Jeff Powell on Friday: England's leading clubs are buying second tier players because the real elite have no interest in coming to the Premier League

Hands up all those who have heard of Razvan Rat, Ricky van Wolfswinkel, Jesus Navas, Modibo Diakite, Guillermo Varela, Aleksandar Tonev, Jose Canas and Fernandinho.

Hands on hearts, even if you have an inkling of those names now then how many of you knew who on earth they were as recently as last month?

Thought not.

City slickers: Manchester City have moved early to sign Fernandinho and Jesus Navas (below)

THE REDKNAPP REPORT

Jamie Redknapp on why Fernandinho is already the signing of the summer and his take on Navas, too

Yet all the above and a whole bunch more have just been signed by Premier League clubs, some for considerable amounts of money.



For example, I won’t even bother to identify the handful of Mr Whos? bought by Fulham.

And be sure a whole slew more of unfamiliar footballers like these will be on their way across the Channel or Atlantic this summer.

To be fair, young Varela has moved from Penarol to Old Trafford as a mere £1million gamble that he may make a contribution to the future at Manchester United.

But over at the Etihad, Manchester City have paid £30m and £15m for the transfers of Fernandinho and Jesus Navas from Shakhtar Donetsk and Sevilla respectively.

Although 28, Fernandinho has been capped only five times by a Brazil team in urgent need of the midfield qualities this Senhor is supposed to possess.

No matter.



Joining the champions: Guillermo Varela poses with a Manchester United shirt after signing

England’s leading clubs are happy to snap up players just below the top tier because the real elite appear to have little or no interest in coming to England.

Neymar, perhaps the most dazzling star in the South American firmament despite an indifferent performance against England at Wembley, has gone for £50m to Barcelona, the club at which Lionel Messi has reiterated he wants to finish his career, even if a Premier League side were to offer him more money.

United may yet pay £23m for Robert Lewandowski but, if so, only because Borussia Dortmund won’t let him go to arch rivals Bayern Munich.

Jose Mourinho has yet to enter the mid-summer transfer fray but if Chelsea ever had any chance of signing Cristiano Ronaldo it has broken down along with his relationship with the Happy Special One.

Dutch of class: Ricky van Wolfswinkel has joined Norwich New Hammer: Razvan Rat (left) in action for Romania against Trinidad and Tobago Real Madrid’s priority over incoming transfers is to keep Ronaldo, which is likely to thwart United, also.

Yet in the midst of all this activity, whither the promising young English footballer?

And what price the England team?

The transparent preference for Premier League managers and chairmen is to flood their squads with foreigners.

In some cases – Chelsea notable among them – they sign overseas players surplus to their requirements and farm them out on loan.

This is done sometimes to stop their rivals picking up the talent.

Partly, also, in case their assessment of players is faulty and the signings they first thought of turn out to be flops, while the ones borrowed by other clubs become stars.

Special Swan: Midfielder Jose Canas (right) will join the south Wales club from Real Betis The right tone: Bulgaria midfielder Alexandar Tonev has signed for Aston Villa

Seeing the Light: Modibo Diakite (left) is moving from Lazio to Sunderland

The loan system – particularly between Premier League clubs and teams in comparable European divisions – is an iniquity which should cease forthwith.



Not only because it enables the rich to hedge their judgement but because it perverts the competition when the borrowed are not allowed to play for other clubs against the team which has sent them out on loan.

Just as importantly it stuns the development of players, not only foreign but more especially the young English footballer.

Even at the inflated valuations some of the little-knowns or unheard-ofs listed above, our leading clubs prefer them to domestic players.

We have all heard the arguments about relative skills levels. The FA do have questions to answer about the quality of coaching in this country but so, too, do the Premier League clubs with their academies.

The part-hidden agenda is cost.

Lack of options: England boss Roy Hodgson has bemoaned the lack of English players in the Premier League

No matter what the transfer fees, it is considered cheaper to buy abroad than invest in the growing of home boys – and more lilkely to produce results.

England manager Roy Hodgson is already complaining, quite rightly, that there are not enough Englishmen gathering regular experience in the Premier League to comprise a team of World Cup-winning potential.

Were it not for Manchester United, Chelsea and one or two others, there might not even be the requisite XI to take the field at all. The same applies, the more so, to Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland as Britain’s domestic talent is denied opportunity.

Should our Premier clubs – in their cosy delusion that theirs is the greatest league in the world – care?

One other coming trend suggests they should be very concerned indeed.

The odds are shortening daily against Wayne Rooney and Gareth Bale leaving these shores.

Paris match? Both Gareth Bale and Wayne Rooney are being linked with moves to French champions PSG



Paris is calling, with PSG ready to pay whatever it takes to capture both of them.

Spurs insist Bale is going nowhere but will their resolve weaken against an offer, say, of £85m? Arsenal would like to keep Rooney in England but will their interest wane at more than £50 million?

My guess is yes, on both counts.

The Premier League, in its self-importance, may choose to forget it was that solitary 1966 World Cup glory which revived English football from the doldrums.

But if it continues failing to attract the biggest stars in the world, as well as losing its own main attractions, it may not be too long before the mother country of the game finds itself praying for another such miracle… in vain.

Then, never mind Ricky van Wolfswinkel, we’ll be down to watching Rip van Winkle.



What the hell is cricket coming to when an Aussie can’t knock off a Pom’s wig in a bar without getting hauled over the proverbials?

No good, if you ask me or any of the real men who have battled for the Ashes down the decades.

At this rate the game’s most feisty and boisterous rivals will be reduced to sipping cranberry juice in separate cafes and addressing each other as Mister. Or, in the case of Ian Botham, as Sir.

Head to head: Ian Chappell and Ian Botham fought in Melbourne in 1977



All-round hero: Botham hits out during THAT innings at Headingley in 1981 and (below) steams in with the ball

What transpired at 2am in Birmingham the other night, when David Warner introduced young English batsman Joe Root to the delights of Anglo-Australian horse-play, was as babies shaking rattles in their prams compared with Botham v Ian Chappell in Melbourne 36 years ago.

Now that was a fight.

Even theirown versions of it differ in detail. But there is little doubt that Chappell treated our Beefy to a few choice Pommie jibes and was knocked off his bar stool for his trouble.

A few meaty swings later it went outside and ended, apparently, with Botham chasing Chappell around a car park.



The upshot?



Arise Sir Ian.

And this is only one of countless tales of macho mania between cricketing legends after a few stiff drinks.

Now, in this age of political correctness when to call someone a plonker is a crime against his human rights, we have Warner being banned by Australia until next month’s first Test and fined £7,000 for what sounds like a bit of a lark.

Fronting up: David Warner apologised for his role in an altercation with Joe Root

Trouble: The Walkabout in Birmingham where the incident took place

Receiving end: England's Joe Root was hit by Warner

So much, thank god, for the cries for his head or at least deportation.

By all accounts Root did nothing while having his comical hair-piece removed by a glancing cuff. Shame on him, Beefy? Well, at least he declined to press police charges. Had he done so we would have suffered a sudden loss of faith in his apparently glittering future at the crease.

Bold: Botham has predicted a whitewash to England in the Ashes

Still, our cricket authorities felt compelled to deny that either he or any of his England team-mates had engaged in any banter.

Banter with Aussies? Perish the thought, dear. Whatever next?

Sledging to take the form of the Aussie wicket-keeper telling an English batsman that his mother brews a lovely cuppa and his fiancée is a virgin?

Pass the wet lettuce.

As for the upcoming Ashes series, Botham’s prediction that England will whitewash Australia 5-0 has been met by a typical riposte from another of his old sparring partners from Down Under.



Allan Border told him: ‘If that happens I’ll give you a running piggy-back round Piccadilly Circus.’

Trouble is, these two old warriors won’t be playing this summer and the danger is that the new generation will have to let die some ripe traditions which form part of the life-blood of the game.

What the hell is cricket coming to?



A sanitised, dehumanised void bereft of characters, like so many of our best loved sports and past-times.





The best footballer in the world at the moment has been accused of dodging three to four million in tax.



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