How FIFA controls the individual football education of children and teenagers
If you want to achieve your dream of becoming a professional footballer, you have to sign up with a football club organised under the control of FIFA. Anyone who wants to use privately organised football training organisations on their way to becoming a professional falls under the control of FIFA, even in the case of (additional) training outside a football club organised under the FIFA regime. Since privately organised football training institutions represent competition for the FIFA organisation in terms of FIFA’s educational monopoly, participation in such programmes can put players at a disadvantage in achieving their goal of becoming a professional footballer. FIFA cannot afford to allow training programmes outside its control to produce better footballers than football clubs organised under FIFA.
In these times where individuality is becoming increasingly important in all areas of life, private training programmes and organisations are also becoming more and more popular in the football business, often in addition to training at football clubs. As demand is high, the number of private training programmes has also increased. For example, former Frankfurt professional Martin Hinteregger has organised an individual training programme for 9 to 13-year-olds in his home country of Austria under the label ‘Coach 13’ as part of his association CHANCEN LEBEN. Furthermore, a youth performance centre for 14 to 17-year-olds is also planned under ‘Coach 13’ from 2025. This performance centre is to be steadily expanded over the years. Children from the U15 to U17 age groups are to be trained at the youth performance centre.
Coach 13 currently offers 250 children the opportunity to take part in additional weekly individual training sessions and test matches organised by Coach 13 in addition to their football training sessions and matches at their football clubs. Coach 13 provides the youth coaches, training equipment and organises football pitches. Coach 13’s youth programme and performance centre will be run in close cooperation with the children’s respective football clubs and the programme also sees itself as a bridge between different football clubs. Coach 13 aims to offer alternative paths to the existing football clubs, national training centres and academies under the banner of FIFA and support children in their dream of becoming a professional footballer.
Creating training programmes for children is a good thing and these concepts should be encouraged. Children who may possibly fall behind the grid due to existing systems, but are only able to realise their talents later, are given further opportunities for a career in this regard.
In FIFA’s view, the training of young players is one of the foundations for maintaining power in international football. In order for the association to maintain and consolidate its power, it is important that each generation is exposed to the mechanisms and organisation of the system from the very beginning. This can be compared with a wide variety of state structures and political systems, in which essentially all political players — regardless of the form of government — operate a wide variety of youth organisations. It would not look good for FIFA if the next Messi, Ronaldo etc. were to become a star due to training work other than that organised mainly under the direct control of FIFA. This scenario would be associated with an extreme loss of power for FIFA and its relevance would crumble.
There is no doubt that youth development is extremely important, not only in a political sense but also in a business sense, and that it represents an international market worth billions.
As there is a lot at stake for FIFA in the youth sector, both politically and financially, it is not surprising that FIFA is trying to use its regulations to put pressure on its direct and indirect members (national associations and football clubs) in order to maintain control over the youth players themselves in privately organised training programmes.
FIFA’s regulations regarding the control of private football training centres and institutions are well hidden in the regulations and are not easily recognisable. Relevant regulations in this regard can be found in the Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players (June 2024). The passages of interest here can be found under point 07 International Transfers Involving Minors. Under the main point 07. there is point 19bis Registration and reporting of minors at academies.
Point 19bis Registration and reporting of minors at academies is summarised in 7 sub-points and regulates the following:
Football clubs that run an academy themselves (in their organisation or in an organisation with legal, financial or de facto links to the club) must report children and young people (regardless of whether they are registered with the club or not) to the association, e.g. in Austria to the OEFB.
Under the regulations, children/young people are all under the age of 18.
According to the regulations, an academy is an organisation or independent legal form of company with the aim of enabling players to train over a certain period of time by providing infrastructure and equipment. These are, for example, football training centres, camps, schools, etc. As Coach 13 is an independent association that organises training sessions, matches and infrastructure, provides staff for this purpose and currently looks after over 200 players on a scheduled basis for a longer period of time, Coach 13 is to be regarded as a private academy within the meaning of the regulations.
In Austria, for example, the OEFB (national association) is obliged to request all private academies that have no legal, financial or de facto connection to football clubs to enquire which children/young people are participating in the private academy. Furthermore, the OEFB must report any misconduct in private academies and take measures to prevent misconduct.
In the relevant example here, the OEFB must ask Coach 13 which children/young people are taking part in the training programme and monitor Coach 13 for any misconduct and put in place any necessary control measures. These obligations are highly problematic on several legal levels. The OEFB has no legal influence on private organisations and these obligations are highly problematic in terms of competition law and data protection law.
The national association (e.g. in Austria the OEFB) is obliged to keep a register of all children/young people (full name, nationality, date of birth, agent, etc.) who belong to or participate in a (private) academy.
A football club that wishes to cooperate with a private academy is obliged to report the cooperation to the national association (e.g. in Austria to the OEFB), to ensure that the private academy reports all players to the national association (e.g. in Austria to the OEFB), to ensure that the private academy takes measures against any misconduct and to report all misconduct. As already described above with regard to the obligations of the national associations, these obligations of the football clubs are highly problematic from a competition law and data protection perspective. Furthermore, it is not clear to football clubs what measures they are taking to fulfil their obligations.
The purpose of these control systems is to ensure that all participants comply with FIFA regulations and uphold the ethical principles of organised football.
Furthermore, the national association (in Austria, the OEFB) is obliged to report to FIFA in certain cases.
Any breach of the above obligations will be prosecuted by the FIFA Disciplinary Board and sanctioned in accordance with the FIFA Disciplinary Code.
Based on the title of 07 International Transfers Involving Minors, one would think that these regulations do not apply to purely domestic situations. However, the Commentary on the Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players (2023) clarifies that the reporting and monitoring obligations apply regardless of whether the player is a ‘national’ or a ‘foreigner’. Furthermore, it is irrelevant for the applicability of the obligations whether the player is registered with a football club and thus with FIFA in the broadest sense. The reporting obligations of point 19bis exist independently of the obligations that a football club has to register players.
FIFA justifies the monitoring rights and reporting obligations of its members by claiming that this enables FIFA to identify and prevent misconduct in connection with football and children. However, this justification is flawed when you consider that FIFA is probably not able to take control measures in every area of children’s/young people’s lives or has the authority to do so. If something happens to children/young people, it is always bad, but that does not justify the control rights implemented by FIFA in a competition law or data protection law sense. What children/young people do outside of their activities within FIFA’s association structures is simply none of FIFA’s business. It is clear that the provisions are regulations to maintain FIFA’s power, which are being attempted to justify with inappropriate and exaggerated arguments. Nobody would approve a situation in which Apple obliged app developers to name all customers who use the application on Android devices. This example is comparable to the present regulations concerning the control of FIFA.
For example, since Coach 13 and all football clubs concerned must disclose all their players coached by Coach 13 to FIFA, FIFA knows which players have received training in football from external organisations and when. Whether FIFA wants such players to grow up in the sport it organises is doubtful, as this would probably lead to a loss of reputation and power for FIFA in the long term.
Furthermore, these regulations clearly violate European competition and data protection law due to a lack of appropriateness and legitimisation. Football clubs and national associations are subject to obligations that are not clearly defined and in some cases cannot be implemented in national legal systems. As violations of these obligations are sanctioned, football clubs and national associations are under pressure to implement these obligations, which negatively affects the business of programmes such as Coach 13. Private training programmes and players should defend themselves against such restrictive regulations.
