The minor application process

The minor application process under the Procedural Rules Governing the Football Tribunal can be summarised as follows (see “Minors: scope”):

Creating a minor application

A minor application applies to players aged 10 or older but under 18, regardless of sex, status (amateur or professional) or whether they play 11-a-side football or futsal.

The new Member Association is responsible for creating the minor application and entering all the relevant information in TMS. For each minor application, the new Member Association must upload mandatory documents in PDF format, depending on the application type. The overview of mandatory documents for each application type is set out in the “Guide to Submitting a Minor Application”.

A document not available in one of the three official FIFA languages (English, French and Spanish) must be uploaded in TMS together with its respective translation in one of the three official languages. Failure to provide a translated document may result in the Players’ Status Chamber (“PSC”) disregarding the document in question.

Counter-approval

In case of a request for approval of an international transfer, the former Member Association will have seven days to submit its position (approve or dispute) in relation to the minor application. If there is no response from the former Member Association after seven days, the minor application will automatically be sent to FIFA for review and decision.

Review

The case handler is responsible for reviewing the information and documents in the minor application. Once the review is complete, the case handler will nominate the judge or judges and submit a proposed decision for their consideration.

Additional documentation (if requested)

During the review, the case handler can request additional documents from the parties through TMS to complete the minor application. The requested party must respond through TMS by the specified deadline.

Decision

The Member Associations concerned are legally notified of the PSC’s decision through TMS. The decision will have one of the following statuses: “Accepted”, “Rejected” or “Not admissible”. If the minor application is accepted, the parties concerned can complete the player’s transfer or first registration. If the minor player is being transferred internationally, the transfer must be processed in TMS (see “Minors: scope”).

Grounds

The Member Associations concerned have ten days from the date of notification of the decision to request the grounds. Notification will be deemed complete once the decision has been uploaded to TMS.