By Andrew Warshaw
May 10 – UEFA’s refusal to change the rules to allow a raft of suspended players to take part in the Champions League final was entirely correct according to the competition’s leading administrator.
Michael van Praag (pictured above), Dutch chairman of UEFA’s Club Competitions Committee, said players yellow-carded during the course of the Champions League had no right to have them waived for the final in Munich on May 19.
Six players have been ruled out of the end-of-season showpiece for bookings – three from Chelsea and three from Bayern Munich – with Chelsea skipper John Terry (pictured below, left) added to that list because of his automatic red in the semi-finals.
In addition to Terry, Chelsea will be missing Ramires, Branislav Ivanović and Raul Meireles, with Luiz Gustavo, David Alaba and Holger Badstuber suspended for Bayern.
Although UEFA will allow yellow cards issued in the group stages of this summer’s European Championship to be waived for the quarterfinals, wiping the slate clean has not been adopted for the European club campaign which will not change for the next three years.
Interestingly, UEFA’s Club Competitions Committee includes representatives from both England and Germany neither of whom, according to Van Praag, have ever once made a request to alter the system.
Nor, he added, has anyone else.
“Every tournament has its own regulations and in UEFA we have a three-year cycle,” Van Praag said.
“The fact is that the majority of our Committee represent not only the clubs but also the European Club Association (ECA).
“We have met at least three times in the last three months and not once was there a request to change this particular rule.
“I don’t see what the fuss is about.”
Van Praag said there was a very good reason why yellow cards issued in the semi-finals should stand.
He told insideworldfootball: “If you change the regulation in such a way that yellow cards in the semis can be written off to play in the final, imagine what could happen in terms of players starting to misbehave.”
FIFPro, the players’ international union, has described as “nonsense” the idea that waiving cards would give players license to kick but Van Praag was having none of it.
“I don’t how FIFPro can say that,” he argued.
“There were players in the semis who knew full well that if they got another yellow they would miss the final yet they misbehaved anyway.
“Why should we change the rules so that they can do as they like?”
Van Praag added that at no time had he been approached by either Chelsea or Bayern before they made it to the final.
“I represented UEFA at the Barcelona-Chelsea game at the Nou Camp and even after the game not a single person approached me saying the rule should be changed,” he said.
“I really don’t understand why this is happening now.
“It was never a question of taking a decision to leave things as they are.
“The fact is there was no request to change it.”
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