Opinion

The stunning plans to reform English football developed by Manchester United and Liverpool have been branded disgusting.
Thats the view of The Times’ chief football writer Henry Winter, who joined Monday’s talkSPORT Breakfast to discuss the proposals to shake-up the game.
Avram and Joel Glazer are the owners of Manchester United
Details were revealed on Sunday about Project Big Picture, with the top clubs in the Premier League offering the English Football League an immediate financial package and also 25 per cent of their annual revenue, but in return the Big Six would wield more power.
The radical proposals, written by Liverpools Fenway Sports Group owners with help from Man United, would see the Premier League reduced to 18 teams, the League Cup and Community Shield scrapped, and money handed to the EFL and FA to help them through the coronavirus crisis.
While many of the ideas are looked on positively, the proposals would create an unequal balance of power with the ‘Big Six’ at the top having all of the control moving forward.
Incredibly, they even want power to veto proposed club takeovers – stopping rich investors buying rival clubs who could soon challenge for silverware – and they also plan to scrap the 14-vote requirement to introduce or block new regulations.
The Premier League and Government have both released statements criticising the proposals, while EFL chairman Rick Parry supports ‘Project Big Picture’.
Project Big Picture proposals

  • Premier League being reduced from 20 to 18 teams.
  • Special status for the nine longest serving clubs with only the votes of six of those long-term shareholders needed to make major changes.
  • £250million immediately given to the EFL to help them through the coronavirus crisis.
  • £100million gift to the FA.
  • 25 per cent of the Premier Leagues annual revenue will go to EFL clubs.
  • Parachute payments for teams relegated from Premier League abolished.
  • League Cup and Community Shield would be abolished.
  • Fan charter that would include £20 away ticket price cap, subsidised away travel, focus on return to safe standing and minimum eight per cent capacity for away allocation.
  • Six per cent of Premier League gross revenues to go towards stadium improvements across top four divisions, calculated at £100 per seat.
  • New rules for distribution of Premier League income.
  • A womens professional league separate of Premier League and the FA.
  • Plus changes to the loan system and a later league start date in August.

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But it’s fair to say Winter is not a fan, telling talkSPORT he believes the changes would destroy 130 years of English football.
“It boils down to this,” began Winter on Monday’s talkSPORT Breakfast. “Do we want Joel Glazer running English football? I dont particularly want him running Manchester United…
“[They are] one of the greatest clubs in the world and weve seen the money hes taken out of them. Now what they are going to do is, ultimately, take more money out of English football because they are going to control it.
They are going to say to the likes of Burnley, ‘you dont really count’; they are going to say to the likes of Aston Villa and Leeds, who came up, ‘you dont really count because we have the voting power over the broadcast money’.
There are good elements in [Project Big Picture] in terms of helping out the EFL clubs, but not at the cost of destroying 130 years of English football.
John Henry’s Fenway Sports Group have been leading the push for Premier League reforms
The Premier League could change radically if the reforms are approved
They will actually then be able to dictate who becomes the owner of other clubs, and if they can see a really wealthy person coming in to a middle ranking club who could compete and invest in the team, they will probably say, no we dont want them because actually it will cause long term problems.
The whole irony is that Liverpool and Manchester United – great clubs with great support and fair play for their supporters turning against their owners on this – this has come on the back of two of the most amazing results.
It actually shows how vibrantly competitive the Premier League is in the 20 club structure, with Aston Villa showing Liverpool the way and then Spurs with Manchester United.
I find it absolutely disgusting.
Watch a clip of Henry Winter on talkSPORT, above…