page_title: Transfer (association football)
section_title: Solidarity contribution
hierarchical_section_title: Transfer (association football) / Solidarity contribution
caption_attribution_description: Robinho, St. Jakob Stadion, Basel (Switzerland), Switzerland - Brasil 1:2
context_page_description: In professional football, a transfer is the action taken whenever a player under contract moves between clubs. It refers to the transferring of a player's registration from one association football club to another. In general, the players can only be transferred during a transfer window and according to the rules set by a governing body. Usually some sort of compensation is paid for the player's rights, which is known as a transfer fee. When a player moves from one club to another, their old contract is terminated and they negotiate a new one with the club they are moving to, unlike in American, Canadian and Australian sports, where teams essentially trade existing player contracts. In some cases, however, transfers can function in a similar manner to player trades, as teams can offer another player on their squad as part of the compensation.
  According to FIFA, from January to September 2018 there were 15,049 international transfers of male players with fees totalling US$7.1 billion, and 577 international transfers of female players for US$493,235.
context_section_description: Under FIFA rules, if a professional football player transfers to another club during the course of a contract, 5% of any transfer fee, not including training compensation paid to his former club, shall be deducted from the total amount of this transfer fee and distributed by the new club as a solidarity contribution to the club(s) involved in his training and education over the years.
  This solidarity contribution reflects the number of years he was registered with the relevant club(s) between the seasons of his 12th and 23rd birthdays, as follows:
  As of July 2015, there is an ongoing controversy between several youth soccer clubs and the United States Soccer Federation (U.S. Soccer) over this issue. When Major League Soccer's Seattle Sounders sold the rights to DeAndre Yedlin to Tottenham Hotspur for US$4 million, a Seattle-area youth club for which Yedlin had played, Crossfire Premier, sought its share of solidarity payments. While Spurs acknowledged Crossfire's claim, MLS and U.S. Soccer intercepted the funds before they could be sent to Crossfire, claiming that the sealed ruling in a 1996 antitrust case gave MLS exclusive rights to all transfer fees involving league players. Crossfire has since petitioned FIFA to either force payment or allow the club to sue MLS and U.S. Soccer; several other youth clubs have since joined in Crossfire's request, including one of Clint Dempsey's previous clubs.
caption: Manchester City paid €1.805 million for Robinho.
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