Celtic will have to pay a UEFA agreed fee of between €70,000 and €630,000 to Sheffield Wednesday for Liam Shaw.
The midfielder is out of contract in the summer and from January 1 was able to discuss a transfer to a non-English club.
At yesterday’s media conference Neil Lennon announced that Shaw had been signed but until it is confirmed by either club it is not yet official. Celtic were recently in a similar situation with Ben Davies before Liverpool appeared on the scene. It was reported that a deal with the Preston defender was agreed, not signed, and was dependent on Davies being fit and well come July 1.
The details of the Shaw transfer have still to be confirmed but no negotiations are required between the clubs. Like Moussa Dembele and Kundai Benyu the fee is decided by UEFA dependent on a couple of variables.
Sheffield based publisher The Star consulted Dr Dan Plumley of Sheffield Hallam University who explained how the international transfer fee is worked out:
How will Shaw’s fee be calculated?
The way FIFA do it is a lot more ‘set in stone’ than the UK-domestic tribunal-based model, Dr Plumley explains. “FIFA’s model, the one used in Shaw’s case, is formula-based and basically comes down to the player’s age, the date they joined the club and how they categorise clubs,” he said.
The way that these clubs are categorised is down to the national organisations and they don’t publish them. The UEFA categories range from categories one to four and the fees range from €10,000 to €90,000 depending on the category, which would leave you to times that fee by the number of years he has been at the starter club.
“Liam Shaw is 19 and the clock starts when they’re 12, so that’ll be seven years. So the fee will certainly between €70,000 at the bottom end and €630,000 at the very top end. How Wednesday are categorised we don’t know and these fees far more often than not remain undisclosed.
It’s been reported that the fee will be around £300,000 and, though there are a few unknown factors at play here, that doesn’t sound a millions miles off to me.
This seems a good deal for Celtic. Are Wednesday being done here?
Put it this way, it’s not a deal that has fallen in Wednesday’s favour. The fee will be significantly lower than a player of Liam Shaw’s talent would command in the transfer market and it’s also significantly less than he would command if he was moving by tribunal to another English club.
There is a dispute resolution chamber, but only if it is felt the fee is very disproportionate and it’s very rare that things come to that. Scottish clubs seem to have targeted this route to young talent in the past, not only from clubs in England but everywhere across Europe.”
Although Celtic have signed Luca Connell, Jeremie Frimpong, Jonathan Afolabi and Lee O’Connor from England in recent seasons none of them were in the circumstances of Shaw.