The Effect of Brexit on Football

According to leading voices and experts in the game, if the UK choose to leave the European Union, British football could expect drastic changes.

The Brexit could result in more than 400 players losing their right to play in the UK, whereas some believe that it may give home talent a chance.

Rachel Anderson, an aid football agent explained that “We’re talking about half of the Premier League needing work permits. The short-term impact would be huge but you could argue it will help in the long term as it could force clubs to concentrate on home-grown talent.”

N'Golo Kante

However, more than 100 Premier League players would be affected by the situation. Teams such as Newcastle, United, Aston Villa and Watford could face losing 11 players, whilst Charlton athletic would need to find 13 substitutes.

If this is the case, players without an EU passport would need to meet Home Office criteria. Players would need to be a reputable international for a leading nation, in other words, they would have played in 75% of international games over the past several years to gain a work permit. Players such as N’Golo Kante and Dmitri Payet would no longer to be able to play in the Premier League if these standards were applied to EU nationals. A total of 332 players within the first two tiers in England and the Scottish Premiership would be unsuccessful in meeting the present criteria.

Nonetheless, there may be changes in favour of introducing non-EU players to play in the UK from the likes of Brazil and Argentina.

 

By Matt

Matt is the owner and chief-editor of the Footy Blog, one of the UK's leading football news blogs.