Vidagany: Youth Players being Reluctantly Sold as PSR Destroys Football, Claims Zack Oaten

Aston Villa faced challenges with the Profit and Sustainability rules this summer when they had to part ways with promising young players Tim Iroegbunam, who joined Everton, and Omari Kellyman, who signed with Chelsea. Manager Unai Emery had hoped to retain these talented individuals at the club, but financial constraints ultimately forced their sale.

Newcastle United were another team who were forced to sell top talent to avoid being punished as they sold Elliot Anderson to Nottingham Forest in a deal that would never have happened without PSR. 

Vidagany was outspoken on these deals which he feels are complicated and are ruining the game. 

"The clubs need rules to stick to, but PSR is making it very complex. The system is forcing the club’s to sell their academy players. This is the way to make more profit and stick to the rules. This is killing some of the spirit of football to sell academy players and I am not only talking about us and Omari Kellyman, but the case of Conor Gallagher with Chelsea too. It is not natural in football.  

"PSR is not helping the clubs to control inflation of football. It is a contradiction. We as a club, we have an ambition to be among the best. I don’t like the concept of the top six. It is an establishment we are trying to break. 

"The business is now telling you we are now going in the wrong direction. When the system forces you to sell academy players, 'one of our own', like fans sing in the stadium, this will disappear from stadiums. In UEFA, you need academy players in your squad, but if you sell them then you have to put players in the squad who are not at the level. Football needs a reset and then combine European and Premier League with more common sense." 

Premier League chief Richard Masters cannot see what there is to be done as he concedes there are flaws in the system. 

"Players that generate the most profit are sometimes utilised in different spending plans that people have and in investment plans over a three-year period," he has said in response via sister site Chronicle Live. "So I’m not quite sure how you apply accounting principles and avoid that outcome. 

"I do understand the point, but I think there is a huge opportunity for young players, young homegrown players in the Premier League at the moment. I think it's one of the great stories of the last 10 years, the fortunes of the England team being transformed by the investment that's been made in the academy system, not just across the Premier League but across the EFL as well. The story around young players in this country is a really positive one."