World football's governing body FIFA is on a collision course with the European Union over its plans to introduce a maximum quota for foreign players. FIFA's president Sepp Blatter says he is convinced that the EU will endorse his proposal to have no more than five foreigners per football team. The "6+5" plan, which was overwhelmingly endorsed by the FIFA Congress on Friday, also includes a rule to have at least six home-grown players per team.
But the European Commission insists that this contravenes EU labour laws and cannot be introduced in European clubs:
"No hope"
"They have no hope at all of getting this through," says John McDonald, spokesman for sports at the Commission. "The FIFA rule is based on discrimination on the grounds of nationality, which is incompatible with Community law."
Home grown talent
But he will face similar opposition at the Parliament. Belgian MEP Ivo Bellet, the special rapporteur on football, explains that the EU shares "the same objectives as FIFA of boosting home-grown talent so as not to have to draft in expensive foreign players".
Bellet is urging Mr Blatter to follow the lead of UEFA, the European governing body, which plans to have at least eight 'home-trained' players by 2009, without specific reference to their nationality. "This is the only method that's compatible with the EU Treaty," he adds.
Tough on small countries
Most of Europe's major football clubs stand to lose from the FIFA rules and are opposed. Dutch club PSV Eindhoven complains that the best Dutch players were being snapped up by wealthy foreign teams. As a consequence, small countries needed the freedom of bringing in foreign players themselves to be able to compete, spokesman Pedro Salazar told Radio Netherlands Worldwide.
Tags: FIFA, football, Johan Cruijff, Pele, Sepp Blatter, soccer