From Zurich’s rulebook to dressing rooms across Europe and beyond, FIFA’s next rewrite of the transfer regulations will alter how clubs weigh contractual risk in the international market. The revised Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players take effect on 1 January 2027, refining the definition of a player’s protected period and introducing an escalating scale of penalties for clubs that breach contracts during it.
The protected period is central to disputes over players leaving before their deals expire. Under the current system, a contract signed before a player turns 23 is protected for four full seasons or four years, whichever comes first. For those aged from 23 to 27, the term has been three complete seasons or three years; it falls to two seasons or two years for the 28-to-31 bracket, and to one season or one year for players aged 32 or above.
FIFA will retain much of that framework but shift one important boundary. A player who signs before reaching 23 will still be covered for four seasons or four years. The next category will now run from age 23 until the day before a player’s 28th birthday, extending the three-season or three-year protection by a further 12 months. Contracts signed on or after a player turns 28, but before their 32nd birthday, will carry a protected period of two seasons or two years. From 32 onwards, it remains one season or one year.
When a club and player renew an agreement by extending its previous duration, the protected period begins again. That principle survives unchanged in the new regulations.
A stepped response to contractual breaches
The disciplinary consequences for clubs will no longer begin automatically with a two-window registration ban. Instead, FIFA will apply a progressive system where a club is found to have breached a contract within the protected period.
- A first breach will bring a warning and a financial penalty.
- A second breach will restrict the club to registering no more than five players.
- A third will result in a fine and a ban on registrations for one transfer window.
- A further breach will lead to a two-window registration ban.
- Any additional cases will be assessed by FIFA’s Football Tribunal.
The framework also addresses the club that signs a player after that player has broken an existing contract. The player may owe compensation to their former club and could face a playing suspension of up to four months. The destination club, meanwhile, can still be barred from registering players for two transfer windows if it is shown to have encouraged the breach.
There is, however, a newly defined 45-day presumption. If the player signs for another club within 45 days of ending the earlier contract improperly, FIFA will presume that the new employer induced the breach. The incoming club can overturn that assumption only by satisfying the Football Tribunal that it did not prompt the player’s action.
After those 45 days have passed, the receiving club will not be sanctioned unless the former club can provide clear proof that the new side encouraged the contractual breach. The burden therefore changes with the calendar: an early move will demand an explanation from the new club, while a later move requires evidence from the old one.
Rules for cross-border moves, not domestic disputes
These provisions apply to international transfers, meaning moves between clubs in different national associations. They do not govern a purely domestic Spanish transfer. In a case involving two Spanish clubs, such as a hypothetical domestic move for Julián Álvarez, national law would take precedence, including Royal Decree 1006 and Spain’s Sports Act. FIFA does not hold jurisdiction over that domestic contractual setting.
