6+5 Rule

[Romey 1878]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/apr/3...n-six-plus-five

[jamiemaher85]

I thought that looked an ok idea tbh.

[iggy]

I thought that looked an ok idea tbh.

 

 

Me too, but the chances of it ever getting past the EU were slimmer than that of me getting a Liverbird tattoo!

[holystove]

well it's a ridiculous plan ... it goes against one of the core constitutional provisions of the EC treaty.

 

i'm happy the commission made it clear that this is highly discriminatory and therefor illegal, if we would have had to wait for a European Court of Justice ruling the damage would have been much worse.

 

anyway if they're so in love with the rule they can still apply it in non-EU states, if it works there maybe they can convince the Member States of the EU to take that whole "discrimination" thingy out of the treaties .

[Sporting4ever]

well it's a ridiculous plan ... it goes against one of the core constitutional provisions of the EC treaty.

 

i'm happy the commission made it clear that this is highly discriminatory and therefor illegal, if we would have had to wait for a European Court of Justice ruling the damage would have been much worse.

 

anyway if they're so in love with the rule they can still apply it in non-EU states, if it works there maybe they can convince the Member States of the EU to take that whole "discrimination" thingy out of the treaties .

 

 

Yeah, well, what those idiots at the EU general assembly forget is that football is NOT a normal bussiness, where the normal rules of trade apply and free movement for workers isn't really that good an idea. But no, they keep their attitute toward the game that has brought us to a breaking point since the Bosman rule came into beeing. The simple fact that they claim discrimination is the basis for it is falatious, because what we're seeing now clearly points to a much more disciminatory rule that what we would have, and that is the fact that any player born in any EC country is worth less than a foreigner, and that is not only discrimination, it's gonna kill the sport in the medium/long term.

 

What's the point in spending millions to train new players when they're gonna leave for pennies? Smaller clubs are gonna start/continue to disapear until the foundation of each countries' FAs will collapse.

 

England, the most powerful league in the world, hasn't produced a tittle fighting side in God knows how many years, and probably never will, they even missed out on the last Euro, and they claim the 6+5 is discriminatory?

 

They've given free reign to the the bigger sharks to keep spending more and more, keep paying more and more, until we'll reach a critical point and it'll all come down like the house of cards that it is. Any structure is only as strong as it's weakest link, and the weak links are getting weaker...

[holystove]

Yeah, well, what those idiots at the EU general assembly forget is that football is NOT a normal bussiness, where the normal rules of trade apply and free movement for workers isn't really that good an idea. But no, they keep their attitute toward the game that has brought us to a breaking point since the Bosman rule came into beeing. The simple fact that they claim discrimination is the basis for it is falatious, because what we're seeing now clearly points to a much more disciminatory rule that what we would have, and that is the fact that any player born in any EC country is worth less than a foreigner, and that is not only discrimination, it's gonna kill the sport in the medium/long term.

 

What's the point in spending millions to train new players when they're gonna leave for pennies? Smaller clubs are gonna start/continue to disapear until the foundation of each countries' FAs will collapse.

 

England, the most powerful league in the world, hasn't produced a tittle fighting side in God knows how many years, and probably never will, they even missed out on the last Euro, and they claim the 6+5 is discriminatory?

 

They've given free reign to the the bigger sharks to keep spending more and more, keep paying more and more, until we'll reach a critical point and it'll all come down like the house of cards that it is. Any structure is only as strong as it's weakest link, and the weak links are getting weaker...

 

i recognize the problem, i just have a problem with the solution fifa proposed.

 

it's just such a serious breach of EU-law and i see no justification in the exceptions of art. 39 ECT.

[Sporting4ever]

i recognize the problem, i just have a problem with the solution fifa proposed.

 

it's just such a serious breach of EU-law and i see no justification in the exceptions of art. 39 ECT.

 

 

I dissagree. This EU law has enabled things like arsenal, with 90% foreign players, and benfica, with 87% foreign players to be a reality. And what does it get them? benfica has a youth program whitch they intend on beeing like ours, and yet they put at most one of their kids in the 1st team, while we put 2 or 3 per year. We play with at least 6 portuguese players, and yesterday we even had 9, while benfica has played various games with 1-2 portguese players, and had no portuguese players in the pitch at one time this season, a 1st for such an historic club.

 

In treating football and football clubs like any other bussiness, the EU is beeing descriminatory itself, because it's failing to protect the rights of the players born in those countries. By ignoring that football is not a bussiness like they perseve it, they're killing it.

 

The only alternative would be transfer limits and salary caps, and I don't see anyone agreeing on that...

[holystove]

I dissagree. This EU law has enabled things like arsenal, with 90% foreign players, and benfica, with 87% foreign players to be a reality. And what does it get them? benfica has a youth program whitch they intend on beeing like ours, and yet they put at most one of their kids in the 1st team, while we put 2 or 3 per year. We play with at least 6 portuguese players, and yesterday we even had 9, while benfica has played various games with 1-2 portguese players, and had no portuguese players in the pitch at one time this season, a 1st for such an historic club.

 

In treating football and football clubs like any other bussiness, the EU is beeing descriminatory itself, because it's failing to protect the rights of the players born in those countries. By ignoring that football is not a bussiness like they perseve it, they're killing it.

 

The only alternative would be transfer limits and salary caps, and I don't see anyone agreeing on that...

 

well the idea is in the area of employment to look at EU citizenship rather than which Member State you are from .. you could implement the 6+5 rule applying to non-EU citizens.

from the EU's point of view a player of Sporting that came through the youth program of Austria Wien is the same as one that came through the youth program of Benfica, allthough one is portugese and one is Austrian they're both EU citizens and you can't discriminate amongst EU-citizens ..

and that is my whole problem with the 6+5 rule, it takes away from the fact that the EU is in this process of unification and tearing down barriers to free movement and then FIFA tries to implement an new barrier amongst different Member States.

 

to me it's the same thing as a player born in London not being allowed to play for Everton because there's already two guys from Ipswich and four from Birmingham playing for Everton. (although i do realize that for some people that might be taking it a step too far, it's just how i see the EU in the areas where it has been given exclusive competences).

[Guest efctaxi]

I am not an EU citizen by choice .

I am English .

I don't want to be called a European . I want to be called an Englishman .

I don't even like my American friends refering to me as a Brit

 

Next , we'll have a National team full of non English players . We already have a non English coach .

 

The 6+5 is essential to the future of English football in many respects .

[Sporting4ever]

well the idea is in the area of employment to look at EU citizenship rather than which Member State you are from .. you could implement the 6+5 rule applying to non-EU citizens.

from the EU's point of view a player of Sporting that came through the youth program of Austria Wien is the same as one that came through the youth program of Benfica, allthough one is portugese and one is Austrian they're both EU citizens and you can't discriminate amongst EU-citizens ..

and that is my whole problem with the 6+5 rule, it takes away from the fact that the EU is in this process of unification and tearing down barriers to free movement and then FIFA tries to implement an new barrier amongst different Member States.

 

to me it's the same thing as a player born in London not being allowed to play for Everton because there's already two guys from Ipswich and four from Birmingham playing for Everton. (although i do realize that for some people that might be taking it a step too far, it's just how i see the EU in the areas where it has been given exclusive competences).

 

1st of all, trying to turn the EU into a massive country is so far into the future that to think that football is a stop gap for it is completely a non-factor.

2nd, football is NOT the same as any other bussiness, and players are NOT like other workers. That fact has been been made very clear ever since the bosman law came into effect. There's and ever increasing gap between big and small, but unlike bussinesses, clubs can't buy other clubs, can't move their headquarters to a different country, clubs are limited to their countries laws and regulations, plus their FA's laws and regulations, and add to that the EU's laws and regulations. while companies can move factories and the like to other countries and get cheaper labour, and advantageous tax incentives, clubs cannot. And yet, the EU persists on ignoring that football is a world onto itself, and that their laws that promote free movement are in fact descriminating against players IN THEIR OWN COUNTRIES.

 

You say that we cannot discriminate between a citizen born in the EU from a citizen born in England, for example. But the simple fact is that it's cheaper to get foreign players than it is to get the home grown kind, and that, not only is discrimination, it also does not protect their right to work.

 

There's teams here that practically don't field a single portuguese player, and there's clubs in malta and romenia that are pretty much all portuguese. Where's the logic in that???

 

Besides, most players that play in EU countries have or are close to having EU nationality as well, even if they're from Cameroon, Brazil or Argentina. A lot of them can get double citizenship fairly easy anyways, since there's tons of emmigrants there, so in effect, there's no limits.

Messi does not count as a non-EU player, and he's just 21, Ronaldo could ask for english citizenship, since he's been in the UK for 5 years, so how do you stop it??

 

What the EU is doing is simply ignoring the fact that football can't follow the same rules as normal bussinesses, because it'll be it's downfall, they're ignoring the problems it presents to it's member states' citizens, putting their european citizenship above their country's, and they're in effect dennying a joint effort by the governing bodies to solve this, i.e., UEFA and FIFA.

If you exclude this, the only chance will be a solution akin to what the americans have, transfer limits, salary caps, etc., but I sensirely doubt any FA can pull THAT off.

[zequist]

MLS has minimum domestic quotas, and "domestic" is defined by whichever side of the border the team is on. So the American teams are all required to have a minimum number of American players on their rosters, and the Canadian teams - Toronto, Vancouver, and any future ones that may sign up - are all required to have a minimum number of Canadian players on their rosters. Unlike the EU, however, the NAFTA zone has no provisions in its treaties for free and unfettered movement of labor. So MLS is free to make its own rules, and so is the Mexican FA. And MLS has those provisions in its rulebook for similar reasons to what Sporting is arguing - MLS' founding philosophy was that the whole point of having a domestic league was to develop, expand, and maintain the domestic talent base, and if they allowed the league to be dominated by international players that would defeat the whole purpose. Of course, we're also in a very different situation in this country, since we (and Canada too) are lagging about a hundred years behind England and Portugal in trying to seriously develop the sport.

Edited May 5, 2009 by JD in DC

[Guest efctaxi]

I might be wrong , but wasn't the 1986 double winning Liverpool team totally devoid of a single Englishman ?

So much for the FA cup .

 

I don't know what the % is regarding English players in the prem , or lower leagues , but I'm sure if the same % was applied to our national employment figures , then we would probably be in some kind of Civil war right now .

 

It's wonderful to watch these guys week in week out , but it would be much nicer to watch English guys gaining success , and the development of our game having more focus .

[holystove]

1st of all, trying to turn the EU into a massive country is so far into the future that to think that football is a stop gap for it is completely a non-factor.

2nd, football is NOT the same as any other bussiness, and players are NOT like other workers. That fact has been been made very clear ever since the bosman law came into effect. There's and ever increasing gap between big and small, but unlike bussinesses, clubs can't buy other clubs, can't move their headquarters to a different country, clubs are limited to their countries laws and regulations, plus their FA's laws and regulations, and add to that the EU's laws and regulations. while companies can move factories and the like to other countries and get cheaper labour, and advantageous tax incentives, clubs cannot. And yet, the EU persists on ignoring that football is a world onto itself, and that their laws that promote free movement are in fact descriminating against players IN THEIR OWN COUNTRIES.

 

You say that we cannot discriminate between a citizen born in the EU from a citizen born in England, for example. But the simple fact is that it's cheaper to get foreign players than it is to get the home grown kind, and that, not only is discrimination, it also does not protect their right to work.

 

There's teams here that practically don't field a single portuguese player, and there's clubs in malta and romenia that are pretty much all portuguese. Where's the logic in that???

 

Besides, most players that play in EU countries have or are close to having EU nationality as well, even if they're from Cameroon, Brazil or Argentina. A lot of them can get double citizenship fairly easy anyways, since there's tons of emmigrants there, so in effect, there's no limits.

Messi does not count as a non-EU player, and he's just 21, Ronaldo could ask for english citizenship, since he's been in the UK for 5 years, so how do you stop it??

 

What the EU is doing is simply ignoring the fact that football can't follow the same rules as normal bussinesses, because it'll be it's downfall, they're ignoring the problems it presents to it's member states' citizens, putting their european citizenship above their country's, and they're in effect dennying a joint effort by the governing bodies to solve this, i.e., UEFA and FIFA.

If you exclude this, the only chance will be a solution akin to what the americans have, transfer limits, salary caps, etc., but I sensirely doubt any FA can pull THAT off.

 

ok you're correct that football could be considered something different than a regular business. said commissioner has chosen not to see it that way. i'm also not advocating a united states of europe, but in the field of cross-border employment, the EU has the competence to decide. seems like people in different Member States haven't yet come to grips with the fact that a lot of legislation these days doesn't come from their own national parliament but are mostly measures toward market integration taken by the commission, council and/or european parliament.

 

i don't totally understand why it's cheaper for for example Benfica to employ an Italian, than it is to employ a Portugese.. could you explain that, does that have to do with social security payments or something? in any case it must be because of national taxation.. so i'm guessing the fault lies with national authorities on that issue(?).

same goes for the issue of getting EU-citizenship. The EU doesn't give citizenship, it's the member states that grant citizenship.. if Deco gets Portuguese citizenship, I as a Belgian don't have a problem with that although by Portugal deciding to give Deco Portuguese citizenship, him and me now share european citizenship.. If Ronaldo wants UK citizenship, how can you have a problem with that? If he meets the requirements and he wants to have UK citizenship, then who has the right to deny him?

 

Portugal has a much stronger league than Malta, so inferior Portuguese players have to go abroad to get work, seems logical to me.. don't really see a problem with that.. The same with the Premier League. It's the best league in the world so every player -in the world- wants to play there. You even see an influx in foreign ownership of English teams. As a fan i would want to watch the best players possible regardless of their nationality. It's the reason why i follow the EPL rather than the belgian league.

 

anyway i fully accept your premise that football teams could be treated differently, even though in my mind i don't see the added value of that...

..

 

I don't agree with the comparison to NAFTA, in the field we are talking about a comparison to the USA is much more correct vis-a-vis the level of integration between different states.. and a californian not being allowed to play in NY would at the very least strike an american as an "odd" rule.

This is the current state of EU law, like it or not..

..

 

It is however an anomaly to have different national leagues operating in one european market.. then you get problems like we're talking about now.. where development and investments don't always pay off for the teams due to the freedom of their players to choose where to go.

 

 

anyway i'll shut up now, i think we've reached common ground .

[Sporting4ever]

ok you're correct that football could be considered something different than a regular business. said commissioner has chosen not to see it that way. i'm also not advocating a united states of europe, but in the field of cross-border employment, the EU has the competence to decide. seems like people in different Member States haven't yet come to grips with the fact that a lot of legislation these days doesn't come from their own national parliament but are mostly measures toward market integration taken by the commission, council and/or european parliament.

 

We.re very far away from anything resembling an Unites States of Europe, but that seems like the end objective, and I can understand why. As more responsability is given to bigger entities, we move closer to a global union that will come eventually. After all, the planet isn't as big as it looks. Still, there's lots of things that need to be better adressed, like proper usage of EU funds, which a lot of countries waste, an honest effort to balance things out all around, otherwise you run the risk of permanently damaging economies in certain countries, etc, but that's all a bit off topic

 

 

i don't totally understand why it's cheaper for for example Benfica to employ an Italian, than it is to employ a Portugese.. could you explain that, does that have to do with social security payments or something? in any case it must be because of national taxation.. so i'm guessing the fault lies with national authorities on that issue(?).

same goes for the issue of getting EU-citizenship. The EU doesn't give citizenship, it's the member states that grant citizenship.. if Deco gets Portuguese citizenship, I as a Belgian don't have a problem with that although by Portugal deciding to give Deco Portuguese citizenship, him and me now share european citizenship.. If Ronaldo wants UK citizenship, how can you have a problem with that? If he meets the requirements and he wants to have UK citizenship, then who has the right to deny him?

 

Now, that's where you're wrong. Bigger leagues "prey" on smaller leagues, so here, we don't have that many european players, except players from eastern europe. In that regard, it's cheaper to buy a player than to train and build him up from the youth programs. benfica have a "must win" mentality, and for the last years, they've pretty much bought a new squad every year, to have them fail, and then they start again. this year, they've spend upwards of 30m€ to end up in 3rd place.

Deco already has portuguese citizenship, that's why he's played in our national squad. As for ronaldo, my point is that there was another proposal out there, a variation of the 6+5 rules, in which you were limited to 5 foreign players that hadn't been in the country for less than 5 years.

 

Portugal has a much stronger league than Malta, so inferior Portuguese players have to go abroad to get work, seems logical to me.. don't really see a problem with that.. The same with the Premier League. It's the best league in the world so every player -in the world- wants to play there. You even see an influx in foreign ownership of English teams. As a fan i would want to watch the best players possible regardless of their nationality. It's the reason why i follow the EPL rather than the belgian league.

 

anyway i fully accept your premise that football teams could be treated differently, even though in my mind i don't see the added value of that...

 

That's not the point. A lot of those players have value to play here. They simply don't because lower teams prefer to buy players in Brazil (mostly) than they want to for portuguese players, and that's mainly because they're cheaper and their wages are lower. While I applaud wanting better players, that's not the case, in pretty much any league. Why teams like liverpoo and arse rid themselves with foreigners when there's local talent that is equal/superior to what they go outside to buy? And the lower teams, it get's even worse. And it's because they're cheaper, and they work for less. That rule the FA has regarding the apearences in the national squad is nice, but it's circumvented so many times that's it's virtually useless...

 

Unlike other bussinesses, which can continue and grow, despite the number of companies that exist, football is very much dependant on it. Every league needs the lower, smaller clubs for support, to create a stable player base, to have the sport closer to the communities. When those smaller clubs can't survive, because they don't have revenews to cover their expenses, the player base is smaller, and the structure built on it faulters. We've seen it everywhere, clubs going into debts so big that they cannot survive it, or need desperate measures to stay above water, like the most recent case with valencia. An industry that depends on a certain degree of control, since clubs can't relocate, and is unable to establish regulations that would help it's survival, is quite probably doomed, because it forces most clubs to operate well above their possibilities, and sooner or later the house of cards colapses.

 

 

I don't agree with the comparison to NAFTA, in the field we are talking about a comparison to the USA is much more correct vis-a-vis the level of integration between different states.. and a californian not being allowed to play in NY would at the very least strike an american as an "odd" rule.

This is the current state of EU law, like it or not..

 

Well, not really. States have a limited ammount of power. There's quite alot of decisions that are only decided at the federal level, and don't forget, they've had that form of government for over 200 years, while the EU still struggles for legitimacy within it's own members. While we have the open borders, and the euro, we're still individual countries. And while you're correct about the comparison, it's not exactly what they want to impliment. They don't want to limit anyone from working anywhere, they want to limit the number of foreigners in each team. That will mean that each club will think better on who to hire, and not simply throw money away on every potential player they see, like united has done, with macheda, and the brazilian twins, anderson and nani. When you know you cannot go for quantity, you go for quality, be it foreign or domestic. That means each league will be a little more self sufficient, smaller clubs will be stimulated to keep up and probably expand their youth programs, since there'll be a bigger demand for local talent, Local players will have their value increased, since you cannot simply go abroad and buy cheap workforce in bulk, and that ensures that each league can survive, and clubs are no longer forced to live above their possiblities.

 

 

It is however an anomaly to have different national leagues operating in one european market.. then you get problems like we're talking about now.. where development and investments don't always pay off for the teams due to the freedom of their players to choose where to go.

 

 

anyway i'll shut up now, i think we've reached common ground .

 

Exactly. The big shots forget that, not only are the leagues very different, so are the countries where those leagues are. The differences between GNPs has influence, since the quality of life is different, the minimum wages are different, etc. And yet, the EU wants everyone everywhere play by the same rules, when in fact no one plays in the same level...