Jack Anderson: Transfer sagas evolve from Eastham to Bosman to Rashford
Belgian Footballer Jean-Marc Bosman looks on at Benfica on April 25, 1996 in Lisbon, Portugal. Bosman, whose judical challenge of the football transfer rules led to the Bosman ruling in 1995. This landmarkjudgment completely changed the way footballers are employed, allowing professional players in the European Union to move freely to another clubat the end of their term of contract with their present team. Picture: Getty Images/Getty Images
FIFPRO are the global representative body for national professional football associations. They advocate for players’ rights in both the women’s and men’s games – pay equality, workload issues, contractual disputes, the day to day of any union. In 2015, FIFPRO celebrated the 50th anniversary of its foundation with a series of events. One of them was a conference on legal issues in football.
The star of the event was Jean-Marc Bosman, whose legal victory 20 years previously, in December 1995, at the then European Court of Justice, tilted the balance of power in football from club directors to players. The reason players at the top level earn as much as they do today is because of Bosman. The court case, which essentially introduced free agency in football transfers, combined with ballooning broadcasting rights to fuel the astronomical rise and rise of the football transfer market (and associated player wages).
