Former Manchester United defender Gary Neville believes that the English game should introduce a minimum quota for British-based players in Premier League sides.

Neville thinks that this summer has represented "a tipping point" in English football, with the influx of players signed from abroad by Premier League clubs stopping youngsters from getting chances in the top flight.

The current England assistant coach wants the Premier League and Football League to safeguard the future of young players in Great Britain by agreeing that each side should feature at least three players from home nations in their starting XIs.

He told The Guardian: "Last week I looked at a list of players signed into the Premier League. I like to think I'm well-read on football but, honestly, I'd never heard of 50-60% of them. All right, we might unearth lots of talent from abroad. And some fantastic foreign players and managers have enhanced British football no end. But I used the phrase 'tipping point' last season and I feel we're going too far right now.

"We need to protect our English, Scottish, Welsh, Northern Irish and Irish national teams by giving more boys from those countries more opportunities. England not winning trophies, or even reaching the semi-finals of major competitions any longer, is a problem for us. It's also a problem for the Premier League, which seems behind the German and Spanish leagues. Look where the Spanish were 12 years ago. They weren't always successful but, since then, they have produced some wonderful teams. There is an opportunity for us to do that one day. But we need to help ourselves.

"British football clubs and managers, the Football Association and the Premier League need to come together as one. We all want a successful group of home nations which produce more domestic players. It's not just England. Look what's happened to Scottish football. Look at the Republic of Ireland. Roy Keane, Niall Quinn, Steve Staunton, Paul McGrath and Kevin Moran always played on English soil and in the Premier League.

"We need to come together and get back to a point where there is a quota system of some kind, where each team has three or four players from the home countries at the start of every match."

Neville continued his role under Roy Hodgson yesterday by helping the Three Lions coach take a training session at St George's Park, ahead of tomorrow night's friendly against Scotland.