The way soccer players (outside the US) change teams is different than the trade/free agent system used by American professional sports; instead, the acquiring team pays a transfer fee, unless the player’s contract is up and then there is no fee. Contracts tend to be a bit longer, at least in the EPL, where five years or so seems normal. The transfer fee is set by the player’s current team, sometimes as part of the player’s contract negotiation, and smaller teams make a good bit of their revenues by developing players for sale to the richer franchises. Transfers happen only in two windows: the close season (what we call the off-season) in the summer and for the month of January.
All of which is a lead-in to saying that the current situation of Fullham’s Louis Saha is quite amusing, and strange, to this American observer. Saha has come on very strong this year, with his 15 goals leading Fullham to a better halfway record than they’ve had in years. However, the top clubs in the EPL, especially Manchester United and Chelsea, seem to never be quite satisfied with their makeup and so ManU has come along and offered to buy Saha. Fullham management, well aware that without Saha they have little chance of making a strong finish and qualifying for European competition (meaning even more money coming in next season), have said no to them.
But the player, not surprisingly, wants the chance to star for one of the world’s top clubs and his desires must be taken into account–one would only imagine that his play will suffer otherwise–and so today’s headline, that Fullham have put an £18 million transfer fee on him, seems capricious at best. However, all the attention plus a six week injury to top striker Hernan Crespo have brought the other big spender, Chelsea, into the situation.
This news comes only days after Saha himself announced that his transfer to ManU was done, requiring only that he pass a physical and that his new employers send over a check for £; Fullham have denied any such deal, of course, and insist that Saha is far too precious to their needs to let him go. Cottagers boss Chris Coleman (don’t they have some quaint team nicknames?) says no way but one can only watch and see what happens over the next two weeks, before the window closes.
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