English Players in Danish league no more

[Martin Dew-Hattens]

I have heard that from next year the English players are not "allowed" to play in the Danish league.

In actual fact this will be good for Denmark since it will give the young Danish players the preference and training sessions will once again contain all first team players and not just second team players as at present in some clubs.

This is not a Danish rule so it must be an English rule. Can anybody tell me why ?

Even if this is a rule then I cannot understand it since it must be "restriction of trade" which is illegial !

[The Expert]

So who will this affect in the Badmintonligaen?

Hvidore the new champions with Nathan Robinson, Gail Emms and Tracey Hallam and Lillerød with Canadian/English player Carl Baxter, thats it I think...

Not really squads of English keeping our young players out of contention and certainly not out of training sessions!

I can't see Badminton England telling Emms and Robertson what to do particularly as Nathan pretty much lives in Denmark and if I was Baxter I would just revert to being Canadian!

Now if it was no foreign players allowed that would be different, but that is something that will not happen.

[georgelarge]

Perhaps if our players were allowed to play for whatever County they choose and if all the Counties were able to pay the players then they wouldn't have to play abroad.

[nasigoreng]

Better still adopt the danish system, as most people think its a good idea, and create an English League, along the same lines. As far as I know, players who represent their county 1st team, get expenses, free board & lodging, and do not pay fees. If you are not lucky enough to play for the 1st team, i.e represent 2nd or 3rd team, you do not get any expenses, in fact you have to pay a match fee, for the honour.
Can County Associations afford to pay their players? They will need to work harder to get sponsors, I guess.
When I was involved, it was very hard to get sponsorship money for Badminton as opposed to football or cricket.

[CWB]

I have heard that from next year the English players are not "allowed" to play in the Danish league.

In actual fact this will be good for Denmark since it will give the young Danish players the preference and training sessions will once again contain all first team players and not just second team players as at present in some clubs.

This is not a Danish rule so it must be an English rule. Can anybody tell me why ?

Even if this is a rule then I cannot understand it since it must be "restriction of trade" which is illegial !

If this is true (and what are your sources?) and is a ruling made by the English authorities then it would be (a) a foolish waste of an excellent way to develop the English players and (b) illegal.

I've not seen mentioned this elsewhere.

[Martin Dew-Hattens]

My source of information is the the Danish television which has now quoted it twice. Once during the semi and then again during the finals in which the English took part.

I did not attend these events personally so I did not ask the Brits directly.

Its not a Danish rule - of that I am sure so it must come from the English camp.It can only come from the new England manager.

the coach /manager of Hvidore(jesper Larsen) in which they played has now jointed my club (GBK) so I think I will go to a more direct source of information.

Watch this space.

[PeteG]

Better still adopt the danish system, as most people think its a good idea, and create an English League, along the same lines. As far as I know, players who represent their county 1st team, get expenses, free board & lodging, and do not pay fees. If you are not lucky enough to play for the 1st team, i.e represent 2nd or 3rd team, you do not get any expenses, in fact you have to pay a match fee, for the honour.
Can County Associations afford to pay their players? They will need to work harder to get sponsors, I guess.
When I was involved, it was very hard to get sponsorship money for Badminton as opposed to football or cricket.


Its not quite that bad. I think it does depend on how well off the association is. At the moment I play for Lancashire 4th team and match fees aren't required, trips away are either subsidised or at a reduced cost, but as far as I know Lancashire is quite well off as counties go. I played for Shropshire previously and they didn't have the same level of funding. They only run two teams, but like I said they are currently much smaller than Lancashire (but with some good juniors emerging) so can't afford the same level of funding enjoyed by some of the larger counties.

Either way if people didn't want to pay to play then they wouldn't turn up!! But I agree that it would be much better for badminton to have fully funded national leagues with professional and semi-professional teams, so that the stronger players could get ome funding and also so that we could possibly attract some foeign talent over here. The issue is finding the funding and being able to re-jig an age old county structure.

[NeilNicholls]

Even if this is a rule then I cannot understand it since it must be "restriction of trade" which is illegial !
maybe, maybe not.
My contract with the company I work for forbids me to have involvement with competitor companies.
I freely accept such condition.

If ther England players playing in the Danish leagues are receiving UK Sport funding, maybe it's a contractual thing.

[CWB]

maybe, maybe not.
My contract with the company I work for forbids me to have involvement with competitor companies.
I freely accept such condition.

If ther England players playing in the Danish leagues are receiving UK Sport funding, maybe it's a contractual thing.

I, too, have had employment contracts that forbid later working for competitors.

They are usually couched in such general language that they amount to unreasonable contract terms and are not enforceable.

That is not to say that the English funded players cannot be banned from competing broad by BE though. It just seems so short-sighted and silly.

[Martin Dew-Hattens]

After some investigation is seems that the t.v got it wrong. In actual fact Gail and Nathan are going to another Danish Club called Skælskør.

Here is the link in Danish (sorry)

http://www.badminton.dk/default.asp?pageid=3062

Here is the link to skælskor but there is no mention of it there

http://www.sbkbadminton.dk/

Skælskor has many sponsers and hence allllllloooooot of cash !! Without knowing the exact figures it would not surprise me if they each picked up 20,000 pounds for next years outings to Denmark.

[Luncheon]

Thats great.....fair play to them....but 20 thou is still pretty poor in comparison to tennis.

One of the best club badminton leagues in Europe and one of the top pairs in the world and its only 20k.

Can't see these facts changing in our lifetimes!!!

[dlp]

The suggested figure of 20k is for club play, this would not include major tournament prize money, sponsorships etc.

Compared with what can be earned playing in the ICC.. nothing, that sounds quite good.