JEFF POWELL: Every Premier League club should start one English player

In the Tower of Babel now perched at the pinnacle of what used to be English football, Erling Haaland will say 'takk' in Norwegian when next a goal is put on his plate by Ilkay Gundogan.

Who will answer 'bitte' or 'sorun yok' or 'de nada' according to whether, in the heated delight of the moment, he speaks one of the many languages he's learnt during his travels around the globe.

'Thanks mate,' followed by 'No problem, pal' are no longer part of the regular lexicon of the Premier League.

Not with Englishmen now in the minority in all but two of the starting line-ups in what advertises itself as the best league in the world.

Not with Manchester City kicking off with only one home boy so far this season. As did Liverpool and Tottenham when their quota slipped to a singleton by the second weekend.

Not when one club has started none at all in both their opening games of the 2024-25 Premier League campaign. Unbelievably, that dubious distinction has been foisted on grand old Wolverhampton Wanderers.

Two cultured Molineux legends will be turning in their graves. Stan Cullis who, in his Harris tweed jacket and Wolves tie, managed that historic institution to three English league titles in the 1950s. And Billy Wright, who captained that team while in the process also of becoming the first player in the world to claim 100 international caps. 

No wonder England have won sweet FA since that solitary World Cup in the halcyon summer of ’66. Back in the mists of time when the only ‘foreigners’ in the what then was the First Division came from Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland.

Nor is there any real prospect of more patriotic silverware in the foreseeable future.

Not unless officialdom’s convoluted wrangling down the decades finally reaches legislation imposing an English quota on English teams, for the sake of the game England bestowed upon the world.

Not while the interests of the clubs remain in anything other than our national interest. Not when the pecuniary priorities of almost all the mega-clubs require drafting in expensive incomers from Europe, Africa and Latin America.

While gifted Englanders, aka Raheem Sterling at Chelsea, are expelled to bombed-out training squads. When this influence infects the more modest likes of Fulham and Brentford — both down now to one homegrown starter — it threatens to become fatal.

Where is the incentive for youngsters in what we might now describe as our indigenous population to pull on the boots and strive for glory? More money than ever is being spent on academy prospects at inflated costs, Scott McTominay the latest to depart days after Conor Gallagher.

The summit of our national game lives at the moment in vacuous compliance with a requirement for a minimum eight homegrown players in registered 25-man first-team squads.

A rule of convenience if ever there was one.

The misstep at Molineux brings the outcome of that shabby compromise into stark relief. So detrimental is that to the national game that this football-loving population should rise up in clamour for change.

Nothing less will suffice than regulation enforcing all Premier League clubs to kick-off with an absolute minimum of three domestic players in their teams.

And to prevent chicanery with substitutes, there should always be at least one Englishman on the pitch at any given minute.

In a perfect world, that would be at least half a team. Impossible? Not for Everton, with eight from the beginning for the last two Saturdays.

And before anyone says look what’s happening to them, Newcastle started with seven and Southampton six.

A couple of others come close. Even Manchester United have four.

A figure which ought to encourage Manchester City, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool and Spurs to realise that such a commitment would help them steer clear of draconian punishments for financial fair play offences.

Such a reformation will not be made any easier by the fascination with foreign coaches, who prefer to recruit players they know well and understand more perfectly than they do British grit.

It is no coincidence that, in Eddie Howe, Newcastle have a very English manager, even though that means nothing when looking at Wolves.

Yes, the days are long gone when Celtic became the first British club to win the European Cup with a team comprised wholly of players born in Scotland — and all but two within the city of Glasgow. Or when to play cricket for Yorkshire you had to be a native of God’s own county.

West Ham won the FA Cup in 1975 with nine players from the local community and two northerners in Alan Taylor and Graham Paddon.

Even when Sir Bobby Robson argued that the incoming wave of overseas players led by Argentine World Cup-winning maestro Ossie Ardiles to Tottenham would help improve domestic skill levels.

Times keep changing in myriad ways. The hour has now arrived to realise that when it comes to England football, home grown should mean what it really says: Born of and bred in this green and still mostly pleasant land.