Supporters Direct welcomes FA proposals on home grown players”
Supporters Direct (SD), the umbrella group for supporters’ trusts in the UK, has been pleased to note the proposals published yesterday by the FA, aimed at increasing the quantity and quality of English footballers playing in the Premier League first teams.
Like the FA, we believe that it is crucial for the future success of the England senior team that younger English players are given more exposure in the top flight of English football. We warmly welcome these proposals, to reduce the maximum number of foreign players able to take part in a first team squad, to ensure that at least two home grown players are club-trained, and to change the definition of home-grown players to ensure that more genuinely English players are registered as such (by reducing the eligbility age). SD chair Brian Burgess said:
““We greeted the FA Commission’s earlier proposals on the creation of football hubs and a strategy to increase the number of available artifical grass pitches in a similar fashion. We see these proposals as realistic and achievable, and would urge the football authorities to back them publicly and respond positively to the forthcoming consultation. "We believe these proposals to be a good way forward, in contrast to the previous proposals to allow Premier League B teams to compete in Football League competitions, which we now hope will be formally and publicly dropped.”