January 7 – Welsh club football doesn’t often generate much publicity outside the principality but Cymru Premier champions The New Saints have lodged an appeal with FIFA claiming they are owed a transfer fee from Saudi Pro League club Al-Orobah for striker Brad Young.
Young, top scorer in the Welsh top flight last season, left Saints for Saudi Arabia in September for a fee of £190,000.
Saints chairman Mike Harris said they had not received a penny, branding the Saudis “an absolute disgrace” and warning other clubs doing business with the Saudi league to make sure they get the money before their players leave.
FIFA confirmed it had “received a complaint in relation to this matter”.
“As it is pending before the Football Tribunal, please understand we cannot comment further at this stage,” a statement said.
Harris told BBC Radio Wales: “We’re due our transfer fee – not a penny has come. We’ve reported it to FIFA. One [payment] was due immediately in September – we gave them 16 days’ grace – and the other was due [last week], which was the second part.
“We can’t even get hold of the club so I’d be saying to any club thinking of selling a good prospect to Saudi Arabia to not do the deal unless the cash is in your bank before the player goes. No other club should be taken in by the promises of riches that don’t turn up.”
A Saints spokesperson says the case is due to go to the FIFA Players’ Status Chamber for a formal decision on January 14.
Young joined Saints in September 2023 after leaving Aston Villa, and went on to score 22 goals for the Welsh champions, winning the Cymru Premier’s player of the season award.
He left just before the club’s Conference League campaign, having had his head turned by the Saudi club according to Harris.
“They came in on the last day before the transfer window closed and unsettled our player, promising the world,” Harris.
“We’re not a selling club – we did not want to sell him. The money they were offering him was life-changing. This guy from Saudi Arabia was all ‘we are this, we are this’ and that they’ve got loads of dosh. I didn’t want the dosh – I wanted the player to play in Europe.”
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