UEFA General Secretary David Taylor warned Wednesday that soccer clubs with heavy debts could be excluded from future European competitions. Speaking at the Leaders In Football conference in London, Taylor said there would be plenty of warnings and reprimands, but that the exclusion from European competition of clubs heavily in debt “is absolutely possible.”
On Tuesday, English FA chairman Lord Triesman estimated the total debt of English clubs at around $5.3 billion. Taylor believes clubs hugely in the red such as Liverpool, Chelsea and Manchester United put their own future in jeopardy, and that they should bring their finances under control.
“There is concern about these numbers, particularly in an era of financial crisis,” Taylor told the BBC. “Debt in itself is not necessarily a bad thing. Just because I have a mortgage it doesn’t mean I’m bankrupt. But the debt does have a requirement to be properly serviced. Clubs must work within all available means and they must not expose themselves to such an extent that the whole future of the club is jeopardized unless some white knight comes over the horizon with millions and millions of pounds.”