Liverpool will pay £4m to Fulham for England youth international Harvey Elliott, a tribunal has ruled today – settling a long-running dispute between the two Premier League clubs.
The Premier League champions signed Elliott in the summer of 2016 after his Fulham contract had expired, but the two sides could not agree on a fee. Liverpool reportedly had offered around £750,000 in compensation, whilst Fulham were rumoured to be holding out for £10m. Elliott, who had joined Fulham aged eleven, had made three senior appearances for the west London side, making his professional debut at fifteen when he came on as a substitute in the 3-1 League Cup win at Millwall in September 2018. He subsequently made two substitute appearances under Scott Parker in the league defeats by Wolves, where he became the Premier League’s youngest ever player aged 16 years and 30 days and Newcastle United.
Elliott has gone to make two first-team appearances for Liverpool and is currently on loan at Blackburn Rovers, where he has amassed the highest number of assists in the Championship this season. The tribunal is unable to take his post-transfer performances into account as it has to assess an appropriate fee at the time of the deal in question. This fee would be the highest assessed by a tribunal for a teenager in English football. As well as the £4m fee, £1.2m of which is believed to be payable up front, Fulham would be entitled to a 20% sell-on clause should Elliott leave Liverpool.
Fulham released a statement this evening, which reads:
“The Professional Football Compensation Committee has today given its decision with regards to the compensation payable following Harvey Elliott’s move to Liverpool in 2019.
Under the Youth Development Rules, the PFCC is tasked with assessing the compensation due for a player who leaves an Academy at the end of his registration, if the parties cannot agree the figure between themselves.
After a full hearing, the PFCC has decided that Fulham should be entitled to substantial compensation.
The award (undisclosed) is a record amount for a 16-year-old player and, in the circumstances, Fulham is very pleased and thanks the PFCC for its careful consideration of the arguments we put forward.”
I didn’t like the dirty tricks Liverpool were trying to get Elliot for next to nothing, we all know that he is going to be worth a massive fee if he leaves them in the future. I personally feel that we should have received more for him and I hope we don’t do similar business with them again, they have gone down in my estimation as a club.