PLATINI HAS THE RIGHT IDEA

THE INVASION of foreign owners in English football riled Michel Platini — and you can understand why.

“You have to have an identity,” claimed the UEFA supremo, “that is where football’s popularity lies.”

The power of football in this country is in the identity created at clubs in previous eras.

If that identity is lost, clubs become nothing but soulless brands, supporters are replaced by ‘customers’ who readily swap badges like they switch soap powders.

Certainly, as I look at the chaos which surrounds West Ham through the collapse of the Icelandic economy, I feel increasingly bitter at how our football clubs are now traded around the world as commodities.

For me, West Ham should be about what goes on around Green Street not be beholden to Wall Street.

Although I long surrendered scarf for Press pass, I still have a strong affinity to the Hammers.

Winner

It comes from supporting them as a kid in an era when, in general, you supported the same team as your dad, the one closest to home.

I went to see my first football match on the opening day of the 1969-70 season. It was against Newcastle. West Ham won 1-0. Geoff Hurst hit the winner.

It had to be West Ham because my dad took me. His dad had supported them and his dad before, who watched them when they were called Thames Ironworks.

You quickly identified with the team and the players because you all felt part of the same thing. It was called community.

Now a new generation of kids are more likely to get a sense of community from Facebook than football.

Identity - of a team and local heroes - is the DNA which has bound the game together for generations but is being lost by the arrival of the city slickers who have caused global chaos.

Crisis

The demise of West Ham’s Icelandic owners may well merely open the door for another bunch of foreign money men. I’m not sure it’s the way forward.

Much better if the club were to turn into a mini-Barcelona and be bought by the fans who then elect a president every four years and the club is run under strict stewardship.

Given the banking crisis there is an argument to say West Ham could end up being worth as little as £50million if a Dutch auction ensues.

If 50,000 fans could stump up £5,000 in bonds to become stakeholders, that would raise £25m.

Newham Council could match that (surely a better investment than in some Icelandic bank) and West Ham could reclaim its identity.

I reckon Monsieur Platini would approve.