League Managers' Association chief executive Richard Bevan revealed earlier this week that some foreign owners in the Premier League were interested in abolishing relegation from the English top flight. The Football Association has made it clear no such idea would ever be implemented, while the very suggestion of scrapping the current system has met with widespread condemnation from managers, chairmen and owners of Premier League and Championship clubs. "We should be open to new ideas from other sports or other countries, but this is a bad idea," Martinez told the Wigan Evening Post. "In the British game and the Mediterranean game, you need to have the prize of promotion and the punishment of relegation. "That's what keeps football clubs aiming for dreams. If you take away that dream, you kill the ambition of all football clubs outside the top flight. "We are probably the biggest example of a club that has followed its dream, and to stop others trying to follow in our footsteps would be wrong. "It's so important that football protects that dream, because without dreams you don't get big achievements. It wouldn't be beneficial for anyone." The 'franchise' model has proved successful in other sports, particularly in North America, but Martinez does not think it is a concept that would work in Britain. "From one point of view, I can see where they are coming from in proposing this, because it's a great model that works in certain sports in America from a financial point of view," he added. "But it has no place in British football - and I can't see it ever taking off seriously over here."
