(Hey, Frankfurt capital markets is slow this week, thanks to holidays in London and New York on consecutive Mondays.) Lawyer's perogative ... never let 'em see you sweat. And never let 'em pin you down.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Nice Post, Karl ! Why should he be out of contract when exercising a buyout clause? This buyout clause only works if the player is signing a new contract somewhere else - as long as nobody exercises the option, the old contract remains valid as if no option exists. By exercising the option you are taking the player's rights out of an existing contract = in other words: you transfer the rights to dress the player from team A to B. Bosman is only for players with expired contracts (which is definitely not the case if you're just exercising an option). The judgement had nothing to do with buyout options, it just said that teams can't demand a transfer sum for a player whose contract expired.
Olaf, if I understand what you're saying, Landon's buy-out can't be exercised absent a new contract/team in the picture -- in this case, MLS. Traditional European buy-outs only work, then, if another TEAM pays the fee, not the PLAYER. Another wrinkle I wasn't aware of. Now that I'm a bit confused again, Olaf, can you confirm that even "true" free agents, out of contract, such as the 100+ former Bundesliga 1. & 2. players looking for work in Germany after their contracts expired/were terminated this past off-season, cannot sign with new teams after noon on Monday? Thanks.
Yes, I can confirm that. An absolutely ridiculous rule - in other terms: FIFA determined that a pro player who is unemployed in September is forced to stay unemployed at least until January.
If this is the case, then Maverick, since you're a lawyer in Europe, get before a judge, certify these out of work players as a class, and get a class-action suit going -- assuming that that's how it works over there. Olaf, what if LD gets Nike to buy out his contract, even BEFORE he has team lined up? Then it's not a transfer, but a true end-of-contract event. Assuming that the provisions of the contract don't stipulate that (a) another FIFA sanctioned team HAS to fund it and (b) he has to move to another team immediately upon exercise, then if he exercises it with someone else funding it, and waits to go to another team, it seems to me it isn't a transfer in either the common-sense understanding of the word, of the technical definition in the FIFA sense.
I'm pretty sure that only transfer (including buyouts) club to club can happen. A sponsor can pay the money, but he cannot get the soccer rights. And even if this can happen, I think legally this would be neglected and seen as transfer of the old club to the one where he decides to play next.
There was a story today about just this type of suit coming because out of contract players (free-agents) were being barred from playing until Jan. because of the new transfer system.
Hey, you're good. DFL today made an exception rule for all pro players, who were unemployed on July 1st - they can be signed throughout this year. The players' association threatened to sue them otherwise.
Nice to see that the banter on Big Soccer has sent shockwaves through Europe -- they're so quick to act given our threats. See, it's not just journalists that read Big Soccer... face it, we're important.
BTW, who's misinformed now? What was that about 600,000 POUNDS per year? http://www.soccertimes.com/usteams/2002/aug30.htm "Preston reached an agreement with Fulham calling for a transfer fee of approximately $750,000 a while ago, but Lewis was not willing to accept a substantial pay cut which his potential new club was proposing. Lewis' contract with Fulham, which ran to the end of the current season, reportedly paid him around $400,000 annually. He asked the same salary from North End which, while not making him Preston's highest paid player, would have placed him in the top half dozen. Brown proclaimed that would have thrown off the team's salary structure, so when Lewis held tight to his demand, Brown said he was walking away from the negotiations." BTW, great news for MLS, if these reports are to be believed (which I do, 'cause it's Buff). If a $400,000 per annum salary places a players among the half dozen or so highest-paid players on most First Division squads (IMO, Preston is pretty average in terms of financial resources), that makes it much, much easier to compete for the signatures of up-and-coming young American stars, as far as Major League Soccer is concerned...
Sorry, Buff/Aris, always confuse you with Wagman... you write the articles for cybersoccernews, right? (I like you better, anyway.) Sorry, couldn't resist, not after someone used a patently false number to "call" me on my "misinformation"...
Stroke it... We should all practice a little intellectual masturbation... it's a healthy and natural response to adulthood.