LONDON, Jan 7: FIFA president Sepp Blatter criticised England’s decision to hire a foreign coach on Monday, the day Fabio Capello arrived at FA headquarters for his first day of work.

Capello succeeded Steve McClaren following England’s failure to qualify for Euro 2008. The FIFA president claimed the FA had “broken a principle of international football” by not choosing an Englishman.

Blatter told BBC Sport: “I have never seen Italy, Germany, Brazil or Argentina with a coach from another country. In fact, most of the best teams have a coach from their own country.

“I would say it is a little surprising that the motherland of football has ignored a sacrosanct law or belief that the national team manager should be from the same country as the players.”Blatter said it was now “High Noon” for English football after the failure to qualify for the Euro 2008 finals and insists the domestic football authorities need to address the issue of overseas players in the game.

He added: “When you talk about being a football nation and you look at the big clubs in the Premier League it is not the English or British game that is represented. The clubs are international XIs.”—AFP