Uefa: Clubs Should Follow Arsenal Model

UEFA has held up Premier League club Arsenal as the financial model that all European football clubs should follow as the governing body prepares to implement tough new financial restrictions.

From the 2011-12 season, clubs must break-even over a rolling three-year period or risk a possible ban from UEFA European competitions.

UEFA compared Arsenal’s approach to that of clubs with super-rich owners with general secretary Gianni Infantino stating: ‘What model waits for a knight rider on a horse and then rides away?’

Having moved to the Emirates Stadium in 2006, Arsenal now turn over more than £300m a year (including revenue from property sales) and made a pre-tax profit of £35m in 2009.

Added Infantino: ‘Ten years ago Arsenal reported less income than Chelsea, Liverpool and Newcastle. Now it is more than those clubs and in 2009 more than double Newcastle’s. This shows what is possible with good management and careful investment.’

In recent years, the Premier League has seen an influx of wealthy foreign businessmen acquiring control of clubs and embarking on lavish spending on players. This has left some at risk of failing to adhere to UEFA’s impending restrictions.

With recent losses of £121m, Manchester City would appear to be the English club with most to do to satisfy UEFA’s rules. City, who have embarked on an unprecedented spending in the wake of the 2009 takeover of the club by billionaire Arab tycoon Sheikh Mansour, have already sent club officials for talks with European football’s governing body to discuss how they can comply with new regulations.

UEFA president Michel Platini does not foresee a problem with City after revealing that he had been given personal assurances by the club.

‘Last year in Abu Dhabi, I met up with the owner of Manchester City and he promised they would live with the rules and regulations.’

There will be some leeway for big-spending clubs as they look to reduce their outlay. During the first two seasons that the rules are in force, clubs will be allowed to overspend by a total of £37m, a sum that will be reduced on a sliding scale for each three-year reporting period that follows. In addition, clubs will be permitted an unlimited investment in stadium infrastructure and youth academies.

Under the new rules, UEFA would place clubs at risk of overspending in a special category and closely monitor them.

UEFA has previously voiced its specific concern about the financial state of Premier League clubs, some of which – like Manchester United or Liverpool (prior to their takeover in October last year) – have taken on large levels of debt.

However, Platini insisted that the new rules are not designed to target Premier League clubs in order to curb their success in the Champions League, in which an English club reached the final for five straight years prior to the 2009-10 campaign.

‘I want to be proud to have been pro-active and not [to have] ignored a problem everyone was aware of but no one wished to take on.

‘There will be no witch hunt. If a club does not fall in line and does not apply the same rules as everybody else, they would have to live with the consequences.’

UEFA’s latest figures illustrate that clubs across Europe have yet to curb their financial outlay in order to fall in line with the impending restrictions.

Its review showed that more than half of 655 clubs reported a loss in 2009 and that the combined deficit across Europe’s 53 football nations was £1bn.

Spending on player wages is up almost 10%, with clubs spending 64% of their income on these and other staff expenses.

European Club Association chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge and his 197 members are fully behind UEFA’s new proposals.