FERGIE RUES THE 90 MINUTE RULE

Last updated : 12 September 2004 By Editor

Taken from The M.E.N.

"The academy regulations are a problem for a lot of clubs.

"I don't agree with the system, and don't see the value of it at all - and I don't think that we are going to produce the players everyone expects we are going to produce in that system.

"We have guarded against that by developing alliances throughout the world and will continue to do that because it is imperative that we still produce young players of our own."

Says Les Kershaw, United's Academy director: "FIFA set up rules with regards to a boy who is out of contract.

"If we sign an Italian or Spanish boy, for instance, there is only a certain one-off payment. There is nothing else to pay for him.

"But with an English boy you have no clue whatsoever of the price on his head. You then have to go to tribunals and there are down-payments, then more money when certain appearances are made etc. You haven't a clue what you are going to finish up paying.

"There are eight-year-old kids in England with price tags on their heads! And if we want them we have to pay compensation.

"The scenario is simple. Unless kids are based within a 90-mile driving distance from Manchester then we have no chance of getting one from England.

"If the rules now were the same years ago it would have been near impossible to have got David Beckham to Manchester United.

"At this club we have stuck with the British kids longer than most, but going abroad is the cheaper option.

"When Ryan Giggs and the rest of those kids came through it was an English first division. It was an English game.

"In fact, you were victimised if you had foreigners in the side. But it is very much a European game now. If we want to compete with the Real Madrids and Inter Milans etc then we have to do this."