Former BBC boss Dyke to be new FA chairman
Former BBC director general Greg Dyke is set to become the new chairman of the Football Association, the English game’s governing body announced on Thursday.
The 65-year-old is in line to succeed David Bernstein when the current chairman steps down in July after the FA refused to alter a rule requiring the holder of the post to quit at the age of 70.
Now the appointment of Dyke is subject to the approval of the FA council.
A lifelong football fan and the current chairman of west London side Brentford, currently second in England’s third tier League One, Dyke previously had business experience of the game when buying sports rights on behalf of both commercial broadcaster ITV and the BBC, Britain’s two main terrestrial networks.
During the 1990s, he was also a director of English giants Manchester United.
“I was brought up in a household where my father was much more interested in whether or not you had won at football than whether you had passed your exams,” said Dyke.
In my case that was just as well...I am very excited to take on this role with the FA.
“At the grass roots seven million people play football every weekend, women’s football is booming and the ambition is for it to be the second-biggest team participation sport in England behind only the men’s game, we have the best known, most successful league in the world with the Premier League and the Football League is so much stronger than it was eight years or nine ago.
“Having said that I am a big supporter of financial fair play which, in both the Premier League and the Football League, will have a big impact and hopefully bring a degree of financial sanity to the professional game.
“I do see one of the most important tasks for the FA is, over time, to make thoughtful changes which will benefit the England team,” said Dyke.
England have not won a major trophy since lifting the World Cup on home soil back in 1966.
Roy Hodgson, the current England manager, speaking at a press conference Thursday ahead of the team’s World Cup qualifier against San Marino on Friday, congratulated Dyke and said he looked forward to working with him.
“I don’t know him [Dyke) personally but I congratulate him on being appointed to the position,” Hodgson said.
“I’ve been really pleased with my relationship with David Bernstein and the support he’s given me and the work he’s done at the FA in my time, and I’m now hoping I’ll be able to forge a similar relationship with Greg Dyke and that he will continue in the same way as David has done.”
