Peter Corrigan: The verdict is guilt by lack of Association

Premier League club chairmen do not enjoy the best of images at the moment. They have been likened to robber barons, and the description does not seem inapt in the aftermath of the part they played in hustling the Football Association's chief executive, Adam Crozier, out of office a month ago.

There has been an indecent swiftness about the manner in which they have moved in to dismantle the trappings of Crozier's reign at the FA. They have yet to flog off the carpets and curtains at the plush headquarters he set up in Soho Square, but they have been checking the inventory, going through the books and seeing if there is any money to be rescued from the proposed National Football Centre at Burton-on-Trent, or even from the cancellation of the new Wembley, again.

By the time the new man is appointed they should have the corridors of power all nicely sorted out – and bugged and booby-trapped, too, I wouldn't wonder. All the better to impose the sort of ruling élite that the chairman of Fulham, Mohamed Al Fayed, envisaged when the 20 chairmen met earlier this month. Fayed did not actually speak but he circulated a 2,500-word submission for his colleagues to read. They did not get the opportunity to debate what he said but many of us did, because most of the contents were leaked to one or two newspapers and they revealed an attitude that did not delight all his fellow chairmen.

The nub of Fayed's submission was that the top clubs should put their own interests first and foremost and not be dictated to by organisations such as the FA. They may be the governing body of the game, but he said: "I am not prepared to tolerate other people telling me what I can or cannot do with my investment."

You will note that he said "investment" not "club", which some may think significant, and he carried on in the same vein with pronouncements like "we must think of ourselves", and "we must maximise our returns". His message was quite clear – if we look after the pounds the peasants will look after themselves.

After I had written, with some dismay, about Fayed's views I was greatly heartened to receive a call from a Premier League chairman who wished to be disassociated from his remarks.

The chairman, who prefers not to be identified, said: "I would not like anyone to think that Mr Al Fayed's words represent the opinions of us all. We did not get a chance to discuss the views he put forward in his paper.

"There is much more to football than the health of the big clubs. Obviously, our viability is important to us but we cannot detach our ambition from the wellbeing of the game as a whole.

"Football in this country is a fundamental part of the social fabric and as such covers a wide base that includes all levels of the amateur game, women's football and youth and schools football. Each is very important. It is like a pyramid. If the base is allowed to weaken, then it will eventually weaken the apex. So for those at the apex to have no concern for the base is misguided."

Another misconception is that football at the top level is big business. "We're not," the chairman said. "Most Premier League clubs operate in the £40-£80 million range and that doesn't qualify us to be called big businesses.

"What we are is high profile, and this seems to attract an inordinate amount of regulation. This is one of our main problems because we answer to so many authorities. Fifa, Uefa, the FA, Premier League, the academy... all of them involve us in many stringent requirements. It makes our lives so complicated that sometimes you feel you are drowning in a sea of regulation.

"The new transfer-window system is an example. Here is something imposed upon us from Europe and it has caused no end of problems for no obvious benefits. We have yet to experience what will happen when the window opens in January. The basis of our society is free trade but football clubs lead very inhibited existences."

Would that we could hear more of the calmer and more authentic voices from the clubs dealing with real problems instead of the usual self-serving bluster that bellows from the boardrooms of the better-off; they give only the impression of a zest to control everything within reach.

Recent fears expressed in this column that the growth of the clubs' influence will be to the detriment of grass-roots development brought a reaction from the Premier League emphasising that they mean no threat to the funding of the amateur game. "If you take into account all the funding the Premier League and our clubs invest in community, education and social inclusion projects I would not be surprised if our contribution surpasses that of the FA," a spokesman told me.

These are facts and factors that help to balance the notion that the big guns are out to plunder any available resource, but the fact remains that the game's general interests are best governed by a largely independent body. Since that description has fitted the FA for the past 130 years or so, it should be left well alone.

Richard Scudamore, the chief executive of the Premier League, was making encouraging sounds last week and managing not to join in the wholesale rubbishing of Crozier's reign which seems to be fashionable these days. Nevertheless, he managed to strike a couple of alarming chords.

In the next television deal in two years' time the clubs are not expected to suffer the anticipated drop in revenue as long as they deliver more screen fodder. This will mean the permanent division of Premier matches into five on a Saturday, four on a Sunday and one on a Monday. It's a grim prospect for the traditionalists, but by then we should be resigned to it.

More worrying is his determination that clubs should be paid a significant sum by England for "borrowing" their employees. Since the players concerned were English long before they became "employees" of one club or other, this would be an outrageous development.

It would be a hiring fee that the clubs could increase at will and it would eat into the international profits used by the FA to nourish the game generally. And what about the other countries who want to borrow players? How much more or less would Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland have to cough up to assemble their teams? The difficulties Wales encountered in fielding a team for their vital Euro 2004 qualifying tie against Azerbaijan recently should be warning enough about club attitudes. Players of many nations play in the Premiership; how could the lesser, faraway ones afford to get their players out of hock? Player-lending could become as pernicious a business as money-lending.

In the face of all the furtive activity that has been taking place since Crozier departed, you would have thought the FA would have hastened their search for a strong, single-minded successor who would fight to preserve the association's autonomy. Signs suggest that is not quite the type of man they are seeking, and neither are they seeking him very quickly.

Unless the senior non-professional members of the FA start remembering their responsibilities and resist these manoeuvrings he will be hamstrung before he even starts.

Gift from the wrap artists

Exit the Springboks last weekend, chastened by their heavy defeat at Twickenham and muttering darkly about the accusations of brutality levelled against them. How good it was when their flight landed them back on South African soil, where they could put the unpleasantness behind them.

But they stared disbelievingly as the carousel delivered their luggage. Every bag was plastered with headlines of their 53-3 beating and reports of their rough play which had been carefully clipped out of our newspapers and stuck down with clear tape. I have no evidence that the baggage handlers at Heathrow were responsible, but I do admire their sense of humour.