Premier League clubs' growing practice of sweeping the globe for promising
teenagers is under threat from UEFA, who are targeting new rules aimed at
limiting the transfer of players under 18.
European football's rulers have become increasingly concerned at the top clubs
in England, Italy, Spain, Portugal and France looking to cream off the best
young players from other countries.
Clubs have been made aware of the opportunity following the success of Spanish
midfielder Cesc Fabregas at Arsenal, while in other big leagues young players
are being brought in from Africa, South America and eastern Europe.
UEFA president Michel Platini is now considering making a proposal to compel
young players to sign their first professional contract at the club where they
have trained.
The Premier League believe any restrictions would fall foul of European labour
laws but UEFA say they have been encouraged by the European White Paper on sport
published last week calling for stricter rules on the transfer of young players
and 'the principle that players should sign their first professional contract
with the club which has trained them'.
UEFA communications director William Gaillard, special advisor to Platini,
told PA Sport: 'Our president has been talking about the idea that the first
contract for a professional player should be signed with the club that has
educated him in the academy.
'He says that the biggest clubs have the best players and the best coaches -
that has always been the case - but if they also have the best youth it's the
end of football as we know it.
'So let's leave at least the young players for a couple of years with their
original clubs so they can complete their education because there are a lot of
cases all over Europe of terrible failures of very promising players that have
been transferred very early, when still children, and haven't developed well and
their career has been ended.'
Gaillard said the practice was basically 'youth trafficking' and was not
ethical.
He added: 'They are being brought over at a very young age and basically
dumped in the streets if they don't make it. There have been some successes, like Fabregas, but you can count them on one
hand.
'The president is talking to the whole football family because he wants some
kind of consensus and then obviously we will discuss it during the French
presidency of the EU.'
UEFA also believe restricting the transfer of young players would give more
opportunity for domestic teenagers to come up through the academies of the top
clubs.
They face opposition from players' organisations, however.
Mick McGuire, vice-president of the international players' union FIFPro, said:
'We are in no way in agreement with that because a 16-year-old and his parents
have a right to decide with which club he signs his first professional
contract.'
McGuire, who is also deputy chief executive of the PFA, said FIFPro accepted
there was a problem with young players being dumped after failing to make the
grade but that further discussions were needed from all of football about how to
solve that issue.
