Former Liverpool star and Newcastle United manager Graeme Souness has issued his verdict on the Premier League’s neutral venues plan.
Discussions regarding a resumption of the 2019/20 season are continuing, with one proposal seeing the remaining 92 matches played behind closed doors in neutral venues - with no club playing at their home ground.
However, this has led to some objections among the Premier League clubs, the majority of whom are in the bottom-half of the table, as they believe they will lose what could be a significant advantage in their battle to avoid relegation in that scenario.
As a result, Souness, who managed Newcastle between 2004 and 2006, has expressed concern about the plans and believes it will be extremely difficult to have those proposals approved by the 20 clubs in the division.
“It’ll be very difficult to get everyone to agree to it because everyone is looking after their own house right now. For the clubs that are objecting to it, they feel that there is a lesser chance of surviving in the Premier League and there is a real argument for that,” he told Sky Sports’ Football Show.
“The teams near the bottom need every single advantage they can possibly get. For Brighton, for example, they have five home games. Although they’re against big teams, they’ll see that as an advantage.
“I think it’s going to be very difficult to get any consensus, I think if it goes to a vote it will be very difficult to get it through. It comes down to money, it really does, we talk about the Premier League being awash with money but if this thing really bites, and hopefully please God it doesn’t, some Premier League clubs will be in dire straits financially.
“It won’t just be the smaller ones who don’t have such a big budget, some of the bigger guys will go because of the outlays they have. If you’re spending more than you’ve got coming in, ultimately you’re going to be in trouble and that’s the top and bottom of football.”
