Football rules aimed at encouraging locally trained young talent may be unfairly allowing top clubs to snap up the best talent in their region, an adviser to the European Union’s top court warned.
(Bloomberg) — Football rules aimed at encouraging locally trained young talent may be unfairly allowing top clubs to snap up the best talent in their region, an adviser to the European Union’s top court warned.
In a potential headache for UEFA, Europe’s football governing body, Advocate General Maciej Szpunar said the idea of forcing clubs to use a certain number of home-grown players may be a justified restriction on the EU’s labor movement rules — partly because it allows potential future soccer stars to stay close to home while they train.
But the adviser to the EU’s Court of Justice said that argument may fall flat if the measures allow big teams in major leagues to meet their quotas by scooping up youngsters trained up by other teams.
“These doubts obviously increase if the national league in question is a major one,” the court said in an emailed summary of Szpunar’s non-binding opinion. “If a club in a major national league can ‘buy’ up to half of home-grown players, the objective of encouraging that club to train young players would be frustrated.”
The case is the latest challenge to soccer’s rulebook at the EU’s top court, which has taken a key role in shaping how players can enjoy the freedom to move clubs, and country, within the 27-nation bloc. A landmark ruling in 1995 involving Belgian Jean-Marc Bosman meant that clubs could no longer block a move or demand a fee if the player left at the end of their contracts. Restrictions on the free movement of foreign players were generally outlawed, but the ruling said measures encouraging the recruitment and training of young players must be accepted as legitimate.
The opinion “endorses UEFA’s commitment to encourage youth development and competitive balance across Europe” but “as the Advocate General notes, the beautiful game would lose some of its attraction without rules pursuing those objectives,” the body said after the ruling.
Belgian Dispute
Thursday’s case stems from a dispute in Belgium, where Royal Antwerp Football Club challenged the national version of the UEFA rules, saying they infringe the freedom of movement for workers in the EU. The club argued they “restrict the possibility for a professional football club to recruit players who do not meet the requirement of local or national roots, and to field them in a match.”
The lawyers bringing the case on behalf of the club and a player said Thursday’s opinion “validates our clients’ analysis of the illegality” of the home-grown rules, Jean-Louis Dupont and Martin Hissel said in an emailed statement.
As of the 2008-2009 season, UEFA has required football clubs to include a minimum of eight so-called home-grown players on the squad size limit list sheet that contains a maximum of 25 players, the EU court said.
Home-grown players are defined as players who, regardless of their nationality, have been trained by their club or by another club in the same national league for at least three years between the ages of 15 and 21. Out of these eight players, four at least must have been trained by the club at issue, it added.
The EU court is likely to issue a final ruling in the case in the coming months.
(Updates with comments from the sixth paragraph)
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