Liverpool FC Forum

[JC_81]

We won't be the last 'big club' threatened with legal action in the next few weeks.  The ruling against Chelsea will have every small club who has had a player poached crawling out of the woodwork to try and make some money out of the club that took the player.

[tonyeh]

Its all Rafa and Lucas's fault . They are both sh,it

You're forgetting Parry.

[Kharhaz]

The case with youngsters, as far as I know, is very different compared to older players. A youngsters contract is more fragile as that player can be signed young and compensation payed (fee if you like) that is set to the club who own that youngster. The compensation payed is down to the contract the lad has signed and varies on how talented he his. Chelsea, for instance, signed a talented young lad but didnt want to pay the full amount and so bribed the kid into breaching his contract to join them. That is dirty tactics. Kids as we know, are impressionable. As long as a club buys a youngster and pays the compensation due, nothing illegal has happened. Smaller clubs call it poaching, which in a way it is. However, thats why such vast scouting networks exist amongst so many clubs. Crewe have lost so many talented players over the years, especially since the bosman ruling, but nothing has been done illegally. It sounds like a moan from Dario Gradi to me, he has helped Crewe develope so many talented players and lost them all. Liverpool have shown an interest and thats about it. All this is just a lame story trying to be linked with what has happened to Chelsea.

I also mentioned older players. Were Liverpool not punished for the way the approached Christian Ziege when he was at Middlesborough? There have been less tasteful ways to approach players, and a majority of the time they are picked up and dealt with, Liverpool in this instance. Whats going on is nothing new, its just poor taste, and we all know, poor taste sells, and the press stretch every little saucy bit of news they get to the max.

[Owzat]

Somewhat difficult to assess, we make an offer and Crewe reject it. Then the kid wants to move and it's supposedly tapping up.

Someone needs to make this clear or every dick, dick and dick in football will start complaining about tapping up any time a kid changes his mind. Kids DO CHANGE THEIR MINDS, they are tempted by bigger clubs, they are unpredictable and somewhat f in useless some of them. A 12 year old chose the bitters over Crewe, absolute shocker that, must have been something underhand in that. Why oh why would a kid chose to play for a Premiership club over a team in the lower divisions?!?!?

The problem with all this, and the Chelsea punishment is no exception, is PROOF ABSOLUTE. If a team bids or makes a legitimate approach for a player then a player could well be influenced by that move. If a big company that pays well approached your company to ask you to leave, you might well consider handing in your notice anyway if your company didn't want to play ball.

It is life, what I find somewhat staggering is that clubs are trying to claim ownership of kids under 16. Surely since they can't "work" legally on much more than a paper round, they can't be 'owned' by a company. They can't sign professional contracts until they are 17 can they? I am on board with compensation for time, money and the skill put into developing kids, but surely up to 17 a club takes a risk with all kids. And what happens with kids clubs decide aren't up to it and discard? How many clubs have clear outs and you see half a dozen players 'released' ? It's not a one way street, people give their loyalty to clubs/companies and get walked all over. Crewe surely have to accept their 'station' in life, that they are a lower league club and the best players will want to move to the best clubs. If they find a player first then they should be entitled to be paid for however many years they have put into developing that player, much the same way as companies have to pay redundancy to employees based on age, years of service etc.

I'm more worried by big clubs moving in for players and forcing transfers through, sure those end up with transfer fees but (vaguely) proportionate to their value in most cases while kids could be stars or nothings for Crewe, Accrington Stanley, bitters, Chelsea, the mancs, us or whoever they play for.

"He was our best 12-year old" - how ridiculous does that sound? He was not 'your's', he represented you, was at your academy etc, but surely under 17 they are like at school learning and not employed or 'owned'. Chance comes along to go to a better school and they might take it, equally if the school kicks them out then they (have to) take it too. Or perhaps Crewe would like to state they never sh1t on some kids' dreams and aspirations. You wonder if they are squeaky clean either, perhaps Dario knows the activities of all those employees scouting for kids, but perhaps they have turned the heads of kids who might otherwise have ended up at small clubs in the non-league. Or perhaps non-league 'doesn't count'

I'd say in this instance it is unfortunate, but we made a fair bid of six figures for a player and can't help that our valuation was rejected and the kid subsequently wants to leave. C'est la vie, we bid for the player but can't be held responsible if that bid turned his head. What should we have done Dario? Declare interest in the papers, media in general and waited until he decided to leave? Sounds too legitimate to me and won't go very far unless football has gone mad. £100,000+ is a lot of money for a kid in a lower league club, did they expect us to get to £1,000,000+ ? Whether our valuation/bid was realistic or not, it wasn't a small sum. Might be compared to Johnson or even Ronaldo, but the player isn't either of those or he'd have long since moved to a big club.

The main consequence of this Chelsea punishment was inevitably going to be a lot of smaller clubs whinging about young players who moved to a bigger club and the smaller clubs didn't like it. The main danger is FIFA deciding to hand out punishments to all the big clubs on the basis they might be guilty and wanting to punish the big clubs for being big, give them their 'comeuppance' as it were. Let's not worry about the kids themselves, let's worry about the clubs. The fact that the kid thinks they would be better off at that club and is making a career move doesn't come into it, the smaller clubs are sore and want vengeance. Put a ban on transfers of any player aged between 17 and 21 and be done with it, make it illegal to sign these players and it's sorted.

[lakes10]

from what i now ubderstand (but only going by whats SSN have said) we asked the players dad about his son coming to the club and then spoke to the player about coming to the club, only when the players dad told crew about it did we put the offer in, the ofer was then turned dpne.

if this is true then we did go about it the wrong way, we shouild have spoken to crew first.

anyway the FA are going to look into to it and it dont look as bad as what other teams have done.

ciggy is right in the past we have tapped up players................but all the top 4 have.

[Roger Red Hat]

dont we have some sort of alligence with Crewe? dont we have an invested interest in them? I thought we support them financially or summat, might be wrong.

[GYBS]

Its all Rafa and Lucas's fault . They are both sh,it

Ye know what GYBS, you kick off when someone derails posts or brings up hidden agendas in other threads.

So what the f'cks all that about 

I was thinking the same thing, people have been carded for less you know GYBS, I speak from experiece here. 

Tut tut  trying to get people carded - bit naughty

[GYBS]

It doesn't appear we have done anything that bad... we offered them a six figure sum for a fifteen year old which they rejected. Is that illegal? The player now wants away. Is there an additional law that says he isn't allowed to ask this because of his age? I don't know... contracted professional players are asking to leave clubs all the time. The laws of transfers need to be more transparent and clearly understood by everyone. I understand  Gradi's gripe but this has been going on since they employed 'scouts' to go looking for talent. I do, however, think clubs need to be compensated if they do provide the 'bigger' clubs with young talent.

I think the current system needs to be scrapped or phased out, the entire notion of "owning" someone is fairly abhorrent if you think about it. Imagine if the place where you work owned you , I for one would not like that at all! What is wrong with these players all being free agents but being tied to clubs with notice periods etc like in the real world? I'm not quite sure how you would make the transition to this system as so much of a clubs assets are tied up with the player but I think it is ineviatable that it will happen, it would also get rid of this insane situation with clubs being so massively in debt due to over reaching on transfer budgets.

That's exactly what we have though 

A player signs a contract for an agreed length of time. He can give 6 months notice at the end of the contract. If he wants to leave before that then the employer is entitled to compensation.

Same as if you're a soldier and you sign a 2 year contract. If after 6 months you decide to leave then you need to buy out the remainder of the contract.

(someone in the military is gonna correct me on that...I can feel it  )

All depends on what force you join mate

Air Force - sign up for 9 year initally - if you want to leave you put your notice in the normally wait for a year before leaving . After 9 years you can sign on for a further 3 years then another further 2 years or you can get promotion to NCO level and sign on for pensionable 22 years service .

Navy - Sign up for 22 years to start with if you want to leave hand in your notice and then work for a year before leavin

Army - think its 9 years to start but not sure

but there is no buying yourself out of your contract

[heimdall]

Its all Rafa and Lucas's fault . They are both sh,it

Ye know what GYBS, you kick off when someone derails posts or brings up hidden agendas in other threads.

So what the f'cks all that about 

I was thinking the same thing, people have been carded for less you know GYBS, I speak from experiece here. 

Tut tut  trying to get people carded - bit naughty

I do wish you would stop obsessing and talking to me GYBS. Have you not noticed that I have been ignoring you for the past few weeks, that is too avoid confrontations but I have to say soemthing here to respond to your blatant slur.

My post was in no way meant to incite any moderator to give you a card, I would never do that! If I think a post is out of order then I report it through the proper channels, I was merely trying to give you some advice based on personal experience, if you choose to ignore it then that's up to you.

JUST to reiterate mods, I am not advocating anybody being given a card.

[dawson99]

dont we have some sort of alligence with Crewe? dont we have an invested interest in them? I thought we support them financially or summat, might be wrong.

I thought similar...guess the friendlies will be stopping then

[dawson99]

From BBC Sport

No Crewe complaint over 'tap-up'

The Football League has told BBC Sport no complaint has been received from Crewe Alexandra over an alleged illegal approach to one of their players.

Earlier in the week Crewe director of football Dario Gradi said they had reported an unnamed Premier League club for tapping up one of their youngsters.

Reports suggested it was Liverpool and the player was 15-year-old Max Clayton.

But Liverpool, who were willing to offer a six-figure sum for Clayton last year, knew nothing about any complaint.

Crewe rejected Liverpool's initial approach in February 2008, but Gradi says the teenager now wants to leave the League Two outfit.

[kazza]

Italians not happy at transfer of Fornasier

Fifa have confirmed they have been contacted by Fiorentina about Manchester United's signing of Michele Fornasier.

The Italian Under 16 skipper has agreed a move to Old Trafford and he played in their Milk Cup win in Northern Ireland in the summer.

With Italian clubs unable to offer professional terms until they are 18, Premier League clubs have been constant raiders on Italy.

Manchester United have been one of the most consistent plunderers of the Italian market, having previously bagged the likes of Giusseppe Rossi, Federico Macheda and Davide Petrucci.

Fifa's recent banning of Chelsea for their capture of former Lens youngster Gael Kakuta, has brought the spotlight on other potential deals which could see Fifa act on them.

United's signing of French starlet Paul Pogba has angered his former club Le Havre, and both clubs have issued statements insisting they are in the right and will take action against the other.

However, whilst Fifa are still waiting to hear from Le Havre over allegations they have made about Pogba - Fiorentina have made moves to lodge an official complaint about Fornasier.

"We can confirm that we were contacted by Fiorentina with regard to the potential transfer of the player, Michele Fornasier, to the English club, Manchester United," a Fifa spokesman confirmed.

"However, so far no formal investigation was opened since the relevant documentation needs to be completed."

Fifa also confirmed that the Football Association, on behalf of Manchester United, have made contact with them about the registration of Empoli's youngster Alberto Massacci.

Massacci is another Italian starlet to have been snapped up by Sir Alex Ferguson's academy - but his move has been delayed by the Italian FA, who have yet to release his registration.

"We can confirm that our services were contacted by the Football Association on behalf of its member club, Manchester United, with regard to the international clearance for the player Alberto Massacci since the FA was not able to receive the pertinent international transfer certificate from the Italian Football Federation (the association of the player's former club). We are currently investigating the matter."

[Owzat]

Fifa's recent banning of Chelsea for their capture of former Lens youngster Gael Kakuta, has brought the spotlight on other potential deals which could see Fifa act on them.

Or opened the floodgates for complaints left, right and centre.

[kazza]

Fifa's recent banning of Chelsea for their capture of former Lens youngster Gael Kakuta, has brought the spotlight on other potential deals which could see Fifa act on them.

Or opened the floodgates for complaints left, right and centre.

I am feeling that with all the complaints FIFA may just throw them out (including the Chelsea ban when they appeal). It's a can of worms.

[Owzat]

Where's the conclusive proof? Who can vouch for why someone does anything?