Premier League chiefs held a meeting with the top-six clubs to discuss the fall-out of the Project Big Picture proposals without informing the other 14 clubs in the top-flight.
The meeting was held by the chairman, Gary Hoffman, and the chief executive, Richard Masters, along with senior representatives from Liverpool, Manchester United, Manchester City, Chelsea, Arsenal and Tottenham on Tuesday 13 October - two days after the proposals were first reported.
The Guardian reports that senior figures from the other 14 clubs in the top-flight are furious that the meeting was held without them and they were not informed about it either before or after the meeting took place.
Growing dissatisfaction does not just orientate around the plans themselves but the fact that neither Hoffman or Masters were not keeping them informed, with any of the clubs aware until later that Masters had been kept informed on the continued discussions or that Hoffman had received a copy of the plans by Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck, who was involved with Project Big Picture from the beginning.
When the proposals were first published, the Premier League did not make it clear that it had known about the plans since the beginning or that Hoffman had responded positively to the big-six, instead stating that they had ‘seen media reports’ about the plans, and condemned them, saying ‘a number of the individual proposals … could have a damaging impact on the whole game’.
Many clubs were also unaware before, during and after that Football Association chairman Greg Clarke had initiated talks with Buck in January and that they had then invited United, Liverpool, Parry and Masters to join.
A senior executive of one of the 14 clubs said: “Some of the clubs are furious. When it came out in the Telegraph, Gary Hoffman should have said he had been aware of the plans and had a copy but we weren’t told that. I certainly wasn’t told they were meeting with the big six, and only them, to ask for agreement on a strategic review.”
