Weakened teams? The weakest link tomorrow will be the Premier League's dopiest rule

By Brian Reade

Published 23:32 20/05/11

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Things I’m hoping for on Sky’s Super Sexy Survival Sunday:

* A pair of chicken owners laying live eggs at 5.45pm as a squawking Big Sam streaks past the Molineux directors' box with 'MUGS' tattooed on his ample buttocks.

* The 47 cameras Sky send to each Premier League ground to capture human despair failing to pick up a single tear.

* At 6pm, the chairmen of two clubs demanding £50million in compensation from the Premier League for being “illegally” dumped into the Championship.

Because that will mean Manchester United rested most of their Champions League Final side against Blackpool and were beaten, keeping the Tangerines up and giving other clubs the excuse to divert attention away from their own failings and play the victim.

And this time, hopefully, when the debate about fielding weakened sides is out in the open, and the lunacy and hypocrisy of it is laid bare, we may finally kill the farcical rule for ever.

Alex Ferguson should be allowed to name who he likes from his 25-man squad tomorrow and play them wherever he wants, because this season is different.

We are not where we were four years ago, when Liverpool and United rested players ahead of finals and Sheffield United’s Neil Warnock almost self-combusted.

This season, the Premier League demanded every club hand in a squad list of 25 players after each transfer window.

Why then, if all of those players complied with the home-grown criteria and were deemed worthy of a squad shirt, should the games they are selected to play in be a concern for anyone but their manager?

One of the most scandalous decisions of the season was the £25,000 fine given to Blackpool for fielding a “weakened team” against Aston Villa in December, when they were facing four games in 12 days (and narrowly lost 3-2, to an 89th minute goal).

Ian Holloway contemplated resigning over the shameful assessment of his management skills. If he had, you could only have applauded him, because it was yet another ruling that kicked the smaller clubs.

The Premier League never confront the big boys when they make wholesale changes ahead of Champions League games, because they know they will be ridiculed for trying to tell Ferguson or Arsene Wenger which of his players are sub-standard. So how can they tell Holloway?

But the smaller clubs don’t always help themselves.

Wolves chairman Steve Morgan is asking for the book to be thrown at United if they don’t play their first XI tomorrow.

This from a man who backed his manager Mick McCarthy 18 months ago when he dropped 10 first-teamers at Old Trafford, caring nothing about the effect it could have on United’s rivals.

So what’s changed?

If you oppose a rule, you oppose it. If a rule is wrong, it’s wrong.

And Premier League Rule E20: “In every league match each participating club shall field a full-strength team,” is about as wrong as it gets.

Particularly when the pen-pushers and bean-counters who sit in judgement know as much about picking a football team as your granny’s half-blind moggy.

They are a far weaker team (on far weaker ground) than any side any Premier League manager could possibly select tomorrow.

So Fergie, do your worst tomorrow and Holloway your best.

And let’s get this outrageous rule out there and kick it to death.

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