Sheffield Wednesday may be stopped from completing transfers until any player wage deferrals are settled

Sheffield Wednesday are among the clubs who have entered into discussions with the PFA regarding the deferral of player wages and along with other clubs may find they are unable to sign players until deferrals accrued from any agreement are settled.

Yesterday Wednesday owner Dejphon Chansiri was praised after confirming all non-football staff would be paid their full salary despite many of them being put under furlough.

It means the Government will pay 80 per cent of the furloughed employees’ wages under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme. Chansiri will ‘top up’ the remaining 20 per cent.

On player wage deferrals, FIFPRO general secretary Jonas Baer-Hoffmann says while legal issues remain to be overcome, the "spirit" of existing contracts mean they ought to remain valid until the extended end of the current campaign.

Professional Footballers' Association chief executive Gordon Taylor has warned any clubs imposing deferrals must be blocked from making signings until the resulting debts are settled.

Taylor said: "It's not a time to be relaxing regulations on financial propriety when we have already had problems with Football League clubs such as Bury.

"If a club is doing deferrals then the regulations state that they would be embargoed from signing any players."

FIFPRO officials have been part of working groups established by FIFA and UEFA to look into the consequences for players whose contracts generally run out on June 30.

"You could very much argue that the spirit of the contract is that it runs until the season is over and a new contract starts with a new season," said Hoffman.

"Nevertheless, there are legal obstacles with mandating such an extension which we're trying to manage as well as we can, but we are very concerned that we might end up in a situation where (clubs) pick and choose who is being retained for the last couple of months of the season and who is not."