Hailed as a milestone in the history of local football by Malta FA president Norman Darmanin Demajo, the player status and transfer reform was rubberstamped yesterday during a well-attended Extraordinary General Meeting at the Centenary Hall.

The approved proposals, which follow a rigorous consultation, are intended to bring the local game in line with the footballing realities in the major European countries with regards to the rights and obligations of players and clubs.

The amendments include the introduction of minimum requirements for the contract of professional players, including the right to be paid their wages in full for the first six months while they are recovering from injury and the right to be given a fair trial when subjected to disciplinary proceedings by clubs.

The removal of salary caps at all levels, the lowering of the minimum age, from 18 to 16 years, when a player can sign his first professional contract, a new concept for training compensation and a significant reduction in the transfer parameters of out-of-contract players.

In sync with FIFA rules, a player who doesn’t receive the wage at the end of the month, can ask the MFA to impose sanctions on the club.

If a player goes three months without being paid, he/she will be entitled to a free release, subject to the MFA’s approval.

As was to be expected, the revision of the transfer parameters sparked a lively discussion during yesterday’s EGM.

Under the new guidelines, the transfer fees will be cut by half from June 9 before dropping further to 25 per cent from season 2016/17.

The initial proposal was for the transfer value of players to go down to 20 per cent in the second year but this was raised by five per cent after the council backed a motion advanced by officials of BOV Premier League clubs.

Whereas under the old transfer system, the maximum value of a player was capped at €50,000, transfer compensation for out-of-contract players can’t exceed €30,000 under the new parameters.

In a nutshell, if a top Maltese player was valued at €80,000, the fee will be halved to €40,000 but the recruiting club will only have to pay €30,000 as that is the maximum amount stipulated in the MFA regulations.

That figure will decrease further to €20,000 (25 per cent of the original amount) if a club were to sign the player before the start of season 2016/17.

Players aged over 35 who reach the end of their contract can change clubs for free under the new regulations.

Another highly-debated proposal approved yesterday was the rise in the foreigners’ quota from five (on the pitch) to seven in the BOV Premier League.

From season 2015-16, top-flight clubs can have seven foreign players in their 18-man squad but the remaining 11 must be homegrown. Teams are now allowed to have up to seven foreigners on the field of play at any given time.

The increase in the number of foreigners has been a bone of contention for several months amid suggestions that this move would deal another massive setback to Maltese football.

Initially, the Premier League clubs pushed for eight foreigners but Malta FA officials believe that the agreed quota will not hamper local talent as clubs are now obliged to have 11 homegrown players in their squad.

The situation in the remaining three divisions is unchanged with Division One clubs allowed three foreigners while those in Division Two and Three can only have one in their squad.

A visibly delighted Darmanin Demajo paid tribute to the clubs for having the courage to press ahead with these important reforms.

“A reform of this magnitude will inevitably attract the usual criticism but don’t worry about that,” Darmanin Demajo told the assembly.

“We are not perfect and I don’t exclude that, at some point in the future, we may conclude that some of the proposed changes didn’t have the desired effect but I can assure everyone that, in this exercise, we have tried to safeguard the interests of the players, clubs and administrators.

“I want to congratulate all of you as we have reached an important milestone today.

“What are the next steps? Now that, hopefully, there will be more movement of players, we have already started working on the next step which is the commercialisation of clubs.

“We are in talks with the government about this. Clubs can’t survive if they continue to be run like they are today.”

The MFA president said the cards are still in the clubs’ hands because they can still control their spending. He urged top-flight clubs to explore the possibility of turning semi-professional, arguing that this is achievable considering their annual budgets.

Challenging reform

Addressing a news conference at the end of the EGM, Bjorn Vassallo, the Malta FA general secretary said the current administration showed courage and motivation in pushing on with this challenging reform, tackling important issues that had been stagnant for decades.

“The association’s members have followed us in this vital transformation,” Vassallo said.

“I can only commend the council members who, in a short period of time, have changed their way of thinking.”

Chris Bonett, the Malta FA vice-president who heads the association’s legal department, described this reform as a “defining moment in the presidency of Norman Darmanin Demajo”.

“When we came up with the idea to undertake this reform, we were branded insane with some speculating that we didn’t have a long time in football,” Dr Bonett added.

“But we had the guts to change the status quo because we firmly believed in what we were doing.”