“He would have been ready to play within 24 hours.”Īll of that changed in January, when - four and a half years after the Brexit referendum - Britain formally, and finally, left the European Union. Once Motherwell had agreed to a fee with his former club and to a contract with the player, it would have been a simple matter of “jumping on a plane and doing a medical,” Motherwell’s chief executive, Alan Burrows, said. The bureaucracy, it turned out, was quite another.Ī year ago - indeed, at any point in the last two decades or so - Ojala’s move to the Scottish Premiership would have generated as little fuss as it did attention. Legally, for another two weeks, he was not even permitted to kick a ball.
Even after he completed his compulsory isolation, Ojala was still not allowed to start preseason training. What he did not know was quite how long his wait would be after that.
Upon landing, Ojala knew, he would have to spend 10 days isolating in a hotel before joining his new teammates.
Travel restrictions were still in place in Scotland when, in the middle of July, the Finnish defender agreed to join Motherwell, a club of modest means and sober ambitions in the country’s top division.
