Sunday, July 17th, 2011 « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. Supporting the Lord Wenger; coach of the decade
By Tony Attwood
The Premier League has changed their rule on ‘weakened’ teams, probably the most insane, inept, stupid and crazed rule in the history of football. (Well, ok, maybe not the most – the ability of countries to insist that all players – except those named Giggs – must play in friendlies for the country even if injured is the most insane, but this one runs a close second.
Until this past week EPL teams had to nominate the players in their squad at the start of the season. You’ll remember the rules – a maximum of 25 players over 21 years old, with eight home-grown players out of a squad of 25. A home-grown player is one who, irrespective of his nationality or age, has been registered with any club affiliated to the Football Association or the Football Association of Wales for a period, continuous or not, of three entire seasons or 36 months prior to his 21st birthday (or the end of the Season during which he turns 21).
A fairsized level of nonsense, but that’s how it goes.
But the true insanity came with the fact that the clubs couldn’t actually pick anyone they wanted from those 25.
Blackpool were fined £25,000 after Ian Holloway used his squad to the full for a match against the mighty Aston Villa. In December 2009 Wolverhampton W get a suspended fine for not picking the right team against Manchester U.
Now any of the 25 can play in a game without fear of interference – although this is not true for the under 21s who can play for the club without being in the 25 list.
Last season Arsenal did this…
Homegrown players
- Nicklas Bendtner
- Gael Clichy
- Denilson
- Johan Djourou
- Cesc Fabregas
- Vito Mannone
- Alex Song
Non-homegrown players:
- Manuel Almunia
- Andrey Arshavin
- Marouane Chamakh
- Abou Diaby
- Emmanuel Eboue
- Lukasz Fabianski
- Laurent Koscielny
- Samir Nasri
- Tomas Rosicky
- Bacary Sagna
- Robin van Persie
- Thomas Vermaelen
- Sebastien Squillaci
So what have we got this year?
Of course there will be more transfers, and some of those who were under 21 aren’t any more (if you see what I mean), but maybe you can help me sort out the likely 25 that we will have.
Homegrown players from last year
- Denilson
- Johan Djourou
- Cesc Fabregas
- Vito Mannone
- Alex Song
Non-homegrown players from last year
- Andrey Arshavin
- Marouane Chamakh
- Abou Diaby
- Emmanuel Eboue
- Lukasz Fabianski
- Laurent Koscielny
- Samir Nasri
- Tomas Rosicky
- Bacary Sagna
- Robin van Persie
- Thomas Vermaelen
- Sebastien Squillaci
Others – if you can assign them to “Under 21″ or “Home Grown” so much the better – please do write in.
- Gervinho
- Vito Mannone (home grown?)
- Armand Traore (home grown?)
- Emmanuel Frimpong (home grown?)
- Carlos Vela (was under 21 last year but not this)
- Wojciech Szczesny
- Carl Jenkinson (both under 21 and home grown?)
- Kieran Gibbs (home grown and under 21)
- Jack Wilshere (home grown and under 21)
- Aaron Ramsey (home grown)
- Ryo Miyaichi (under 21 but passport issues?)
- Theo Walcott (home grown) (was under 21 last year, but not this I think)
- Francis Coquelin (home grown and under 21?)
- Craig Eastmond (home grown)
- Henri Lansbury (home grown)
- Jay Emmanuel Thomas (home grown)
- Ignasi Miquel
- Gilles Sunu
If you can help put together the exact data I’ll pull it into one article so we can have a working list of the 25 and the under 21s for next season. Sorry not to have done the work myself today, but there’s some other work I must do… and I will write about that more shortly.