The horses have bolted – but Mawhinney has shut the door

Last Updated : 25-Sep-2003 by

Muzzy Izzet - one of the players Leicester were able to retain
Football League clubs have been going into administration almost at the drop of a hat and there has been much anger that some clubs have used it to their advantage.

You will be hard pushed to find anyone with any real thought for the game that does not think both Leicester City and Ipswich Town are guilty of blatant cheating as they both came out of administration with debts wiped out and in Leicester’s case in a position to reclaim their Premiership place.

The League decided to take action but when shove came to push in the summer they did nothing at all, absolutely nothing. Almost immediately, and within hours, Charles Koppel had placed Franchise FC into administration knowing that there would not be no penalties. And so it goes on.

But with even more horses having bolted The League have finally decided to take action and as from next season (of course it will take eleven months or so to sort out) they will be penalising clubs who fall into administration with a ten point penalty.

At this morning’s Chairmen’s meeting in Oxford Chairman from all the member clubs of the Football League voted to ratify the proposal to prevent a repeat of Leicester's situation last season.

The cited the case of Leicester who used receivership to wipe out huge debts before winning promotion to the Barclaycard Premiership, having retained their top earning players.

League chairman Sir Brian Mawhinney announced the decision, saying: "This is necessary because the Football League is the guardian of competitiveness in our divisions and we can't have clubs who go into administration gaining an advantage.

"It is a fundamentally different approach and there was a healthy debate - but I pay tribute to the clubs for attaching that significance to it."

Clubs who are hit with this points deduction though will have the right to appeal to an independent body.

There were further changes agreed by the meeting and these include the introduction of parachute payments for clubs relegated into Divisions Two and Three and also Clubs will also now be expected to publish a list of spending on player agents every six months.

We must all be really delighted and grateful to see Mawhinney at the top of The Football League structure. He has a fantastic record which so far includes losing a General Election and choosing Skoda as the official car of The Football League.

He is also very good at shutting stable doors – if only he could do it in time.