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In football (soccer), the Bosman ruling is a 1995 European Court of Justice decision that allows professional football players in the European Union (EU) to move freely to another club at the end of their term of contract with their present team.

The ruling was made in a consolidation of three separate legal cases, all involving Belgian player Jean-Marc Bosman:

• Union royale belge des sociétés de football association ASBL v Jean-Marc Bosman
• Royal club liégeois SA v Jean-Marc Bosman and others
• Union Européenne de Football Association (UEFA) v Jean-Marc Bosman

Bosman was a player in the Jupiler League, whose contract had expired in 1990. He wanted to change teams and move to Dunkerque, a French team. However, Dunkerque didn't offer his Belgian club RFC Liège enough of a transfer fee, so Liège refused to let him go.

In the meantime, Bosman's wages were reduced as he was no longer a first-team player. He took his case to the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg and sued for restraint of trade. After a tough legal battle he won his case, and on December 15, 1995 the court ruled that the system as it was constituted a restriction on the free movement of workers and was prohibited by Article 39(1) of the EC Treaty. Bosman and all other EU football players were given the right to a free transfer at the end of their contracts, with the provision that they were transferring from a club within one EU Association to a club within another EU Association. Prior to that, professional clubs in Britain (but not, for example, in Spain and France) were able to prevent players from joining another club even if their contracts had expired. In addition to this, a player can sign a pre-contract with another club for a free transfer if the players' contract with their existing club has 6 months or less remaining. The Bosman ruling can be compared to the Curt Flood case in baseball, which led to the elimination of the reserve clause and the advent of free agency.

The Bosman ruling also prohibited domestic football leagues in EU member states, and also UEFA, from imposing quotas on foreign players to the extent that they discriminated against nationals of EU states. At that time, many leagues placed quotas restricting the number of non-nationals allowed on member teams. Also, UEFA had a rule that prohibited teams in its competitions, namely the Champions League, Cup Winners' Cup and UEFA Cup, from naming more than three "foreign" players in their matchday squads. This had an especially negative impact on British teams, because both UEFA and FIFA consider England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales to be separate nations. As an example, Manchester United were forced to count their Welsh winger Ryan Giggs as a foreign player, despite the fact that Wales and England are both constituents of the UK, and comprise a single entity for purposes of conflict of laws. (The Giggs case was more complicated, in that the player had represented England as a schoolboy, but only because eligibility for the England Schoolboys team is based on school attendance and not nationality. Contrary to a widely stated belief, he was not eligible for the England national team.) After the ruling, quotas could still be imposed, but could only be used to restrict the number of non-EU players on each team.

On April 21, 2005, UEFA 52 member federations unanimously approved a rule designed to increase the number of locally trained players. The measure is an attempt to reverse some of the effects of the Bosman ruling. UEFA's chief executive Lars-Christer Olsson was reported by CNN to have said that some of the major clubs in Europe like Chelsea and Barcelona were not happy with this rule, and that he didn't rule out the possibility of a court challenge.

An addendum to this rule means that a player may move in the final year of a four or five year contract provided he hands in a request to the club no more than 15 days after the end of the previous season. The club would be entitled to compensation, but only equaling the amount of the final year's wages as per the contract, which would be far less than an agreed transfer fee in most cases. In addition, the player would have to move to a club that isn't in the same association as his current club. Wigan were the first club to take advantage of this new ruling as they signed Andy Webster from Hearts, although there is still an ongoing challenge to this ruling by Hearts who believe that the £625,000 either Andy Webster or Wigan must pay them is not adequate compensation.

The Bosman ruling was considered and distinguished in Lehtonen (2000), a similar case which involved a deadline imposed by FIBA after which basketball teams could not include players who had played for another team in the same season, where it was found that such a restriction was lawful.

• Text of the ECJ Ruling