The Carnage is Coming

SO "The Blessed Martin" has quit as manager of Aston Villa.

I've seen this one coming, just as the parting of the ways between Liverpool and Rafa was well-signposted. The common denominator: American owners, for with both Villa and Liverpool the crucial decisions are taken Stateside, by club owners brought up in the somewhat different climate of professional sport, American style.

Over there, there isn't a European-style transfer market; Washington Redskins cannot simply buy the Dallas Cowboys quarter back or the LA Lakers purchase the Boston Celtic's point guard in the way Real Madrid could buy AC Milan's play-maker or Real Madrid Manchester United's main striker.

In the USA, most player moves take place at the end of a contract, or after a sometimes complicated player trade deal is set-up. There is so much money in professional sport over there to waste it by buying the services of a single player.

The concept of "cashing-in" on a player's transfer value in the final year of his contract is unknown. Sure, NBA team A might pay-up to get a big name player from Team B in the final year of that player's contract, but the deal will only happen if Team A is prepared to trade a player whome Team B's coach feels can add something to his roster.

I think maybe Randy Lerner, Villa's American owner, a man brought-up in the ways of American sport is somewhat bemused by European football at the top level's obsession with transfers.

He perhaps feels that, if Manchester City, with all that Arab wealth, wants to pay over the odds for James Milner, then Villa ought to take the money - but doesn't want to waste that wind-fall on paying over the odds for a replacement - cue conflict with MON, a manager who is good at spending owners' money, not so good at encouraging young talent..

There is a considerable American influence now at Arsenal, while Manchester United is American-owned. There is no public knowledge of friction between the American money men at both clubs and their very European managers. Because, quite simply, Messers Wegner and Ferguson are the only two top-flight bosses at the top in England whose first instinct is to breed players rather than buy. Of course, both will, if pushed, get out the cheque book, but unlike bosses such as O'Neill, both would rather breed than buy.

Football is changing. The spending spree of recent seasons, fuelled as it was by television money, in some ways resembled the pre-World War I arms race, to build the biggest ships and the biggest guns.

That race ended with the slaughter on the Western Front - there will be similar carnage, without, thankfully, the same waste of life, in European football soon.

World War I put paid to the upper classes across Europe, the class who ruled as of right. The fall-out from football's over-spending will be just as catastrophic and could lead to a more American-style egalitarian, game - run by a meritocracy rather than an aristocracy; Martin O'Neill, heir to Clough of the East Midlands, just might be an early casualty.