Premier League Going to 7 Players on the Bench

[BigDPW]

http://www.teamtalk.com/football/sto...118300,00.html

The Premier League have announced that all 20 clubs will be allowed to name seven substitutes in matches from next season.


A number of clubs and managers have suggested the idea to expand the number of substitutes from five to seven and the Premier League have now approved the rule change.
After a meeting of the 20 member clubs the change has been approved to replicate the regulations in European and international games.
Despite the increase in the amount of substitutes managers will still only be allowed to make three substitutions in a game.
The news will be a boost to managers who have complained that the current regulations does not allow them to keep all members of their squad happy.

[BigDPW]

I think this is good news. I have always wished I could name 7 subs to my squads when I played with Spurs in FM/WWSM.

[Crapshoot]

Heh - good rule change, but it obviously benefits deeper squads more.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

I've been playing a WWSM game and I'm currently coaching in Italy. They have 7 players on the bench. It allows a lot more freedom concerning substituting based on strategic need, especially in the midfield.

[MIJB#19]

They've always late with joining the rest of the world with these kind of rules.

But the real fun has yet to start, I wonder how quickly the Premier League teams will adapt to the upcomong 6+5 rule. FIFA is working on getting a rule in place that allows only 5 foreigners in the starting lineup of any club team around the world.

[Critch]

I thought the EPL's announcement that they may add an extra week of games and play them in the middle east, SE Asia and North America would have been the big news here.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/foot...em/7232390.stm

[Big Fo]

Originally Posted by MIJB#19

They've always late with joining the rest of the world with these kind of rules.

But the real fun has yet to start, I wonder how quickly the Premier League teams will adapt to the upcomong 6+5 rule. FIFA is working on getting a rule in place that allows only 5 foreigners in the starting lineup of any club team around the world.

Won't it be hard for them to get that past the EU? I don't like the idea anyway, the quality of play would suffer.

Seven subs is good news and long overdue.

[BigDPW]

Originally Posted by Crapshoot

Heh - good rule change, but it obviously benefits deeper squads more.

I think that all the Premiere League teams are deep enough to benefit from this rule. Should make for alot more options down the stretch in games. With the current 5 sub benches the subs are pretty much are as follows - GK, D, M, M, F

Now if I was managing with the 7 subs I would go with this - GK, Central Defender, Full Back/Wing Back, Central Midfielder, Winger, Forward - but there are alot more options going to be open for the managers now. Also I think this will allow stronger teams to bring alond younger players more often in the 1st team and insert them late in games that are already decided rather than agonize with wasting a bench spot in a game that may be close with a youngster.

[MIJB#19]

Originally Posted by Big Fo

Won't it be hard for them to get that past the EU? I don't like the idea anyway, the quality of play would suffer.

Seven subs is good news and long overdue.

The EU would be a problem yes. Heck, a governing body like the UN might as well get involved. If they play it well though, they could point out that the identity of local products is at stake, the people in charge in the EU seem to be open to that type of arguments. I'm not sure they can pull it off, but FIFA plays on the idea to maintain the identity of all footballing countries. The non-qualification of England is probably the biggest reason why people take it serious (even though England has never been the type of country to be a lock for big tournaments like Germany, Italy and Spain, so this could be just a "normal" down swing in the performance trend).

Teams could still stack their teams with "foreigners", but in most of the top leagues it would force teams to bring back home grown players at the top of the league. Not just the Premier League would be touched, any league would. Italy's Serie A, Spanish Liga, 1. Bundesliga in Germany. The downside, of course, will be that a lot of players will be at risk to get unemployed. Afterall, if you're allowed to only play 5 foreigners, it doesn't make much sense to even have more than like 8.

There are currently around 300 foreigners in the Premier League (about 15 per team), it would mean half of them, if not more, would be forced to leave that league and either go back home or be a top 'foreigner' in a second tier league like Scotland, Portugal, the Netherlands, or the USA's MLS (who right now probably have the best (only?) regulations on this issue already in place). But as those leagues are stacked with foreigners as well, those leagues will see the same trend of shoving away half of their foreign players. It'll go on and on and eventually (rough estimation now), there might be like 1,000 players forced out of the league they play in, probably even double or triple of that.

Nothing unnatural to business, but given that it'll be unemployment (re-employment?) based on someone's nationality, it's impossible to ignore the implication of discrimination and gnawing on one of the fundamental issues of the United Nations. In the end te second tier dutch players return to the Netherlands, ditto on players from like Romania, the USA, Japan, Australia.

I got to see it before I believe it, but it would fit within the FIFA's way of life to get it done with or without the permission from countries' governing bodies. This could be a huge test for sports and politics (not) getting innertwined...

[ISiddiqui]

If they play it well though, they could point out that the identity of local products is at stake, the people in charge in the EU seem to be open to that type of arguments.

I doubt they'd fall for that though. Hard to make that argument for a labor market. If this is adopted, one of the reasons for the EU will be weakened (free movement of labor).

[MIJB#19]

Originally Posted by ISiddiqui

I doubt they'd fall for that though. Hard to make that argument for a labor market. If this is adopted, one of the reasons for the EU will be weakened (free movement of labor).

Oh, I hear ya. It's one of the cornerstones of the EU. I doubt the EU would be open to allowing this kind of selectivity. But there are protected local brands all around the member countries. I'd say the only way FIFA even stands a chance to get it through is by playing the 'local brand' card.

[MIJB#19]

sorry for the bit of a threadjack, by the way.