A draft amendment

The NFL has always been that American curiosity where, in the land of the free market, the biggest sport is an advertisement for red-blooded socialism. The NFL, as one owner once joked, is where Republicans come together for sports and behave like communists.

Unlike the English football's Premier League, everything in the NFL is pooled, not just the television rights. There's also a salary cap for good measure. But perhaps the most important socialist measure is the draft, where the team that finishes bottom gets the first pick of the best of that year's college players.

It is a compelling event, both very visible and open to scrutiny, and, in many ways, the NFL draft mirrors the way Americans run their primary elections campaigns, of which there is no equivalent in our Westminster model.

In contrast, transfers in English football come across as cloak and dagger operations.

This year's seven-round NFL draft was held in New York's Radio City, a two-day affair shown live on television and endlessly analysed by pundits in the manner in which political experts would analyse election results.

As in most years, the top college players were also invited to Radio City to be guests of the NFL. As the drama unfolded, their families watched on television as if watching their child attend school for the first time.

The draft is a sporting ritual of the kind no other country stages, and, in the days and weeks leading up to it, the press endlessly debates which player will be picked by which team, analysing their strengths and weaknesses in the process.

The fans also get involved. This is not to say they decide which player their team boss selects - that is still the privy of the owners and the coaches - but they can voice their opinion in advance of selection, not after it as in England.

But the draft still pays homage to the essentially capitalist nature of American sports.

Being chosen in the early rounds means huge money for the lucky players.

For example, offensive tackle Jake Long, who was the first pick in this year's draft, signed a five-year deal with the Miami Dolphins worth $57.75m, $30m of which is guaranteed. For someone who has just left college that cannot be bad.

In fact, the draft is so important to college players that there are now academies where they can go to increase their chances of being selected.

The draft, which this year saw 252 college players signed by the 32 NFL teams, is also marked by what Americans call "trades".

The worse a team has performed in the previous season, the higher its draft number. However, that number may give it the option to sign a player it does not want, like a wide receiver when it needs an offensive lineman.

To counteract that, a team will sometimes trade its number with another so it can sign a player it wants. Such trades only surface as the draft unfolds live on television, often providing the element of surprise and heightening the drama.

All this works because the NFL is a closed league - no promotion or relegation - and there is a college system providing a pool of rookies.

The system is unique even in American sports - baseball, basketball and ice hockey do not just recruit from colleges.

Nevertheless, the Premier League was created by people like David Dein, former Arsenal vice chairman, because they were convinced it would be a success. But in typical English fashion there was a compromise. A few ideas were borrowed, but certainly not the open, very public scrutiny of transfers the NFL provides.

Supporters of the English system would argue that Arsene Wenger's recruitment of young hopefuls would not be possible if there was not a certain element of cloak and dagger - not that Wenger is unique. All English managers try to keep transfers secret until they have to be unveiled - but something of the openness and razzmatazz of the NFL draft system could be brought into our transfer system.

Can it seriously be argued that the Carlos Tevez affair could have taken place if we had a more open way of doing things?

It is this lack of transparency that has convinced many people that there is more than a whiff of corruption about football transfers and led to the ongoing City of London police investigation.