BBC SPORT | Football | Fifa wants 18-team Premier League (original) (raw)

Blatter wants to ease fixture congestion

Fifa is heading for a showdown with the Premier League over its 20-club size.

On Thursday Fifa's Congress endorsed a proposal for Europe's top leagues to be reduced to a maximum of 18 clubs by the start of the 2007-08 season.

Fifa president Sepp Blatter said: "We've been given the power to work on it. We'll do it. It'll give four more days to the international calendar."

But Premier League spokesman Dan Johnson ruled out a reduction: "There's no appetite for this kind of change."

Johnson added: "The only people who are going to tell us how to run the Premier League are the league's 20 member clubs' chairmen.

"They are the only ones who can change the composition of the league and they are just not going to go for this - no way."

Fifa's decision could also hit the Spanish, Italian, and French leagues.

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