Fifa warns Ghana FA, others on new transfer system

Published on: 29 September 2010

FIFA has warned the Ghana FA and all its other member federations that failure to implement the new electronic registration system will result in serious sanctions.

The world governing body believes the new system will help win the battle against the unauthorised transfer of adolescent players.

African and South American countries have often complained about minors being poached by clubs from other regions.

But Fifa says this will be greatly reduced by the Transfer Matching System (TMS) which comes into full effect for all international transfers on Friday.

“This is a historic moment for football. TMS is a relatively simple online system but it will have a tremendous impact on the international transfer of players,” said FIFA President Joseph S. Blatter.

“Thanks to TMS, football’s authorities have more details available on each and every transfer. The most important thing is that it increases the transparency of individual transactions and helps us to tackle issues such as the fight against money laundering and the protection of minors in transfers.”

The TMS, in which international transfers will be registered electronically instead of on paper, is designed to give the game's authorities full control over the movement of players, something FIFA says has been open to all kinds of abuse.

To complete a transfer, the buying and selling clubs must enter a number of details into the Internet-based system including the transfer fee, player's salary, agent or lawyer involved and length of contract.

The money must be transferred from and to a bank account.   

In the case of players aged under 18, the movements of both professional and amateur players will be registered.

"For a minor to be transferred, six to 12 documents have to be uploaded to prove a particular case, even for an amateur international transfer," said TMS general manager Mark Goddard.

"The disclosure of an employment contract is required and it must be stated whether the player's parents are moving for football reasons or not."

"The level of disclosure required to submit is so comprehensive, it's going to be very clear again whether the requirements are being met or not."

In the past, South American clubs have complained that European teams have managed to poach players from their youth divisions by arranging a job for the boys' parents, then using that as a pretext that he is moving for family reasons.

Goddard said TMS had practically ended the transfers of players under-18 within South America.

FIFA began phasing in the TMS system one year ago and legal director Marco Villiger said that since then there had been 921 requests for the international transfer of minors of which 747 were accepted and 174 turned down.

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