The European
Commission’s competition decisions in the area of sport, which set out broad
principles regarding the interface between sports-related activities and EU
competition law, are widely publicized. As a result of the decentralization of
EU competition law enforcement, however, enforcement activity has largely
shifted to the national level. Since 2004, national competition authorities
(NCAs) and national courts are empowered to fully apply the EU competition
rules on anti-competitive agreements (Article 101 TFEU) and abuse of a dominant
position (Article 102 TFEU).
Even though
NCAs and national courts have addressed a series of interesting competition
cases (notably dealing with the regulatory aspects of sport) during the last
ten years, the academic literature has largely overlooked these developments.
This is unfortunate since all stakeholders (sports organisations, clubs,
practitioners, etc.) increasingly need to learn from pressing issues arising in
national cases and enforcement decisions. In a series of blog posts we will
explore these unknown territories of the application of EU competition law to
sport.
In this second installment of this blog series, we discuss a recent
judgment of the regional court (Landgericht) of Dortmund finding that the
International Handball Federation (IHF)’s mandatory release system of players
for matches of national teams without compensation infringes EU and German
competition law.[1] More...
On 6 October 2014, the
CAS upheld the appeal filed by the former General Secretary of the World Karate
Federation (WKF), George Yerolimpos, against the 6 February 2014 decision of
the WKF Appeal Tribunal. With the award, the CAS confirmed a six-months
membership suspension imposed upon the Appellant by the WKF Disciplinary
Tribunal.[1] At a first glance, the
case at issue seems to be an ordinary challenge of a disciplinary sanction
imposed by a sports governing body. Nevertheless, this appeal lies at the heart
of a highly acrimonious political fight for the leadership of the WKF, featuring
two former ‘comrades’: Mr Yerolimpos and
Mr Espinos (current president of WKF). As the CAS puts it very lucidly, "this
is a story about a power struggle within an international sporting body"[2], a story reminding the Saturn devouring his son myth.
This case, therefore, brings
the dirty laundry of sports politics to the fore. Interestingly enough, this
time the CAS does not hesitate to grapple with the political dimension of the case. More...
It took almost six months, a record of 26 witnesses and a 68
pages final award for the CAS to put an end to a long-delayed, continuously
acrimonious and highly controversial presidential election for the Football
Association of Thailand (FAT). Worawi Makudi can sit easy and safe on the
throne of the FAT for his fourth consecutive term, since the CAS has dismissed
the appeal filed by the other contender, Virach Chanpanich.[1]
Interestingly enough, it is one of the rare times that the CAS
Appeal Division has been called to adjudicate on the fairness and regularity of
the electoral process of a sports governing body. Having been established as the
supreme judge of sports disputes, by reviewing the electoral process of
international and national sports federations the CAS adds to its functions a
role akin to the one played by a constitutional court in national legal systems.
It seems that members of international and national federations increasingly see
the CAS as an ultimate guardian of fairness and validity of internal electoral
proceedings. Are these features - without prejudice to the CAS role as an
arbitral body- the early sign of the emergence of a Constitutional Court for Sport? More...
With this blog post, we continue the
blog series on Turkish match-fixing cases and our attempt to map the still unchartered
waters of the CAS’s match-fixing jurisprudence.
The first blog post addressed two issues
related to the substance of match-fixing disputes, namely the legal
characterization of the match-fixing related measure of ineligibility under
Article 2.08 of the UEL Regulations as administrative or disciplinary measure
and the scope of application of Article 2.08. In addition, The Turkish cases have
raised procedural and evidentiary issues that need to be dealt with in the framework
of match-fixing disputes.
The CAS panels have drawn a clear line
between substantial and procedural matters. In this light, the Eskişehirspor panel declared the nature of
Article 2.08 UEL Regulations to be administrative and rejected the application
of UEFA Disciplinary Regulations to the substance. Nonetheless, it upheld that disciplinary
rules and standards still apply to the procedure. This conclusion, however, can
be considered puzzling in that disciplinary rules apply to the procedural matters
arising by a pure administrative measure. To this extent, and despite the
bifurcation of different applicable rules into substantial and procedural
matters, the credibility of the qualification of Article 2.08 as administrative
seems to be undermined. And here a question arises: How can the application of
rules of different nature to substantial and procedural matters in an identical
match-fixing dispute be explained?More...
This is the second part of a blog series on
the Real Madrid State aid case. In
the previous blog on this case, an outline of all the relevant facts was provided
and I analysed the first criterion of Article 107(1) TFEU, namely the criterion
that an advantage must be conferred upon the recipient for the measure to be
considered State aid. Having determined that Real Madrid has indeed benefited
from the land transactions, the alleged aid measure has to be scrutinized under
the other criteria of Article 107(1): the measure must be granted by a Member State
or through State resources; the aid granted must be selective; and it must
distorts or threatens to distort competition. In continuation, this blog will
also analyze whether the alleged aid measure could be justified and declared
compatible with EU law under Article 107(3) TFEU.More...
The
editor’s note:
Two weeks ago we received the
unpublished CAS award rendered in the Eskişehirspor case
and decided to comment on it. In this post Thalia Diathesopoulou (Intern at the
ASSER International Sports Law Centre) analyses the legal steps followed and
interpretations adopted by CAS panels in this case and in a series of other
Turkish match-fixing cases. The first part of the post will deal with the
question of the legal nature of the ineligibility decision opposed by UEFA to
clubs involved in one way or another into match-fixing and with the personal
and material scope of UEFA’s rule on which this ineligibility is based. The
second part is dedicated to the procedural rules applied in match-fixing cases.
Introduction
The unpredictability of the outcome is a
sine qua non feature of sports. It is
this inherent uncertainty that draws the line between sports and entertainment
and triggers the interest of spectators, broadcasters and sponsors. Thus, match-fixing
by jeopardising the integrity and unpredictability of sporting outcomes has been
described, along with doping, as one of the major threats to modern sport.[1] More...
The European Commission’s competition decisions in the
area of sport, which set out broad principles regarding the interface between
sports-related activities and EU competition law, are widely publicized. As a
result of the decentralization of EU competition law enforcement, however,
enforcement activity has largely shifted to the national level. Since 2004,
national competition authorities (NCAs) and national courts are empowered to
fully apply the EU competition rules on anti-competitive agreements (Article
101 TFEU) and abuse of a dominant position (Article 102 TFEU).
Even though NCAs have addressed a series of
interesting competition cases (notably dealing with the regulatory aspects of
sport) during the last ten years, the academic literature has largely overlooked
these developments. This is unfortunate since all stakeholders (sports organisations,
clubs, practitioners, etc.) increasingly need to learn from pressing issues
arising in national cases and enforcement decisions. In a series of blog posts
we will explore these unknown territories of the application of EU competition
law to sport.More...
The CAS denial of the urgent request for
provisional measures filed by the Legia Warszawa SA in the course of its appeal
against the UEFA Appeals Body Decision of 13 August 2014 put a premature end to
Legia’s participation in the play-offs of the UEFA Champion’s League (CL)
2014/2015. Legia’s fans- and fans of Polish football - will now have to wait at
least one more year to watch a Polish team playing in the CL group stage for
the first time since 1996. More...
This is the
first part of a blog series involving the Real
Madrid State aid case.
Apart from being
favoured by many of
Spain’s most important politicians, there have always been suspicions
surrounding the world’s richest football club regarding possible financial aid by the Madrid City Council. Indeed, in
the late 90’s a terrain qualification change by the Madrid City Council proved to
be tremendously favourable to the king’s club. The change allowed Real Madrid
to sell its old training grounds for a huge sum. Though the exact price for the
grounds remains unknown, Real Madrid was suddenly capable of buying players
like Figo and Zidane for record fees. However, the European Commission, even
though agreeing that an advantage was conferred to the club, simply stated that the new
qualification of the terrain in question does not appear to involve any
transfer of resources by the State and could therefore not be regarded as State
aid within the meaning of article 107 TFEU.
Agreements
between the club and the Council have been a regularity for the last 25
years. A more recent example concerns an
agreement signed on 29 July 2011 (Convenio29-07-2011.pdf (8MB).
More...
On the 24th June 2014 the Spanish Audiencia Nacional issued its ruling on a hotly debated sports law topic: The
whereabouts requirements imposed to athletes in the fight against doping. This
blog aims to go beyond the existing commentaries (here and here) of the case, by putting it in the wider
context of a discussion on the legality of the whereabouts requirements. More...