I read a very interesting article on the Guardian website today about how foreign players have watered-down the English game.  Unlike many similar statements, this one was from an Italian, Guido Santevecchi, who spoke of the deteriation of rock solid Italian defences for the same reason - an influx of foreign players.

He attacks the four UEFA Champions League teams representing Italy this year. Lazio continue to fight with financial survival and Roma are his pick of the bunch, with their Italian midfielders Francesco Totti, Simone Perrotta and Daniele De Rossi, all world champions, he writes proudly.

But Milan are an “old team full of old glories [...] old Italians like Paolo Maldini and young Brazilians such as Kaka and Pato.”

Everybody knows Milan are past their prime and the team needs to be rebuilt.  And then come Inter Milan, or Internazionale they are know in Italy. He decries the fact that they are the Italian League Champions though they regularly only field one Italian, the fiery Marco Materazzi - a man often associated with red cards and that insult to  Zinedine Zidane.

He likens Inter Milan to teams like Arsenal, full of foreign players that have helped to change the way the team plays, and in the process watered down national football identity.

We are having country versus club debates in this country which are similar to Santevecchi’s argument.  Foreign players have unquestionable changed the Premiership.  Their skill and abilities on and with the ball are a true pleasure to watch.  But the unnecessary cheating and diving is rightly blamed on the foreign imports to our game.

No longer can players like Robbie Savage defend at all costs in the same way as Norman Hunter, Nobby Stiles and Tommy Smith have in past times.  The aggressive side of the English game has been replaced by a nibble-toed, non-contact sport that is more akin to European football styles because it is being played at the top Premiership teams by European and South American players more than English players.

But the main concern is whereas all four top teams in England have made it through to the quarter finals of the UEFA Champions League, when the few English players from Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester United and Liverpool are picked to play together for England, without their foreign team mates, the transition, considering their quality, is poorer than ever before.

While the England national football team suffers our clubs and top league are at their most powerful and successful.  Italy is the World Champions but look like their club football is in disarray and in need of some national spirit and pride.