New FA boss Palios wants 'sensible' debate on internationals spat

New Football Association chief executive Mark Palios wants to hold a “sensible debate” over the availability of players for England internationals.

The issue threatened to boil over last season when England coach Sven-Goran Eriksson provoked a storm of criticism by using two different teams in a friendly with Australia as he tried to accommodate the requests of Premiership managers.

Palios’ predecessor Adam Crozier appeared always ready to wade into battle on behalf of Eriksson.

But, while the former Tranmere defender turned accountant anticipated working closely with Eriksson, he admitted the debate needed “balance”.

“I will have a professional working relationship with Sven,” Palios said on Sky Sports News. I never recruit friends but I make friends with the people I work with.

“It’s down to supporting a key employee of the organisation in whatever they want to achieve. It’s a question of balance – it’s (a friendly) an important opportunity to look at players but there’s nothing like a competitive game to enable you to do that.

“I don’t think there’s a right or wrong answer but there is a sensible debate to have.”

Palios, who is three weeks into the job, identified the continuing problem of hooliganism as a “business risk” the FA had to deal with.

The FA had already chosen not to take up their ticket allocation for the Euro 2004 qualifiers in Macedonia and Istanbul following trouble in the home match against Turkey before Palios began his new role.

But, with a UEFA threat to exclude England from international competition still hanging over the FA, he agreed with the decision.

“It’s a cancer,” he said. “Unfortunately, we are sill in the hands of a few guys who we can’t control and that’s a tremendous business risk.

“I don’t like preventing fans travelling to games but in the context of the few inflammatory games we’ve got coming up, I think its the right thing to do.”

Palios’ background in finance means his appointment is a timely one given that the FA is struggling to cope with the burden of building a new Wembley as well as the national football centre at Burton-upon-Trent.

Staff at the FA headquarters have been cut as a result but Palios was happy to confirm that Wembley’s future looked secure.

“We’ve made our last contractual payment to Wembley,” he said.

"That means that Wembley is, from our perspective, financed and the banks will follow on from that. It’s ahead of budget in terms of boxes and so it’s going quite well.”