Infantino demands reform to ‘rat race’ transfer window

Fifa president Gianni Infantino appealed to European football chiefs yesterday to help reform the sport’s transfer system and described the current set-up as a “rat race” which had cast football in a negative light.

“It is the responsibility of all of us to tackle the transfer system,” Infantino said in a speech at the extraordinary congress of European soccer body Uefa.

“We have to come up with some positive solutions for agents, transfer regulations, for loans and transfer windows, [salary] caps and all these items which are somewhere in the air but which have never been addressed ... in a significant way.”

Later, Infantino told reporters from international news agencies of his ideas for new regulations governing the roles of agents, limits on the sizes of club squads and the co-ordination of transfer windows so they closed before major championships start.

“We have to make sure that transfers don’t affect the integrity of the competitions, they should indeed stop before the start,” he said.

Referring to the way teams could strengthen their squads after a poor start to the season, he added: “When you run a marathon, you don’t run for 10 kilometres and then take a bike.”

Infantino, who was elected Fifa president in February of last year, said that spending on international transfers had totalled around €4.6 billion (Dh20.28bn) during the northern hemisphere summer compared to €3.6bn for the same period the year before.

These included Brazilian forward Neymar’s record-shattering €222 million move from Barcelona to Paris Saint Germain, followed by 18-year-old Kylian Mbappe’s move to the Parc des Princes.

While the 18-year-old striker’s transfer is an initial loan, PSG are obligated to complete a permanent deal next summer that could see the Paris club pay Monaco as much as €180m.

As well as PSG, the Premier League in England spent a collective £1.4bn (Dh6.98bn) during the 2017 summer transfer window, a 23 per cent rise on 2016 and a sixth straight year of record-breaking spending.

Infantino also said that the transfer market “doesn’t necessarily reflect very well” on the sport, although he still believed it played an important role in redistributing resources.

“What is worrying is the inflation that these transfers trigger and the rat race that this entails with all the other clubs,” he said.

“All these negative headlines bring the whole football movement into a negative light.

“From a perception point of view, it doesn’t feel right.”

The Swiss, who previously said last November that he wanted to reform the transfer system, said that leagues and clubs felt the same way.

“I see it from the discussions I had with players, clubs, leagues, associations,” he said.

“I have never felt it is as strongly as I do now.

“It’s not limited only to Europe and we need to have a framework at worldwide level.”

We have to make sure that transfers don’t affect the integrity of the competitions, they should indeed stop before the start GIANNI INFANTINO Fifa president