Football clubs exploit labour laws to obtain UK visas for young talent

September 04 2009 by Matt Jones

Les Reed talks UK visas

UK football clubs are using European labour laws to recruit the best young talent from across the continent. FIFA regulations forbid the transfer of under-18s between continents but according to one agent “there are ways around the rules”.

Top English clubs, who are fiercely competitive in securing the best players, are using sophisticated recruitment techniques to acquire young foreign players and secure UK visas for them.

One technique is to “park” players at feeder clubs in foreign countries where laws are less strict than those of UK immigration. Another is to help the players’ entire family move to the UK, as happened in case of 18-year-old Carlos Vela from Mexico, who was recruited by Arsenal in 2007.

Clubs are also taking advantage of allowances within European contract laws to sign players. When Arsenal signed Cesc Fabregas from Spain it took advantage of a local law that prevents players signing professional forms until they have turned 18 which effectively nullified the player’s obligation to his original club and cleared the path for him to work in the UK.

Les Reed, the former technical director of the English FA who helped set up Charlton's strategy for securing UK work permits for overseas players, explained: “It's a highly competitive market. Every club is trying to recruit the best players. In the last few years it has really intensified. The net has been cast very wide compared to 15 or 20 years ago, when you focused on the boys on your own doorstep and a club would rarely go out of their catchment area to find players.”

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