Papers: Sir Alex slams plans
Richard Tanner writes in the Daily Express...Ferguson: Plan is suicide
Sir Alex Ferguson described a bid to scrap promotion and relegation in the Premier League as "suicide". Several of England’s biggest clubs want to make the top flight a closed shop, according to the League Managers’ Association chief executive Richard Bevan. But Ferguson said it would spell the end for some of the Championship’s bigger teams, as well as killing off the dream of all lower-league clubs. Bevan said: "There are a number of overseas-owned clubs already talking about bringing about the avoidance of promotion and relegation in the Premier League. If we have four or five more new owners, that could happen." Ferguson responded by saying: "If you look at the Championship at the moment, we have at least eight teams with great tradition and history. What do you say to those eight teams? That they can never play in the Premier League? That would be absolute suicide for the rest of the league and particularly the teams in the Championship. You might as well lock the doors. The only place you can make money and realise your ambitions is in the Premier League and you can’t take that away from clubs like Nottingham Forest, Leeds United, Sheffield United and Sheffield Wednesday – all these great teams who formed the nucleus of our old First Division all those years ago. It does happen in a lot of countries, not just American soccer, but I don’t see where the end-product comes. It would be unwise."
Most of the papers run with the news, confirmed on ManUtd.com on Monday night, that Patrice Evra is to pursue his claim of racial abuse against Liverpool's Luis Suarez.
The Daily Mail claims United are in a race, led by Chelsea, to sign River Plate's 17-year-old "whizkid Lucas Ocampos", who has been dubbed "the new Cristiano Ronaldo".
And in the same paper it is reported that UEFA have confirmed Montenegro's Miodrag Dzudovic could help reduce Wayne Rooney's England ban by speaking up for the striker, who was sent off for lashing out at him.