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County cricket needs transfer system, say Yorkshire
YORKSHIRE County Cricket Club are proposing that cricket introduces a football-style transfer system.
The club's chief executive Stewart Regan – a former director of the Football League Championship – has written to the first-class counties and the England and Wales Cricket Board recommending a transfer system be created from next season.
Regan believes the idea would better regulate the movement of players between counties and also prevent counties losing out financially on their biggest assets – namely, the players themselves.
His plans are due to be discussed at an ECB cricket committee meeting near Stratford this week and also at a meeting of the county chief executives at Lord's next Tuesday.
At the heart of Regan's suggestion is his concern that too much money is going into the pockets of players and agents and not back into the clubs who, in many cases, have spent years developing players to county and international standard.
Yorkshire currently face losing Ajmal Shahzad, for example, an out-of-contract pace bowler who has been approached by at least six counties and offered lucrative packages elsewhere.
Were Shahzad to depart, Yorkshire would not receive a transfer fee as happens in football, even though they have spent years helping him reach his current level.
Under Regan's plan such an imbalance would be redressed, with the Yorkshire boss favouring the creation of a transfer window from July 1 to August 31 each year in which counties could discuss with other clubs the potential movement of players for the following season.
"A fully regulated transfer system would be a good thing in my opinion," said Regan, who also wants an independent panel to adjudicate on transfer fee disputes.
"There needs to be recognition that if you spend 10 to 15 years developing a player it's not acceptable for other clubs to come along and simply take them by offering more money.
"One of the biggest problems nowadays is the involvement of players' agents. They are taking players from one club to another and have become a bit of a parasite in the game.
"When you pay an agent commission that is basically money flowing out of the game.
"It's not going back into the academies or anything like that – it's money going into agents' pockets."
Regan hopes a transfer system would also prevent the "tapping-up" of players under contract.
He believes it would stop the poaching of young players affiliated to county academies and has set out a separate list of proposals relating to age group players.
The ECB are likely to set up a working party to assess whether there are any potential restraint of trade issues with Yorkshire's plans.
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Friday 25 May 2012
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