A necessary change in the rules for loan players
For a club like Manchester City, with an astronomical wage bill, the prospect of trying to offload the vast swathes of players you have acquired in recent years is a daunting one indeed. Few clubs want to pay similar prices that were initially paid for these players and even fewer want to pay the wages that said players have become accustomed to. Subsequently the option of loaning out unwanted players at a club like Manchester City is an attractive one. They might not be able to sell their players, but at least they can reduce the wage bill. There is nothing wrong with this in itself. Any club who has unwanted players on their pay roll has a responsibility to that player’s career to ensure that they facilitate as much playing time as possible for that player. However when any club allows a player to leave on loan, is it right that the player on loan should be allowed to compete against all of their parent club’s rivals without ever being allowed to face their parent club itself?
Emmanuel Adebayor is the most poignant example but he is not the only one. For a club such as City, for whom money is not an issue, it almost seems to work out to their advantage that they should be able to loan out a top class striker to a rival and therefore allow him to play for Spurs against Chelsea, Man Utd, Arsenal and Liverpool without having the danger of ever being able to play in matches against City. If Tottenham are paying the majority of his wages then this situation, which benefits City as much as it does Tottenham, has more than a slight negative tint when it comes to the issue of fair competition. Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger is one of the managers to speak out against such scenarios:
“If he [Adebayor] is on loan, he should be able to play against everybody. That is the only thing I believe. Before, remember, you had a choice. There was a period when you had the choice [of allowing on loan players to play against their parent club] and I never, never refused the choice. I always said ‘yes you can play against us’ even though, one time, we loaned Francis Jeffers and he scored against us. I allowed Jermaine Pennant to play against us with Leeds. I always allowed the players to play. I would allow Nicklas Bendtner to play against us [for Sunderland].”
Is Wenger right? Or is he just bitter that he took a moral stance that in retrospect it seems nobody noticed? A bit of both no doubt, his presumptions that all managers should follow his set of principals often leads to him unreasonably feeling jaded but he does also make a fair point about loan players. How can we claim that our league is fair if certain players are not allowed to play against certain teams? If a club decides to loan out a player then they have to accept that their choice has both advantages and disadvantages. Visions of Sheik Mansour having his cake and eating spring to mind.
If a club were in fact rich enough to not be in a position where they were forced to sell their players then it is even conceivable that they would loan out players instead of selling them for the exact purpose of allowing them to play against their rivals and thus indirectly help their own position in domestic competitions. Clearly this would be an illegality of sorts, to suggest it even sounds mildly outrageous yet whether it is intended or not by the parent club this is exactly what is happening. You have to consider that clubs that loan players from other clubs often have to pay transfer fees to do so and also have to pay a percentage of, if not all of, the player’s wages. Therefore they must be entitles to use that player against every single team. People talk about changing back to the system of choice that we had before, I say we should go one step further. We should make it compulsory for players who are loaned out to be allowed to play against their parent club. For the sake of competition and fairness in our league it is a necessity.
Follow me on Twitter @H_Mackay
FREE football app that pays you CASH
Football News 24/7
A player like Adebayor who doesn’t want to play for City is one thing. But what of a young player who is desperately trying to get 1st team action on his club. A player could be very torn in playing against a team that he is still contractually bound to. Maybe there would even be “incentive” not to play well against his parent club. That would be scandalous of course, but could you tell me that it would never happen? No, I think it’s best that players do not play against their parent clubs.
Reply
Hamish Mackay Reply:
January 5th, 2012 at 3:12 pm
But if a player was young then it would still be in the interest of the parent club to send them out on loan in order for them to gain experience and develop in to the player their club hopes they will become. If you send a player out on loan you are effectively admitting that said player is not good enough, therefore there should be no problem with that player playing against their parent club.
Reply
Rupe Reply:
January 5th, 2012 at 4:29 pm
But no-one’s saying the loaning club should be _forced_ to play the loanee against their parent club. In the situation you describe, it should be the choice of the club they’re playing for, whether to use the player or not.
Reply
abbey Reply:
March 15th, 2012 at 2:00 pm
In fairness loaned players should be allowed to face their parent club if they are over 21 years of age. we were told it is an offence for a premier league club to sponsor another club. is loaning a player who will never play against you not sponsoring another club? Mega bucks clubs like Man City can afford to buy 10 top quality strikers and loan them all to lower table clubs so they could help to pull back their main rivals. the current rule is a scam
Reply
If, improbably but not impossibly,City were to be beaten to the title by Spurs, then the joke would be on them. I guess that, at the beginning of the season, they dismissed Spurs’ chance of being anywhere near them come this stage of the season.
Reply
I think if you finish top 5 you shouldn’t be allowed to loan players.
6-10 you can loan 1 player
11-15 … 2 players
16-17 plus newly promoted … 3 players
This would work as a minor handicapping system.
Reply
There may be mileage in changing loan rules so that uber-rich clubs are not encouraged to buy up more talent than they need knowing that like Adebayor they can be loaned out. Perhaps there could be an age limit of say 22 which would allow the development of young players to be progressed, but stop the monopoly of top players at clubs owned by billionaires, just to stop other clubs buying them.
What should not be changed in my view is barring players from playing against their parent clubs. The danger here is the suspicion that loaned players would not play to their full potential against their parent clubs for reasons of loyalty, self-preservation, or indeed corruption. I do not agree that Wenger is taking a moral view here. He is merely being his usual paranoid self where Arsenal’s well-being is involved.
For the reasons I have stated I believe that pushing for loaned players to be allowed to play against their parent clubs is naive, wrong-headed, and in this particular article, motivated by a desire to have Adebayor play against City, whilst disregarding the more general consequences.
Reply
JohnnyB Reply:
January 5th, 2012 at 4:16 pm
Consider. As a player you’ve played well for your loan club but in the game against your parent club you decide to take your foot off the gas. Do you not think your team-mates and manager would notice? Do you not think they’ll give you a rollocking / a spot on the bench for the next game? Players have no loyalty to their clubs (their employers), as is often mentioned when they jump ship for the next payrise. If anyone is being naive here, it’s yourself not the author.
Reply
I do agree with Wenger on this count. One of the few times I have in fact, but if a club loans a player out then he should be allowed to play against every team in that division
Reply
Phil Reply:
January 6th, 2012 at 11:49 am
I would agree with Wenger as well in saying “I would allow Nicklas Bendtner to play against us [for Sunderland].” if it wasn’t for the fact that …
… Arsenal prevented Sunderland from playing Bendtner in the Arsenal v Sunderland game in October.
Maybe that wasn’t Wenger’s decision but it does sound like an empty gesture …
Reply
Those who seem to think players have a ‘loyalty’ to their parent club are somewhat misguided. No player has any loyalty to anyone these days. Take Jamie O’Hara as an example, whilst on loan from Spurs he publicly stated he wanted Fulham to beat Spurs in the FA cup so he could play in the final!…Loyalty?…Where? Players play for themselves and their careers only (not that there is anything wrong with this). Besides, as has been said, if a manager thought his loan star wouldn’t give his all in a game, he wouldn’t pick him. Players play against their boyhood clubs all the time but professionalism dictates they do what they have to do.
Reply
If your a young player being loaned out for the last 6 months of the season to get some experience, will be played every game you are available for the club you are loaned to which is lower down the league, that club is a comfortable 10th in the league which is higher than anyone believed they would be at the start of the season and you come up against your parent club whom you have supported since you were a boy and who you want your career to carry on with and are guaranteed to be playing in the first team next season. your parent club is in a position to win the league and can on the last day of the season against your team and you are the striker, would you score and ruin your parent clubs league ambitions? I dont think so. i know that this situation wouldnt arise too often, but it is a loophole which shudnt be allowed
Reply
I can obviously see were Wengers coming from with this but he’s wrong! There is a hugh gap between Franny Jeffers and the other toot he’s loaned out compared to Ade. Also I find it completely unfair the City can buy up everyone and be in this situation but thats life. When you loan a player its by the parent clubs rules and it makes 100% sense to me
Reply
There should be no loans to clubs in the same divisions. Full stop. The idea of PL teams borrowing players from each other is a farce. I’m a Spurs fan and know that Spurs have benefited from this loan system in two way (we have Ade on loan from a PL rival, and probably loan more players out to PL teams than any other club, eg Jenas, Caulker, Bentley, Keane last season, etc). However it is still wrong. I dont blame Spurs for taking advantage of the rules, I blame the rule makers for being so dumb.
Reply
I would like him to be able to play but if his parent club are still paying part of his wages then that is a major issue and could lead to a dishonest individual helping the wrong side with perhaps an own goal or a sending off. You can not put people in that position.it’s irresponsible.
Reply