PREM clubs are set to be asked to vote in November over whether to switch financial rules.
The latest debate over the planned ditching of the current PSR to Uefa-style Squad Cost ratios at Tuesday’s “shareholder” meeting of the 20 clubs passed without a decision.
But League chiefs feel that the nettle needs to be grasped to provide certainty for next season and it is now anticipated a vote will be tabled.
In what would effectively be a “put up or shut up” position, League bosses will lay out the options and demand clubs pick one.
While PSR rules, in place for more than a decade, which limit losses over a three-year cycle, Squad Cost Ratio is a real-time calculation.
It would see clubs restricted to spending a maximum 85 per cent of their annual revenues on wages and transfers.
Clubs in Uefa competitions – there are a record nine this season – are already limited to a 70 per cent ratio from this campaign.
Despite an outline agreement to switch 18 months ago, there are reservations among clubs, which saw the initial plan to implement SCR this term placed on hold.
Some clubs are still keen to keep PSR until they have potentially utilised the loopholes in the current regulations, which saw Chelsea sell their women’s team to ultimate owners BlueCo in a £200m deal to realise a paper profit that filtered into the seasonal calculations.
Others want more details over the sanctions that would be applied to teams that are in breach of the limits, which are calculated “in real time” rather than retrospectively, as is the case with PSR.
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There are also concerns about plans to implement “anchoring” of spending, which would restrict bigger clubs from paying out more than four and a half times the TV revenue of the lowest-earner.
With last term’s bottom side Southampton having picked up £109.2m from Prem funds, that would mean no club could spend more than £491.4m on signings and salaries.
Prem chiefs outlined their rationale for the anchoring concept, arguing the long-term benefits of a competitive league not distorted by clubs being to simply blow away the rest financially.
Some owners agree that future broadcast deals – which provide the bulk of many clubs’ income – will be imperilled if that competitive balance is lost.
But a number of “smaller” clubs are resistant to changing at this time, despite the previous outline agreement.
For a change to be enacted requires the support of 14 of the 20 clubs, with seven votes against sufficient to block the measure and ensure PSR limits remain for another season.
