Dear Blue Tones
Thanks for your correspondence and I hope I can go some way to answering your questions and alleviating some of your concerns.
Perhaps the easiest way of explaining the selection process for the FA Board is for me to point you towards the Articles of Association that are published on our website at <a class="postlink" href="http://www.thefa.com/TheFA/WhoWeAre" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.thefa.com/TheFA/WhoWeAre</a>. They can be found at the bottom of the page and within the document there is a section entitled Appointment and Retirement of Directors, which will be of particular use.
In terms of day-to-day decision making processes at The FA, particularly those relating to governance and regulation, then it is fair to say that these processes are administered by staff independent of the Board and all of the individuals you refer to. Furthermore, our arbitration, work permit panels, and regulatory commissions are independent, and in the case of the latter include individuals that are former professional players or managers, or both.
You allude specifically to inconsistencies in decisions posed with the involvement of Manchester United, which is an opinion to which you are entitled, but I would disagree that this is in any way evidence based. Indeed, you will find that a contrary view is often aired (not least by Sir Alex Ferguson) and, in reality, it is this that serves to show that opinions on such matters are diverse and often dependant on elegancies. I can assure you that our procedures are fair and just and, again, I reiterate that in the processes you have referred to, they remain independent of the FA Board. I would also add that as a member association of FIFA we are therefore bound by their statutes and rules of association.
I hope this begins to answer some of your concerns.
Kind regards,
Alex Burkwood | Customer Relations Officer
Customer Relations
The FA Group
Hello Alex,
Thank you for your response, this does not really put any of the issues I had to bed to be honest. For example you elude to the fact that the members of the board do not have any responsibilities, if not what exactly do they do? Going back to the initial issue of conflicts of interest you still haven’t answered the question of why 4 members of the board currently sit in roles with member clubs. No matter how it is dressed up there is a conflict of interest here with these members holding influence within the FA, there may not have direct involvement in certain decisions yet they are still in a position of authority where direct or indirect influence can be made.
Let’s take for example one set of decisions involving Manchester United and Manchester City regards work permits. Specifically in the cases of McDonald Mariga and Mame Biram Diouf, both these transfers were proposed around the same time Mariga for Manchester City and Diouf for Manchester United. Both of these players nations sat outside of the top 70 FIFA Rankings yet one work permit was approved and one rejected. If you look at these cases a little closer the player that was rejected was already playing regular football for a top Seria A side in Parma and had played in 75% of his nations games in the last two years, wheras the other came from a relatively unknown side Molde in Norway and had not played in any International games. You’d expect the former to have had the permit approved and if any were to be rejected the latter yet this was not the case. Funnily enough one of the players played for Manchester United who has a member sat on the board of the FA and one was a transfer to Manchester City who does not have a member sat on the board of the FA. What makes this more astonishing is the fact that even the Premier of Kenya tried to intervene by talking with Gordon Brown yet the permit was still not agreed. What makes me even more angry is that the members of the panel deciding the fate of Mariga had members who have been well known to have negative opinions in the press regards Manchester City. Surely even you can see the contention in this decision and this is one of many decisions that have gone in Manchester United’s favour where at other clubs it has gone against them. Look at the assault Vidic did on the pitch yet there was no retrospect taken from the FA whereas in Manchester City’s case Adebayor was banned even after he had already been booked on the pitch as was Vieira.
It is these inconsistencies that enrages fans and when a board member is a chairman of one of the clubs that always seems to be on the favour of the FA then one can be forgiven for thinking that there may be some foul play involved. Surely from a point of fair play then the FA should be looking at protecting themselves from allegations of corruption rather than opening themselves up like you do having current chairman of member clubs sat on your board. There was also one specific question that I asked that you never answered which I deemed to be an important question, I quote
“Can you also give your view on why if there is to be members of the board that have direct ties to member clubs is it that every member club does not also have a representative of equal responsibility? If there is no plans to share the power equally between clubs then surely the obvious plan of action would be to ban any board member having current association with member clubs as to stop a conflict of interest. Is this something the FA would consider?”
Hopefully you now have more clarity on my point of view and can maybe address the concerns, or better still take action by proposing that members of the board of the FA cannot represent a club whilst in duties within the FA.
I look forward to hearing your response.
Regards
Blue Tones
Dear Blue Tones
Yes, you've got us bang to rights. We're bent as a nine bob note and will do anything to protect the top 4 but particularly Manchester United.
Now piss off and leave us alone.
Yours sincerely
The FA.
Pearce_out said:The MEN are copied in the emails, I doubt they have even bothered to read it though.
I was trying to be lighthearted but I'm one of the ones that bang on all the time about corruption in the game.Pearce_out said:Thats the attitude, if we all stay silent it will never change. If we get a loud enough voice they will be forced to change.