priced, ramshackle Parisian hotels who have got it in for the English and the way we flash the cash. UEFA president Michel Platini certainly has a bee in his bonnet in regards to the amount of financial power the Premier League enjoys.

This has lead some people to speculate that Platini is the mastermind behind some kind of grand conspiracy, to sabotage Chelsea's attempt to reach the Champions League final.

Get real. Platini wasn't stood on a grassy knoll overlooking Stamford Bridge as the Norwegian referee Tom Henning Ovrebo blundered his way through the Chelsea v Barcelona match.

It's true that Platini probably didn't want an all-English final, but then neither did I and nobody has accused me of fixing the match. Last season's game between Manchester United and Chelsea was surprisingly entertaining (especially that bit when John Terry fell over) but that doesn't mean that I want to see a repeat of it.

The only people who wanted to see Chelsea get to the final, were Chelsea's fans and staff. For the neutral, Manchester United v Barcelona was the dream climax to the season. United can currently be backed at [2.0] to win the Champions League, with Barcelona at [1.98].

It is true though, that Platini has hardly had a good word to say about English football since taking over the UEFA presidency, but some of the points made have been valid.

Whilst his compatriots can't get the immigrants out of the camps at Calais and onto the first boat to England quick enough, Platini thinks we should be accepting less foreigners to our shores.

He blamed England's failure to qualify for Euro 2008, on the amount of foreign players in our Premier League and has called for measures to limit the amount of non-nationals that can be fielded by a side.

Platini also has no time for foreign owners of football clubs. He described Manchester City's bid for Kaka as 'unethical' and thinks that it is unfair for clubs to spend from much more than they earn from football-related revenues.

It would be easier to agree with Platini's argument, were his own playing career not something of a contradiction to his current beliefs. Did he spend his whole career in France?

No. Platini spent his peak earning years at Juventus, when Serie A was the most financially powerful league in the world. Juve were owned by the Agnelli family, who were also in charge at Fiat. Don't tell me that Juventus' finances weren't bolstered from the sale of the occasional Punto.

Platini basically wants a Champions League that is not dominated by one country and with a greater variety of teams involved. This is laudable, but he's going about it the wrong way.

His notions of salary caps and ownership laws will never come to fruition, because football is a business and it is the clubs, rather than UEFA, that wield the power.

What Platini has got the power to do, is to subtly alter the Champions League, to make things more competitive. If he doesn't want all-English finals, he could start by changing the laws that prohibit sides from the same country meeting each other until the quarters.

UEFA have changed the rules of the qualifying rounds, in a way that could see Arsenal meet a Spanish or Italian side next season.

How ironic, that in trying to curb the power of the Premier League, Platini risks upsetting another Frenchman who doesn't have much time for the English.