‘Led to believe that’s the issue’
Crystal Palace chairman Steve Parish has suggested that Nottingham Forest contributed to their demotion from the Europa League.
Palace have dropped into the Conference League following a ruling by UEFA on multi-club ownership rules.
John Textor owns a stake at the south London side and also at Lyon, who also qualified for the Europa League last season.
Forest secured Conference League football, but wrote to UEFA to express their concerns over Palace’s potential rule breach.
They are now listed by UEFA as a Europa League side and appearing on The Rest Is Football, Parish hinted at their involvement in the decision.
Gary Lineker suggested: “Forgive me, I’m not quite sure how these things work, but Nottingham Forest played a part in this.
“Because obviously they’ve benefitted from it, because they’ve moved out from Conference League qualification to now being in the Europa League.”
“So, we were told that, and I think it’s been made public… ” Parish said.
“I mean basically, these things seem to be played out in public, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of confidentiality that comes out of certain organisations. But we’re led to believe that that’s the issue.
“If there wasn’t somebody that wanted to get in as a consequence, then there wouldn’t be a problem.”
Parish added: “People have got to look at themselves in terms of what they do. Some people will say it’s fine, some people will say it’s not, I don’t really have control of that.
“I only have control of the arguments that we put forward to UEFA.”
“I think it does look bad,” he also said. “Because I think for smaller clubs like us, we’re a medium-sized club, let’s say, this is the dream.
“This is what keeps football alive, this is why everybody goes because they think one day they might win a cup and as a consequence, they might qualify for Europe.
“People are saying, ‘You’re in the Conference League, that’s fine.’ If you win the Europa League, you get into the Champions League.
“These can be defining moments for football clubs and completely change the course of history forever for you as a club.”