Scottish clubs reported to watchdog for youth football deals

Professional footballer Kieran Gibbons has described the push to allow young players more freedom to move between clubs as a “no brainer”.

The 29-year-old is a player for Scotland League Two Side Peterhead but when he was 13, he was registered to one of the SFA’s club academy teams and wanted to leave.

“The training facilities were not the best and didn’t even have changing rooms,” he explained.

“I was travelling a distance and had to come straight from school and had grown tired of this. When the time came to sign on for the following season I asked to leave.”

Kieran said the club “were not happy” but agreed to let him go – though he says unbeknownst to him they held onto the registration.

The player says this only came to light when other senior teams in Scotland invited him for trials and were told by the club he had just left that they would need to pay a £9,000 fee to take over his registration.

He added: “At that time no one was able or willing to pay that for a 13-year-old, who may or may not make it to professional level.”

Kieran says he was then “left in limbo” for more than nine months, retuning to amateur football, before eventually moving to Aberdeen for his first professional contract.

“I was just a kid and I just wanted to play football. There needs to be a change so people in my situation can more easily walk away,” he added.