Letter of the Day | How the system failed a schoolboy footballer

THE EDITOR, Madam:

This season, a schoolboy footballer signed a professional contract with a Premier League club. He may not be the only one. He was still in school, still wearing his school’s colours, and still scoring goals for them in Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA) competition. Neither his school nor ISSA knew. By the time anyone officially found out, his school’s season was in jeopardy and so was his eligibility.

The easy version of this story has a villain. The true version has a system with no guardrails.

Consider who knew what. The club knew, because it drafted the contract, shortly before the start of the school year. The Jamaica Football Federation (JFF) had the means to know, because professional contracts are lodged with it. The parent knew, because she signed her consent. The school did not know, because no rule requires anyone to tell it. ISSA, which bars professionals from schoolboy competition, did not know either, because there is no direct channel through which it would find out.

ISSA’s own rulebook is clear about why the rule exists. It says schoolboy competition is for student-athletes fully committed to their academic development. ISSA also describes its competitions as serving the holistic development of young people, and it warns that boys in high-profile sports like football are the most likely to fall behind in the classroom.

I agree with every word of that.

But a rule that exists to protect a child is worth very little if the only time it is enforced is after the damage is done.

THE CONTRACT

Now, look at what this boy signed. On a plain reading, he is paid in exchange for not playing football for any other institution, and that includes his own school. He also cannot take part in any other amateur or intramural sport without the club’s permission. That would cover house athletics at the school he attends every day. A teenager has signed away his school sports life and not one adult in his education was asked.

Here is what that should look like instead:

First, a pipeline. When the JFF registers a professional contract for any player under 19 or enrolled in school, the system should automatically notify ISSA and the school. The data already exists on both sides. ISSA keeps a database of registered students, and the JFF keeps its own registration system. They simply don’t talk to each other.

Second, the right default. The Jamaica Premier League (JPL) already allows schoolboys to play as student players, without a contract. That should be the required route for enrolled students during the school year, unless the school and ISSA have been formally told.

Third, a declaration. At ISSA registration each year, the student and a parent should sign a statement of amateur status, so no family can say they didn’t know the rule existed.

Fourth, protection for minors. No contract for a schoolboy should be allowed to stop him playing for his school, and every parent asked to sign one should have access to independent advice first.

Now ISSA is poised to punish this young man because the adults around him failed to do their jobs. Whatever the outcome of his case, the least we can do is make sure that, the next time a child’s eligibility is at stake, someone is required to ask the questions that should have been asked in the first place.

SKYE MURRAY