Mikel Arteta for England would break agreement, says Craig Levein

Posted Tuesday, August 31, 2010 by theguardian.com

Mikel Arteta for England would break agreement, says Craig Levein
Mikel Arteta's possible future eligibility to play for England has been questioned by Scotland's manager.

Scotland's manager, Craig Levein, has revealed one reason why Mikel Arteta will not be pictured in an England shirt any time soon by stressing Fabio Capello would be in breach of a Home Nations' agreement if he calls up the Spaniard.

Arteta is keen to explore the possibility of British citizenship, and it has been suggested that Capello has met the Everton midfielder to discuss an England call-up.

Yet the Scottish Football Association and Levein have pointed to an eligibility agreement signed by the four home associations last year.

Under the criteria put in place, only those who have a family bloodline or who have completed five years' education in one country can represent that nation at international level.

"The way I understand it, the home associations have an agreement," said Levein. "I'll tell you how I know. I tried to get Shola Ameobi at Newcastle a while back [to play for Scotland], because he has not played for England but has lived in the UK and has a British passport, so I thought he might be able to play for Scotland. But we had changed the rules."

Levein described the rule as "more than a gentlemen's agreement", adding: "Maybe England are thinking of challenging it but it only came in a year ago.

"I just used Ameobi as an example because he was somebody who had a British passport but it fell down because he didn't have the educational qualification. I understand that it's a newsworthy story but I don't want to go into enormous detail about Arteta. All I'm saying to you is, the way I understand it, they can't cap him."

Levein's comments have been fully endorsed by the Scottish FA. However, the manager admitted he would be happy to select players of any nationality if the rules so permitted.

"From my point of view, my job isn't to decide who is Scottish, it's to win football matches. Take away the rest of it and keep my mind on that one thing, and I would be happy to play anybody.

"I mean, it depends what you think about the current grandparent rule. A lot of guys I played with for Scotland were effectively English. So what's the difference?"

Levein today gathered those players he can currently pick as the buildup for Friday's European Championship qualifier in Lithuania got underway. The manager has been boosted by the likely return to fitness of the Tottenham Hotspur right-back Alan Hutton.Levein also stressed he would not prevent any member of his squad from holding transfer negotiations over the next 24 hours as the window closes. "If a player has a contractual agreement which will affect him for the next three years, then he will go and deal with it. I'm not going to be saying to players, on something that affects their lives and their families, that they are not going away to deal with it."