EUROPE’S biggest clubs must comply with UEFA’s “indirect salary cap” or face the music, Michel Platini yesterday warned.

UEFA’s latest figures show that financial problems affecting European clubs are getting worse, with spending on player wages up almost ten per cent – and increasing at a faster rate than income.

Under UEFA’s new rules, clubs will face possible bans from European competition from the 2014-15 season if they spend more than they earn in the three years before.

Manchester City’s recent £121m losses mean they are the club in England facing the greatest difficulty to abide by the rules – even though owners are also allowed to inject £12m a year (15m euro) into their club.

City are one of 11 clubs competing in Europe this season that would fall foul of the rules were they in force now.

Leading Italian clubs also face problems but UEFA president Platini said whatever their stature, the European governing body would not hesitate to take action.

Platini, speaking at UEFA’s headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland, said: “If a club doesn’t fall in line and follow the same rules as everyone else then it will be time to face the music.

“Our objective is not to put clubs into financial difficulty.

Financial fair play is to help them escape from this devilish spiral and have a viable economic strategy in the long term. I will leave no stone unturned to do this. This is not a witch-hunt, this is so they no longer continue blindly and mindlessly.”

UEFA’s general secretary Gianni Infantino admitted the new rules are targeted at the amount spent by clubs on players’ wages.

“It is about better cost management, in particular the wages of players – it is an indirect salary cap,” said Infantino.

Under the new system UEFA will put clubs that have warning signs of possible problems in a special category where they are closely monitored. Signs include recording a loss in any year; spending more than 70 per cent of revenue on wages; having overdue football-related payments or tax debts; or a level of debts more than the size of the annual turnover.

As its stands currently, Chelsea and both Manchester clubs would be monitored, although United are insistent they would pass the financial fair play rules now.

The European Clubs’ Association (ECA) have thrown their weight behind the new rules.

ECA chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge said: “It’s time to step on the brake and bring a bit of rationality to football.”