Friday, October 27, 2006

Football and free trade

Vladimir Putin's fear of foreign encroachment on to Russian turf has now extended to the soccer field. Or the football pitch, if you like.

The Russian president said Wednesday he was concerned over the large number of foreign nationals playing for Russia's soccer clubs.

Vladimir Putin, speaking at his annual televised question-and-answer session, said: "There are too many of them. We need to restrict their number, because when it comes to composing the national team, we do not have enough players."

I'm not sure I see Putin's logic there. Presumably the five or so foreign players on a team are knocking five Russian players off the bottom of the ladder when they sign up. The guys failing to make the cut were unlikely to make the national team, no?

Moreover, as Daniel Drezner points out, American baseball's example would fly in the face of the notion that foreign-born players hinder local talent development: "Imagine, for a second, imposing caps on the number of Dominican baseball players allowed into Major League Baseball, for example. The best way to have quality American ballplayers is to have them face the toughest competition imaginable."

Posted by Evan Hughes at 08:59 AM

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