Aston Villa owner Nassef Sawiris has criticised the Premier League’s Profitability and Sustainability Rules as they continue to negatively impact us this summer.
The expectation is that Villa will have to green light a high-profile exit before the end of June to avoid breaching the PSR parameters and thus not run the risk of being sanctioned.
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Speculation is intensifying that it will be Douglas Luiz who is sacrificed, and so despite having finished fourth in the Premier League last season to qualify for the Champions League and with no debt, having to sell one of our best players to start the summer unsurprisingly hasn’t gone down well.
As we’ve seen over the last five years, Sawiris and Wes Edens have been brilliant in spearheading our progress on and off the pitch to go from the Championship to the Champions League, but naturally there is a significant gap that must now be bridged if we want to solidify our place at the top end of the Premier League.
Having failed with a proposal last week to raise the accepted losses over a three-year period under PSR from £105m to £135m with a vote among top-flight clubs rejecting it, Villa will be forced into difficult and unwanted decisions now as we try to end the summer transfer window with a stronger squad.
Sawiris though isn’t impressed with the current system and the limitations that the rules put on clubs trying to build and be more competitive, while the idea of having to sell homegrown players in particular given they represent ‘pure profit’, is surely evidence enough that although a lot of the regulations are important and fair, they don’t all promote the idea of competitiveness.
“Some of the rules have actually resulted in cementing the status quo more than creating upward mobility and fluidity in the sport,” he told the Financial Times. “The rules do not make sense and are not good for football.”
He added: “Managing a sports team has become more like being a treasurer or a bean counter rather than looking at what your team needs.
“It’s more about creating paper profits, not real profits. It becomes a financial game, not a sporting game.”
The Athletic report that Sawiris is even considering taking legal action against PSR, and so it remains to be seen if we’re successful in that if we do proceed down that route.
In the more immediate future though, it won’t have any impact, and so Unai Emery, Monchi and the rest of the hierarchy will have to find a way to balance our books this month and give ourselves more financial strength and spending power moving forward through both player sales and maximising commercial and off-the-pitch opportunities as far as that can take us.