December 14 - Bosman Rules OK

EVER been stumped by the ‘name five famous Belgians’ question? Let’s see, you’ve got Jean-Claude Van Damme, Poirot, Tin Tin… erm…. Yeah, we’re stuck. But lo and behold, what was that happening today in 1995? It’s another famous Belgian for our list! Slightly rubbish Belgian footballer Jean-Marc Bosman won his landmark case in the European Court of Justice, creating a legal precedent that forever changed the murky world of football transfers.

When Bosman’s contract was up at RFC Liege in 1990 he was fed up of being a fringe player and decided he wanted to up sticks to Dunkerque, but like it was forty-five years earlier, the path to this coastal French town was far from easy. When a transfer fee could not be agreed Liege refused to let him go, as was the norm in those days. Bosman then received a pay cut and a place on the bench but he didn’t take it lying down, as he (probably) slammed his fist on the chairman’s desk and shouted ’see you in court!’

The court in question was the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg, where Bosman sued for restraint of trade. After five years of courtroom action that saw phrases like “restriction on the free movement of workers prohibited by Article 39(1) of the EC Treaty” and other technical mumbo-jumbo that we don’t understand here at OTFD banded around, Bosman paved the way for out-of-contract footballers to move clubs without any transfer fees being paid.

The first team to be hit hard by the ruling was the reigning Champions League holders Ajax, who saw their young team picked apart with the loss of Clarence Seedorf, Kanu, Patrick Kluivert and Edgar Davids. The most high-profile Bosman transfer in England is undoubtedly Sol Campbell who did the unthinkable, leaving Spurs for their North London rivals Arsenal in 2001, ensuring he gets the full-on Judas treatment everytime he dares show his face at the Lane.

As Bosman himself was no good, we don’t have any footage of him blasting thirty yard overhead kicks in the top corner, so we’ll leave you with our ‘Bosman XI’. If you think we’ve got it wrong tell us below and come back tomorrow for more of the same.

GK - Brad Friedel (Liverpool to Blackburn, 2000)

LB - Bixente Lizarazu (Bayern Munich to Marseille, 2004)
RB - Markus Babbel (Bayern Munich to Liverpool, 2000)
CB - Sol Campbell (C) (Spurs to Arsenal, 2001)
CB - Sylvain Distin (Man City to Pompey, 2007)

CM - Gary McAllister (Coventry to Liverpool, 2000)
CM - Jamie Redknapp (Liverpool to Spurs, 2002)
RM - Andrei Kanchelskis (Rangers to Southampton, 2003)
LM - Paul Merson (Villa to Pompey, 2002)

S - Henrik Larsson (Celtic to Barcelona, 2004)
S - Teddy Sheringham (Man Utd to Spurs to Pompey to West Ham to Colchester, 2001-2007 - king of the Bosman?)

(3 votes, average: 4.33 out of 5)

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