G14 chairman David Dein has confirmed that the grouping representing many of Europe’s leading clubs, will support Newcastle’s bid for compensation for the knee injury suffered by Michael Owen in the World Cup.
Arsenal vice-chairman Dein said he would back Newcastle’s right to take the matter to court but, he admitted that he would prefer the matter be resolved without recourse to legal action.
Newcastle are threatening to sue the English Football Association (FA) and world football governing body FIFA over the injury which could keep Owen out of action for a year.
“We have got the Michael Owen issue where he has been injured in the World Cup and could be out for a whole year,” Dein told The Daily Telegraph.
“In our case, we had Philippe Senderos injured in the World Cup and we haven’t seen him play for Arsenal this season and we are already in October.
“The G14 will back Newcastle and support them and I hope they would support Arsenal if we decided to do something over Senderos. Why shouldn’t we?
“In what other industry would you allow your employees to go to someone else and then be off for a length of time because effectively they were on secondment to someone else?”
G14 are currently backing court cases against FIFA brought by Belgian side Charleroi over an injury suffered by Moroccan Abdelmajid Oulmers, and Lyon, after defender Eric Abidal broke his foot playing for France.
