Premier League CEO Richard Masters was interviewed a few days ago. He believes that the domestic league is playing against FIFA on fans' attention and player time, and FIFA has not heard any calls about too many schedules and player benefits.
At the Leaders Sports Business Conference in London, Masters compared the growing number of FIFA and UEFA events with the Premier League schedule that has not changed since 1994. He said: "There is no space left in the calendar, which obviously involves player welfare issues, but it is essentially a core resource for football, namely player time and calendar space."
"The responsibility of the Premier League is to protect domestic football and maintain the Premier League's event space, which is essentially a weekend event. We hope that when all club owners and coaches wake up every day, the first thing they must consider is how to win the Premier League or succeed in the Premier League, rather than thinking, 'I have too many conflicts now, and I must let some players take off on the weekend'."
"I firmly believe that for the club, this priority in the Premier League still exists, and I hope it can continue to be maintained."
In addition to taking charge of the Premier League, Masters also serves as the chairman of the World League Association. Last year, the organization joined hands with the European branch of the International Federation of Professional Football Players to file a complaint against FIFA with the European Commission on suspected abuse of market dominance.
Masters said: "Our differences with FIFA are its general lack of consultation with domestic football, and we believe that the status quo must be changed. Domestic football needs to have a voice when formulating these changes."
According to Masters, the expansion of club and national team events has forced the Premier League to postpone the start of the game by one week than usual, cancel the winter break, and demanded that the FA cancel the FA Cup rematch mechanism.
He said: "This is not a voluntary choice. It is the butterfly effect of others deciding the future of football in different conference rooms but excluding the league from dialogue. By the way, UEFA is not listed. They always maintain direct consultations with European leagues and the Premier League. You can feel the impact of our opinions on the final decision. Although you may not fully agree, you can at least see this influence, which does not exist in FIFA at all."
FIFA President Infantino Responding to this topic at the Council on Thursday, said: "FIFA will continue to invite all stakeholders who are interested in constructive dialogue to jointly protect the rights and interests of players, achieve a balance between clubs and national teams at a global level, and optimize the football ecology for the future."
Masters' criticism of FIFA's lack of comprehensive consultation coincides with the release of the latest annual player load report by the International Federation of Professional Football Players, which pointed out that top stars have too many games, too frequent travel and insufficient rest.
However, FIFA has repeatedly denied that it should be responsible for the increased burden on players, emphasizing that UEFA has expanded the scale of club competitions, and the number of overseas friendly matches played by top clubs in the offseason and even during the season has continued to increase.
This statement is indeed based on the question and answer session of Thursday's meeting, Masters proudly talked about the pre-season friendly matches held in Asia and North America in the past two decades.
Regarding the progress of the Premier League in trying to replace the Profit and Sustainable Development Rules (PSR) with UEFA-style lineup cost rules, Masters said: "We are discussing alternatives with the club. This is not a negative of the effectiveness of the PSR system, but to be closer to the European regulatory system."
"Our system will set an 85% ratio because the clubs are always expected to maintain their investment capabilities. Therefore, if the proposed 85% of the Premier League system is compared with other mainstream European leagues, our system is more inclusive."
"Perhaps some people will accuse this of being too loose, which is essentially a value choice. The Premier League's achievements are based on supporting investment and international capital flows, and we will never want to hinder this vitality."
The Premier League has been promoting this reform for more than a year, but it has never been voted on due to differences between clubs. At the latest shareholders' meeting, several clubs have agreed to postpone the vote on the new rules until November's meeting due to doubts about the reform plan.
The current PSR rules allow clubs to lose up to £105 million in a rolling three-year period, while the new policy proposes that clubs can only use 85% of their total revenue for first-team salaries, amortized transfer fees and broker commissions, while UEFA's lineup cost cap is 70%.