SPFL: Dundee United ordered to pay Rangers compensation for Charlie Telfer
Thursday 11 December 2014 11:43, UK
Dundee United have been ordered to pay Rangers £204,000 in compensation for midfielder Charlie Telfer.
The decision was announced following an SPFL tribunal. The 19-year-old moved to Tannadice on a three-year deal in June after spending 10 years with Rangers, the club he supported as a boy.
United had already paid Rangers £60,000 plus VAT and had recently upped their offer to around £100,000 including VAT.
However, the Ibrox club were not willing to agree this level of compensation for Telfer, who recently won the SPFL young player of the month award.
United argued Rangers were only entitled to two years’ worth of compensation due to the club’s liquidation in 2012.
Rangers expressed their disappointment with this stance in a statement on the club’s official website.
The statement said: “The payment awarded, which was significantly higher than Dundee United’s final offer, vindicates the club’s decision to take the matter to a compensation tribunal.
“Dundee United introduced a late argument stating Rangers should only be awarded compensation for the training and development of Charlie Telfer for 2 years instead of the 10 years that he was with the club.
“They argued the club in its current form has only existed for two years.
“It is disappointing Dundee United tried to pursue this tiresome, legally incorrect and provocative argument given that it has been repeatedly confirmed by the football authorities in Scotland and beyond that administration and liquidation of the companies that owned the club did not break the continuity of the club’s history or its record of honours won.”
United chairman Stephen Thompson hit out at the decision which be described as "ridiculously prohibitive".
"Today's judgement now sets a dangerous precedent that means some of our most promising young players will be deprived of the opportunity to secure a contract at a club where they have been offered a genuine first-team opportunity and toi mprove their earnings purely because the compensation has been set at a ridiculously prohibitive level.
"The sum awarded to Rangers is almost seven times the amount offered to the player under the terms of his new contract with the Glasgow club."
