Three U.S. Youth Teams File A Lawsuit Involving Dempsey, Bradley, and Yedlin
Three youth soccer clubs in the U.S. have filed a class action lawsuit against players of the Major League Soccer, including DeAndre Yedlin, Clint Dempsey, and Michael Bradley. The lawsuit could also implicate thousands of other players of the MLS. Vice Sports released the exclusive report about the lawsuit, which mentioned Yedlin, Dempsey, and Bradley, with the plaintiffs pursue to recover training and solidarity payments in hundreds of thousands of dollars. According to the latest soccer lines, the teams, including Crossfire Premiere of Redmond, Chicago’s Sockers FC, and the Dallas Texans have claimed that the MLSPU partly owes them money for transfer fees since they played a role to train the players.
When it comes to solidarity compensation, the report quotes Article 21, Section VII of the FIFA Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players. It states that, “If a professional is transferred before the expiry of his contract, any club that has contributed to his education and training shall receive a proportion of the compensation paid to his former club.” Contrariwise, the U.S. Soccer Federation has denounced such a regulation by maintaining that youth teams based in the U.S. have no right to be paid such fees because the clause is not outlined in their policies.
In part, the complaint indicated that the lawsuit could involve thousands of players due to their geographical prevalence. Lance D. Reich, the plaintiff’s attorney, said that his client had to name a few players to clarify the roots of the lawsuit. He also argued that applying solidarity fees and training compensation in the U.S. would violate the anti-trust law, which could lead to other lawsuits.
The attorney clarified that mentioning players’ names was just an unfortunate legal incident to clarify issues related to the lawsuit, with reference to those violating anti-trust law. Including their names in the lawsuit did not carry any kind of personal prejudice towards the players and no one should see it as a contentious issue.
In a statement coming from the youth clubs, a spokesperson said that the US Youth Clubs did not have any choice but mention Bradley, Yedlin, and Dempsey, along with other accused players, with the lawful reason of upholding the Complaint. He also mentioned that the youth clubs do not wish to sue the young players, but the law has to be followed to the letter. Since the players are not required to answer to any of the accusations, the US Youth Clubs have already requested the MLSPU to declare the same opinion so that the players are instantly dropped from the lawsuit.
According to the explanation given by the coaching director at Crossfire Premier, Bernie James, the club is not interested in the making money out of the lawsuit, but in the vivid interpretation of FIFA rules. They only need to know if FIFA rules apply to the US Youth Clubs, and if so, they will comply with the absolute truth. Irrespective of the results, the clubs only need to acknowledge the outcome when it comes to the enforcement of the rules and how they work in the U.S. in relation to other countries.
