The Bosman rule

[dawlishmatt]

Am I correct in thinking that the Bosman ruling regarding player's under 24 was a rule which came from the European Court of justice and only affected clubs whose country's were members of the EU?. If so, now that we are no longer members of the EU, does the Bosman rule still apply to the uk?

[Dave]

Sorry from bringing politics into this, think it's relevant however. The European Union as it's known today did not come into force until 1993 upon the implementation of the Maastricht treaty, it was only at that point Freedom of Movement was born, prior to that it was the EEC , it's relevant because prior to free movement in 1993 players routinely transferred around Europe, although I will freely admit not as frequently as today.

I believe the answer to your question is both yes and no. It has to be remembered not every European national FA is from a country that is an EU member state, but is a member of UEFA, so whilst a player out of contract may able to leave his current club, if he was to leave a club within the EU to move to a non EU country I would suggest free movement wouldn't apply.

So now the English FA along with the rest of the UK are no longer within the EU a lot will depend on what or if any deal is done between the UK and EU, because until December the 31st we're still in the transition period, so if the UK leaves fully on Jan 1st with no deal incoming transferred players would be subject to a points based immigration system same as everyone else.

On that point I couldn't care less if your Tory, Labour, LibDem you'd be living in cloud cuckoo land if you think the current government are going to do anything other than make it lot easier for an international football under a points based system to come and work here, than many other industries, and lower league players 'hypocritical' Yes 'unfair' Yes, but's that's life.

[MellowYellow]

I believe the Bosman ruling wouldn’t be overturned, just part of it would simply cease to apply. Freedom of contract on expiry will continue to apply because that is now enshrined in FIFA and UEFA rules, not just an EU one. What will change is who the government allows to come into the UK and play football. The FA, as a continuing member of UEFA, will remain subject to UEFA rules, which I suspect will continue to have aspects of the Bosman ruling “baked in”.

Like many other organisations dependent on a combination of domestic and international talent, we are waiting to better understand what the political and regulatory landscape will be after the UK leaves the European Union. I am led to believe that government and Premier League are in talks in response to what happens next. The UK government will have to reflect, on how to treat the Premier League an organisation that generates £3.5 billion for the British treasury in taxes annually.