Crew SC, MLS Resolve Sergio Campbell Saga
By Sean Maslin
Columbus Crew SC finally got their man. MLS and the club announced on Wednesday that they had finally reached an agreement with Jamaican side Portmore United on compensation for defender Sergio Campbell.
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After starting his youth career with Portmore, Campbell went to play college soccer at Clarendon College, Arkansas State University, and finally the University of Connecticut. He has also made two appearances with Jamaica’s senior national team and has been a regular for them at the U-17 and U-20 level.
Campbell was selected 19th by Crew SC in this past year’s MLS SuperDraft. He turned 23 just two days after the draft.
While terms of the deal were not disclosed by MLS ( as per league policy,) it is believed that Portmore were looking for $7,500 in training compensation for the Jamaican international.
Since Campbell was trained by Portmore United, a club based in the southern city of Portmore, the club was looking for training compensation. Such compensation is typical for transfer deals in international football and is essentially a way for larger to teams to give back to smaller clubs who have scouted and trained the player during their formative years. FIFA bylaws state that teams are required to pay fees to the team that trained the player until the of the season of their 23rd birthday.
Despite this, MLS has claimed that they cannot pay the compensation because of U.S. child labor laws. According to an article recently written by Jorge Arangure Jr. of Vice Sports, FIFA has never forced MLS to pay such fees.
Portmore also reportedly refused to let go of his international training certificate. The international training certificate is a document that is used to determine who owns what player’s rights. Had an agreement not been reached, then Campbell’s rights would have stayed with Portmore.
While Campbell will now be able to sign and play with Crew SC this season, this is a much larger issue that MLS will need to look at in the future. As teams begin to grow their developmental programs and the league looks to broaden its horizon beyond the United States and Canada, it will need to address this issue as regional teams will not look to sell their young talent without getting something back.
There is also the question as to why MLS is using U.S. labor laws as a standard for player transfers when it is a league made up of two countries: USA and Canada. That the league has not stated what exact child labor laws it would be breaking is also a bit spurious, as is the fact that the player is 23 years old, not 17.
If MLS were to take a serious stand on this issue, they may get burned. Although USA, Mexico, and Canada are three strong countries, CONCACAF and by extension the region’s voice in FIFA is run by the Caribbean and Central American countries who vote as a bloc.
Rather than taking a broad look at how to address this issue the league seems to be taking a narrow viewpoint to avoid having to pay clubs what they have earned.