Editor’s note: This report compiles all relevant news, events and
materials on International and European Sports Law based on the daily coverage
provided on our twitter feed @Sportslaw_asser. You are invited to complete this survey via the
comments section below, feel free to add links to important cases, documents
and articles we might have overlooked.
The Headlines
Challenged
membership put a lot of emphasis on football federations in May. The Court of Arbitration for Sport (“CAS”) has
rendered an award, on 27 April 2016, ordering the FIFA Council to
submit the application of the Gibraltar Football Association (GFA) for FIFA
membership to the FIFA Congress (the body authorised to admit new members to FIFA). The GFA has sought since 1999 to become a member of
UEFA and FIFA. In May 2013, it became a
member of the UEFA and went on to seek membership of FIFA. The latter refused to
submit the application to its Congress as the conditions for it were
(allegedly) not met. The GFA filed an appeal to this decision to CAS which also
ordered that the FIFA Congress
take all necessary measures to admit the GFA as a full member of FIFA as soon as
possible and within the limits of the FIFA Statutes, as it does not have the
power to directly award it with FIFA membership. FIFA discussed the matter
during its 66th
Congress on 12&13 May and finally granted it with membership, along with
Kosovo. Gibraltar had to face an opposition from Spain due to its long-standing
dispute over the status of its territory. On another front, following the decision of the
UEFA Congress on May 3 to integrate the football federation of
Kosovo, the Football Association of Serbia (FSS) has filed an appeal with CAS
against the Kosovar membership. UEFA is already looking to integrate Gibraltar
and Kosovo to its 2018 World Cup
qualification tournament. Kosovo is a self-proclaimed state and not a member
of the United Nations. Its national Olympic committee became a full member
of the International Olympic Committee in 2014 and is
recognized by a number of international sports federations.
The ongoing legal battle between FIBA/FIBA Europe and
Euroleague Commercial Assets (“ECA”) is firing around Europe. This time, the Spanish Higher Council for Sports (“Consejo Superior de Deportes” – “CSD”) annulled the
agreement between the Spanish basketball league (“ACB”) and the Euroleague
because it breaches the rules of the Spanish national basketball federation
(“FEB”). Such an agreement is an infringement of the federation
jurisdiction to decide on the participation of Spanish basketball clubs to
international competitions. The
Spanish national team was under the threat of being withdrawing of the 2016 Rio
Olympic Games and the 2017 EuroBasket by the international federation (“FIBA”)
and the European federation (“FIBA Europe”) because of the participation of
Spanish professional basketball clubs to the Euroleague. FIBA is battling with
Euroleague to impose its own European competition, the Basketball Champions
League (recent update on the ongoing disagreements between the two can be found
here).
The Spanish competition authority (“CNMC”) published its report on the audiovisual
rights’ selling conditions for the Spanish football first and second leagues
(“La Liga” and “Segunda División”) and national cup (“Copa del Rey”) until
2019. In April 2015, joint selling of the national football media rights has
been imposed in Spain. The Spanish National League has to seek the advice of
the competition authority previous to its tender. The main observations of the CNMC is that the penultimate and ultimate La
Liga matches day should be broadcast on free-to-air TV. Also, the possibility
for pay-TV broadcasters to buy more Copa del Rey matches could be
anti-competitive.
Case law
Michel Platini’s suspension from all
football-related activities at both national and international level was
lowered by the CAS from six to four years. The
former UEFA President was first sentenced with an eight years ban by the Adjudicatory Chamber
of the FIFA Ethics Committee for several breaches of the FIFA Ethics Code. This
sanction was later reduced to a six years suspension by the FIFA Appeal
Committee. Michel Platini filed his appeal at CAS which rendered its decision on May, 9. CAS concluded that the employment contract
between FIFA and Michel Platini was valid, however, the alleged unpaid part of
his salary (CHF 2 millions) was not legitimate and, as such, was an undue
advantage in breach of Article 20 of the FIFA Code of Ethics. The arbitral
panel also concluded on a conflict of interest in breach of article 19 of the
same code. However, CAS only retained these two breaches and did not found him
guilty of the others, as a consequence, its six-year suspension was reduced to
four years. In particular, CAS highlighted the fact that FIFA knew about this
payment in 2011 and only started its investigations in 2015. Michel Platini resigned from the UEFA presidency and announced his
intention to appeal the award in
front of the Swiss Federal Tribunal.
CAS released its award on the appeal brought by the Croatian international
water polo player Niksa Dobud against FINA Doping panel decision which sanctioned him for failure to submit to a
doping test. He was previously sanctioned with a four-year period of
ineligibility, the disqualification of the results obtained after 21 March
2015, the date of the attempt to test him and the forfeit of any medals, points
and prizes achieved from that date. The panel found him guilty of evading a
doping test and confirmed FINA decision.
Official Documents and Press Releases
In the news
Olympics
Football
Academic materials
Elena Atienza Macias, Nutritional Supplements and Doping in Sports – A
Controversial Issue
Robert A. Baade and
Victor A. Matheson, Going for the Gold: The Economics of the Olympics
Christian Frodl, Neuer, Hummels, Müller, Götze & Co: the legal
framework governing industrial relations in German professional football
Dionne L. Koller, Putting Public Law into 'Private' Sport
Larry P. Reimer, New Liability Trends, Potential New Risk for Sports
Associations in Canada
Alexander Vantyghem, National Law in International Sports Disputes
Books
Upcoming Events
27 & 28 June - Sport & EU 11th annual conference, Institute for European Studies, CEU-San Pablo
University, Madrid, Spain
28 June – LawInSport Networking Drinks, London, UK
6 July - Asser International Sports Law
Lecture and Book Launch: Antidoping in the wake of the meldonium cases: How to
balance scientific complexity and legal fairness. By Marjolaine Viret, Asser Institute, The Hague, The
Netherlands
19 – 21 July - Executive Programme in International Sports Law, Sports Law and Policy Centre, Ravello, Italy
2 & 3 September - International Sport Arbitration 6th Conference CAS
& SAV, The Court of
Arbitration for Sport (CAS), the Swiss Bar Association (SAV / FSA) and the
Swiss Arbitration Association (ASA), Lausanne Switzerland
16 September - The future of the ‘legal autonomy’ of sport, Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, UK