Premier League clubs vote against selling assets to themselves | OneFootball

Premier League clubs will no longer be able to sell assets like hotels and women's teams to themselves from next season to get round new financial rules. It comes after clubs narrowly voted through a new system of Financial Fair Play (FFP) based on squad costs on Friday.

The clubs met in London to vote on three possible methods of replacing Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR). Squad Cost Ratio (SCR) got 14 votes in favour and 6 against, which is the minimum number that is required to enact a rule change.

Overall squad costs from the 2026-27 campaign will have to be limited to 85% of a club's revenue, although teams competing in Europe will have to adhere to Uefa's maximum of 70%. Squad costs comprise player and manager wages, transfer fees and agents' fees.

Most notably it will end the loophole of selling capital assets, like hotels and women's teams. Last year, Chelsea sold two hotels to a sister company to keep them compliant with PSR. In July, Everton sold their women's team to the parent company, while reports claim Aston Villa have agreed to do the same.

The assessment will only be based on a club's total earnings from football operations. Rules around sustainability, which set out a club's financial spending plans over the medium and long term, were passed unanimously.

But anchoring, which would have placed a top limit on spending based on the money earned by the bottom club, failed to get the necessary support, with 12 clubs voting against it, 7 in favour and 1 abstaining.

"The new SCR rules are intended to promote opportunity for all clubs to aspire to greater success and bring the league's financial system close to Uefa's existing SCR rules," a Premier League statement read.

"The other key features of the league's new system include transparent in-season monitoring and sanctions, protection against sporting underperformance, an ability to spend ahead of revenues, strengthened ability to invest off the pitch, and a reduction in complexity by focusing on football costs."

Thanks for spotting this, Paul.

So it only just scraped through. Brighton, Bournemouth, Leeds United, Brentford, Crystal Palace and Fulham all voted against the system, which will now be in place at the start of next season.

Clubs opposing SCR believe it will impact their ability to spend, and therefore be competitive. By the same token, none of the opponents have ever been close to breaching PSR.

I think we've been close to or over that 85% figure, but increased revenue from Hill Dickison Stadium should improve things for us.

Pity there wasn't a campaign to scrap all such rules as anti-competitive, but of course they have to kow-tow to Europe. What about Brexit!

Paul Kossoff 3 Posted 22/11/2025 at 00:39:13

Thanks Micheal. Seems the premier League are having think tank sit downs to dream of more ways to keep the elite at the top. Apparently Man City were chief go to for this one, I wonder why?

Paul Kossoff 4 Posted 22/11/2025 at 00:41:30

They can't leave things be, can they.

New Premier League rules for the 2025-26 season include a "Captains Only" policy for speaking to referees, an "eight-second rule" for goalkeepers to release the ball, and a rule allowing a retake for an accidental double-touch on a penalty kick. There are also changes to dropped ball restarts, with a corner awarded if a goalkeeper controls the ball with their hands for more than eight seconds.

5 Posted 22/11/2025 at 09:07:49

With regards to 'towing the line with Europe' and 'what happened to Brexit?' - neither of these have anything to do with the European Union or European Commission. If you travel to a foreign country, you're still bound by the laws of that land, regardless of country of origin.

The same goes for competition football. If you enter a competition, you have to agree to the competitions rules and regs. A team isn't bound by the same constraints if it doesn't play in the competition. Equally, if there's a chance the teams will compete, they need to be readied and aligned to those rules ahead of time or be impacted.

I haven't seen the detail of what the rule changes might mean to any teams so can't comment if they're prohibative or expansive.