Matt Maher sat down with Jonny Drury to discuss the latest Aston Villa PSR revelations.
After the financial issues of Villa's transfer window, it has been revealed just how close the club came to breaking rules and risking a points deduction.
Jonny and Matt discuss the revelations and why the PSR and UEFA regulations have punished Villa for achieving Champions League success.
After the financial issues of Villa's transfer window, it has been revealed just how close the club came to breaking rules and risking a points deduction.
Jonny and Matt discuss the revelations and why the PSR and UEFA regulations have punished Villa for achieving Champions League success.
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SportsTranscript
00:00Hello. Welcome to Expressenstab.com. My name is Jonny Durie. I'm here with Chief Sports
00:11Writer and Aston Villa correspondent, Matt Mayer, to talk Aston Villa and the pieces
00:17that have come out today, you will have seen in the Expressenstab, about Aston Villa's
00:23summer of FFP and dealing with what was described by the hierarchy of Villa as a ticking time
00:28bomb to meet FFP regulations. Villa fans will remember earlier in June, there was a
00:33bit of a scramble to, well, I say a bit, a big scramble to meet financial fair play regulations.
00:40A number of players left, the likes of Douglas Luiz even, who were sold to Juventus and players
00:47coming and going. And Matt, I just want to have a bit of a reflection really on the piece
00:50that you've written and I know you sat down with some of the big players at Villa to discuss
00:56this recently. And I'm sure for a lot of Villa fans today, it will be quite alarming
01:01as to how close Villa kind of got to potentially breaching these PSR FFP rules.
01:10Well I think we all knew they were close. I think we knew, you know, why those deals
01:14were being done. The deals that were done in June, obviously the sale of Douglas Luiz,
01:18the sale of Mairi Kelemen to Chelsea and Timo Robbenham to Everton. I think we all knew
01:25why those deals were getting done at the time and why they needed to be done pretty quickly
01:28that the end of Villa's accounting year was going to be June 30th and they needed to raise
01:33funds. We kind of knew that. I think what this has done is kind of put a bit more detail,
01:38you know, a bit more flesh on the bone and understanding just why, you know, just how
01:44close they were to, you know, to the limits. And well, obviously how far that they were
01:51under the limits, how much they needed to raise, how much they needed to do it quickly
01:55and the sheer complexity of that, of the Douglas Luiz sale and, you know, the fact that it only
02:03went through on June 30th or hours before the deadline shows how kind of how tough
02:11the early weeks of the summer were for Villa. For Monchi, the president of football operations
02:17and Damir Vidigani, the kind of director of football ops who is kind of the right-hand
02:23man for both Monchi and Unai Emery, you know, they kind of worked round the clock to get kind of
02:31these deals done and to get Villa, you know, under the PSR limits so they wouldn't face a
02:38potential penalty they feared they were going to get between 10 and 12 points had they done
02:42nothing, had they just left it. And then that kind of follows on to what has happened the rest
02:47of the summer where obviously Villa did break their kind of the transfer record again to sign
02:53Amadou Anana but then sold Moussa Diaby for 51 million at their former record signing. And then
03:00of course, as we spoke last week, that the kind of the final kind of weeks of the window were a
03:05little quiet, perhaps a bit quieter than people expected. And this kind of explains why really
03:12what Villa didn't want to do was create an issue where they're in the same position again
03:18next summer of basically having to, you know, get players off the books early on. So it's
03:24really interesting because obviously they had to, you know, they had to raise funds,
03:28but they feel they've done it in such a way that they have not compromised the squad. You know,
03:34they could have taken the easy option and put Oli Watkins on the market. They could have taken,
03:39you know, they could have sold Amy Martinez. There was an offer for him.
03:43They could have sold Jacob Ramsey, but they didn't want to do that. And, you know, so they've kind of
03:48been faced with this time, you know, as Damien said, it was a bomb and they were there to cut
03:55the cable, but they've done it in such a way that they feel has caused the least amount of
04:01disruption. And, you know, they feel they've come out of the summer pretty well considering the
04:06cards they were holding at the start. In that piece as well, both of them have spoken about,
04:11you know, the rules and the contrasting rules of, you know, there's PSR with the Premier League.
04:16You've got the UEFA sort of financial rules as well, how they sort of
04:20kind of work against each other. And it seems like they spoke very passionately about,
04:25you know, these rules are sort of maybe hindering clubs like Fenerbahce sort of come out of nowhere,
04:31not out of nowhere, but, you know, risen in the last couple of years to get into the
04:34Champions League places. And now they're having to juggle all these different financial rules
04:38that are going against each other. Well, I completely, you know, I think, look,
04:43the one thing that everyone can agree on is that we need some kind of financial controls.
04:47You know, otherwise Manchester City and Newcastle are just going to challenge for the Premier League
04:53title every year because they are owned by nation states. They cannot, as you and Klopp
04:57have said, they cannot go bust. They don't have to run like businesses. You need some kind of
05:03controls. But I think that, you know, I think Gamian in a couple of sentences summed up,
05:09you know, the problem with PSR, the Premier League, is effectively, you know, you need to
05:16build revenues. Well, how do you build revenues? You build revenues by winning. How do you win?
05:21You spend money. But you can't spend money without building the revenues. So effectively Villa,
05:26you know, and other clubs get locked in this cycle and they feel there is this ceiling
05:32where they cannot properly challenge the, you know, the big boys. Another issue for Villa,
05:37I think, that burns them is that they have no debt. They're owned by billionaires. They don't
05:42owe money to anyone. You've got Man United who have a colossal amount of debt, but are not,
05:47you know, there's no issue, you know, you're allowed that amount of debt. There are no rules
05:51against that. But Man United obviously have huge revenues, so far more flexibility than Villa.
05:59And I do think they've hit on a big issue there with the PSR rules, with financial fair play.
06:05You know, the system does count against those, you know, aspirational clubs. It does kind of
06:10keep everybody, you know, it maintains the status quo. Now, there's not, you know,
06:16it's very difficult to come up with a system that is going to work for everybody. You know,
06:21it's easy to say, well, it's wrong. I think coming up with a system that works is far tougher. But
06:26I think what is clear, and obviously, you know, more big news last night with Leicester,
06:31you know, kind of avoiding, you know, a points deduction this season, and effectively a
06:35technicality, you know, which is further, you know, embarrassment for kind of the Premier League is
06:41that these rules are not fit for purpose. And I think there's perhaps an argument that once they,
06:48I mean, they have agreed they're not fit for purpose, effectively, they are changing them,
06:51but they are still in place this season. And I'm a bit puzzled, I think, and I'm not the
06:55only one who's puzzled as to why, you know, that has been maintained for, you know, these rules
07:00that clearly are going to be pushed out, are going to be maintained for another season before they
07:07change them and fall more into line with the UEFA rules, which are, you know, still have their
07:13limits, you know, their issues, but are kind of, at least they're kind of going to match up.
07:19But, yeah, I think big frustration at PSR, you know, and the position that it has put,
07:26you know, Villa and other clubs, you know, the argument, I suppose, going on a bit here,
07:31but I think one of the arguments would be, well, you don't have to spend, you know,
07:35the club has put themselves in, they know the rules, they signed up to the rules,
07:38and they put themselves in this position by spending, you know, the money they have.
07:43The flip side of that is, and the argument that Damien and Monchi would make and did make,
07:48is that Villa have gone in the space of 18 months and been, you know,
07:51relegation contenders or mid-table to a Champions League club.
07:57They've moved too quickly, you know, they've been punished for moving too quickly,
08:01and that they're in a realm now where if they want to sign Champions League players,
08:05they're going to cost a certain amount of money, you know, but you can't, you know,
08:09Villa don't have the revenues to stay, you know, to then stay within the rules.
08:14So, it's kind of, you know, they're a Champions League club without Champions League money.
08:18Where there are clubs that aren't in the Champions League, which do have Champions
08:21League money, the likes of Chelsea, you know, who were in the competition for 20 years,
08:25Manchester United, Tottenham. So, there is that feeling of unfairness, certainly.