Liverpool FC Forum

[Greavesie]

Liverpool are the club reported by Crewe over an alleged illegal approach to sign a player from their academy, BBC Radio Stoke understands.

Crewe's director of football Dario Gradi revealed on Monday his club had made the complaint and the player in question is 15-year-old Max Clayton.

Liverpool were linked with Clayton in February 2008 and were willing to pay a six-figure sum to take him to Anfield.

Crewe rejected the approach, but Gradi says Clayton now wants to leave.

He told the Daily Express: "Max has come in and told us that he wants to leave right now to join a big club.

"You worry financially for the clubs where the players are stolen from.

"What sort of compensation are we going to get for all the work that has gone into developing him? Any compensation is insignificant for the effort that gone in.

"It's simple, the big clubs are stealing other people's players."

Gradi revealed the news in the wake of the decision to ban Chelsea from signing any players until January 2011.

The 68-year-old, who managed Crewe between 1983 and 2007, brought players such as David Platt, Danny Murphy, Seth Johnson, Robbie Savage and Dean Ashton through the ranks at the Alexandra Stadium during his time in charge.

Gradi has given his support to Fifa's decision to place a transfer embargo on Chelsea, after they were found guilty of inducing 18-year-old French midfielder Gael Kakuta to break his contract with Lens in 2007.

Chelsea have already confirmed that they will launch the "strongest possible appeal" to the ruling.

Manchester United could also face an investigation after it emerged that another French club, Le Havre, are going to ask Fifa to look into Paul Pogba's move to Old Trafford in August.

"I'm delighted with what has happened with Chelsea," added Gradi. "I would hope all the big clubs are frightened to death. There is no excuse for breaking the rules.

"We lost a 12-year-old to Everton. He was our best 12-year-old. The lure is that the bigger clubs pay big expenses.

"This kid will be getting several hundred pounds a week in expenses. We pay expenses but nothing like that. It's more a case of giving out £20 if someone can pick a kid up en-route.

"At least Fifa have given the smaller clubs hope."

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Max who?

not like our owners were gonna cough up for players anyway but it doesn't look good for us at all if true

[Bammo]

It doesn't look good but it's hardly damning evidence. Gradi's alluding to us approaching the player illegally. The only facts he's mentioned are that we made a bid and now the player wants to leave.

How do we know that someone at Crewe didn't tell the player of the bid? Just knowing that could be enough to turn his head.

The other thing in our favour is we haven't actually signed him. An illegal approach (as opposed to an illegal signing) may only result in a ban for the January transfer window. Given that we can't afford anyone anyway it won't make a difference

[J*o*n*D*o*e]

looks to me like every lower league manager is going to jump on the Chelsea Bangwagon and cry foul every time someone even looks at a player in the future.

The kid gets wind that Liverpool are interested in him, we make an offer its rejected now kid wants to leave, happens all the time

[Fauxy]

Basically they are reporting us for making an offer which was rejected.. or thats what the evidence that they have says.

[heimdall]

Basically they are reporting us for making an offer which was rejected.. or thats what the evidence that they have says.

Is he our player then? I'm confused by this one. 

[Fauxy]

Basically they are reporting us for making an offer which was rejected.. or thats what the evidence that they have says.

Is he our player then? I'm confused by this one. 

Im not sure if he did actually join us.. but they are just saying that a bid that we made for him, which they rejected, made him want to leave them to join us.

They think we might have poached at him to make him want to leave but they have no actual evidence so based on what they are saying, we havent done anything wrong. Bit silly this one

[GYBS]

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

[lakes10]

Basically they are reporting us for making an offer which was rejected.. or thats what the evidence that they have says.

Is he our player then? I'm confused by this one. 

we tried to get him to come to the club without asking them...well thats what they are saying.

we was once good friends with them......till we yutned our backs on them...ok ok heres come the stick, but we should never shoot a feeder club like them. if we get done for this i cannot see how its going to hurt us, hicks will be over the moon that Rafa will not be able to buy players.

it might be better to the FA to hurt the owners by making them buy players with their own money for 2 years.

[Ciggy]

This has got no legs and is bollox, however other players we have signed in the past we may have tapped up.

If they are going to punish us, then they have to punish the mancs also and that will never happen in a million years..........

[Ben Patrick]

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 

[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. 

[loopyliverpool]

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.

[heimdall]

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.

[Bammo]

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  )

[LFC2007]

I sympathise with the feeder club perspective on this issue. A lot of lower league clubs rely on their best young talent to stay afloat. If they're taken before the age of 16 I think the club is only entitled to receive training compensation i.e. the cost of developing the player, but after that age, the player should have signed a professional deal and the club can then negotiate a fee acceptable to them. If this protection didn't exist (or, if this trend in poaching U16 talent continues), some of these feeder clubs would struggle to balance the books, and by extension, to sustain levels of investment in their Academy systems.