Whether you are a fan or a player, you know that EU football clubs play under the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) supervision. In 2019, UEFA estimated there were more than 50 000 professional football players in the EU, with many thousands more – young and old – playing in their spare time at an amateur level.
Modern football's multinational teams would not have been possible without the landmark 1995 Bosman case, in which the European Court of Justice (ECJ) upheld the principle of free movement of EU workers. The court allowed football players to move to another club once their contracts expired, without a transfer fee or the consent of the releasing club. This enabled players to demand sign-on fees and pay rises from their current club. Apart from making the transfer system more flexible, the ruling also ended any discrimination on grounds of nationality. Pre-Bosman, the UEFA '3+2' rule permitted a maximum of three foreign players and two 'assimilated players' to play in European competitions. The ECJ ended these quotas and any limit on the number of foreign players that can play for a team. Other cases extended these rules to players from non-EU countries who already play in a Member State.
The EU and UEFA renewed their cooperation agreement in 2022, to promote European values and objectives through football by working on anti-doping policies, ending match-fixing and lowering football's carbon footprint. Top of the list is preventing violence on and off the pitch, for example through information sharing between football associations on hooligans.