The issue of compensation is absolutely vital. On the club academy Scotland players, I understand completely that the clubs have concerns and worries about the bigger clubs cherry picking, a loss of control, and players moving from club to club every year, but I think that their fears are ill-founded.
The Bosman ruling, which gave players freedom of movement, was made 21 years ago earlier this month. It is incredible that it took so long to give players freedom of movement when their contract finished. Even when their contract was finished, compensation was still payable prior to that. The Bosman ruling was going to be a disaster for football but, 21 years later, the game is flourishing at most levels, and certainly at the professional level. I therefore think that those fears are ill-founded.
I go back to the fact that it is about the individual. We should really be talking about the individual young lad in these circumstances. I have just been through this with my son’s teenage years. Their bodies and minds change. If they are unhappy and do not want to stay at a club, compensation should not be a barrier to their moving to another professional club. Twenty-eight days allows them to go back to the SYFA’s jurisdiction. I understand that, if they go back into club academy Scotland two years later, for example, compensation will still be payable.
That is where the three-year registration, which we might discuss, kicks in. When a person reaches the age of 16 and signs a professional contract as a player, they are bound by FIFA’s regulations, which bring in compensation, as long as a certain offer has been made or there is a certain salary. Therefore, the age that we are talking about is genuinely 11. If the club picks up a registration unilaterally at the end of every season and that carries on until the person is 23, the person will then be free. That is an issue to me.
We have become more involved in the area. We have watched developments with the petition, mainly because more parents are coming to us about issues that relate to their lad and their registration. More parents are asking for information, but clubs do not seem to give the proper information. I am generalising; some clubs give the proper information, but some do not. If we asked parents whether they realised that, when their lad signed at 11, he could not leave, they would probably say no.
Compensation needs to be looked at. There must be an alternative way. There could be a willingness to have a compensation pool, perhaps separately, that the clubs could apply to under certain circumstances. There can be a huge debate, but any compensation should not stop a 14-year-old boy from deciding that they are not happy and not enjoying things at club A, and that they want to go and play for club B. That is the fundamental issue. I cannot get my head around the compromising of the rights of children.