Peter Corrigan: Country side at risk in the grouse season

Rocking the vote

If there was an award for moaning, Patrick Vieira would be the leader in the doghouse after his complaints about being shattered were mocked the length and breadth of the nation last week. Vieira now knows that to be captain of Arsenal and earning £50,000 a week automatically guarantees him a place at the back of the sympathy queue.

Furthermore, he might reflect that although it is far from uncommon for a professional sportsman to get tired – you are supposed to be knackered the day after a game, anyhow – it is best borne with fortitude and silence.

In its present state, the game does not need players to give its many detractors the opportunity to take an unlimited amount of piss; on second thoughts, perhaps they should test it, because there might be something wrong with him.

It was an episode we could have done without, particularly as it took attention away from a glut of moaning of a more pernicious variety. There has been a concerted chorus of quibbles coming from the ranks of the Premiership, who have decided to chip away at the Football Association in the hope of acquiring some of the governing body's money.

It began with demands that England should pay the clubs when they "borrow" players for an international match, and is now broadening out into an attempt to muscle in on the FA's own sponsorship and advertising deals.

This is not a battle that the FA can afford to lose. They must keep a firm hold on their full authority, and the cash they raise for the good of the game generally.

The argument that clubs are due financial recompense for supplying players for international duty is spurious in the extreme. It would cripple some of the smaller countries if they had to buy their teams off the clubs – some of them ought to be paid for taking the players off their clubs' hands for a week – and it would not do much for England, either.

It is estimated that the total weekly wage bill for the 19 players who were in the England squad the week before last was about £1 million.

There is quite a simple logic to be applied. A player born in England is English before he is anything else. The footballing environment in which he grows up and develops in his younger days is English and to a greater or lesser extent a product of the FA's organisation and administration at all levels of the game.

There may come a day when all clubs have a laboratory in which they clone baby players out of test tubes and bring them up within the club walls, and when they are fully fledged will rent them off to whatever national team is prepared to pay most.

I don't think that plan is sufficiently advanced yet to require us to send in the United Nations inspectors, but until it is I suggest that a man born with qualifications to play for England or, indeed, anywhere else, is the international property of that country long before the clubs claim ownership.

Indeed, if you were to examine the situation even more closely there is far more justification for the national side to charge the clubs for the enhanced value of the players once they've been capped.

We have many examples to choose from. Take the most recent; Alan Smith has been a promising, if worryingly abrasive, striker for Leeds United. How much more is he worth now that he has scored a fine goal in a mature display for England against Portugal? £5m? If Rio Ferdinand had not accompanied England to the World Cup and performed with great accomplishment at the heart of the defence, do you think his transfer fee would have reached the £30m Manchester United paid for him? Would David Beckham be so marketable worldwide without the catwalk that England frequently provides? You could say the same about so many players.

Wales might be slightly amiss if they apply the same argument to Ryan Giggs, but if they follow up on their superb start against Finland and become the vehicle that takes Giggs to the European Championship finals in 2004 it might be different.

The same applies to the promotional deals from which the FA benefit. It is from such revenue that they will plough £200m into the amateur and professional game over the next three years.

It would certainly be right for the clubs to keep an eye on the FA's spending. I am not sure if they need to be in swish offices in the middle of Soho, and we need to keep a close eye on the Wembley rebuilding, about which we have recently heard little.

It has been suggested that they forget about Wembley and use club grounds, as they have been doing over the past couple of years. But I wouldn't trust the clubs to resist the temptation to hold them to ransom in that direction, too.

The FA are due to issue some new guidelines on many aspects of the game's financial behaviour. It should be accom-panied by a reminder of who is boss.

They cannot say they were not warned. Animated managers who bounce up and down on the touchline yelling instructions and abuse in all directions are being pounced on by referees on the orders of the FA.

It will be no surprise that among the first two to be banished to the stand were Graeme Souness of Blackburn Rovers and Southampton's Gordon Strachan. The Norwich City manager, Nigel Worthington, is another.

There was a clear directive during the close season that rowdy managers would be sent off. Philip Don, the Premier League's head of referees said: "To ask them to sit quiet for 90 minutes is crazy but there are limits, and the fourth official will issue two or three warnings before calling on the referee."

Apparently, there is a new rule governing how many people can stand in the technical area – which is the official description of the ground between the dug-out and the touchline.

Only one member of staff at a time is allowed to enter it to give instructions. Abuse to the referee or his assistants does not count as an instruction. It always puzzles me that players do not seem to be able to hear what their manager is shouting, but referees can hear what he's calling them from 80 yards away.

Anyhow, the FA seem determined to stamp out abuse on and off the field, and both Strachan and Souness will face a misconduct charge.

I fail to understand why they can't all be like the England coach, Sven Goran Eriksson; just sit down quietly and let them get on with it.

The amount of injury time added on by the referee is always likely to be a sore point when it brings a decisive goal. Fulham's winner against Tottenham on Wednesday night came after five minutes of time added on.

Spurs fans took the blow with much better grace than did the Ecuadorian team Barcelona de Guayaquil, who were defeated by a goal scored after 22 minutes of time added on last week.

The match against Quito's LDUQ was being refereed by Byron Moreno, who caused a stir at the World Cup for several controversial decisions in South Korea's victory over Italy. After 90 minutes, Barcelona were winning 2-1 and their fans were soon whistling for Mr Moreno to bring the game to an end. They were getting frantic by the time LDUQ equalised after 99 minutes.

They were going bonkers when LDUQ took the lead after 112 minutes. And when the ref blew for time immediately afterwards, they rioted.

It was revealed later that Mr Moreno is standing for election to the Quito City council.

The Ecuador FA have suspended him for 20 games and the League has stated that in future, referees will not be allowed to officiate at games while they are standing for public office.

Surely they're not suggesting...