Asser International Sports Law Blog

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

The end of governance reforms at FIFA?

The main sports governance story that surfaced in the press (see here and here) during the last month is related to significant personal changes made by the FIFA Council within the organization’s institutional structure. In particular, the FIFA Council dismissed the heads of the investigatory (Mr Cornel Borbély) and adjudicatory (Mr Hans-Joachim Eckert) chambers of the Independent Ethics Committee, as well as the Head (Mr Miguel Maduro) of the Governance and Review Committee. The decision to remove Mr Maduro was taken arguably in response to his active role in barring Mr Vitaly Mutko, a Deputy Prime Minister of Russia, from sitting on the FIFA Council due to an imminent conflict of interests. These events constitute a major setback to governance reforms initiated by the football’s world governing body in 2015. For a more detailed insight into the governance reforms at FIFA, we invite you to read the recent blog written by our senior researcher Mr Antoine Duval.

The CAS award in Real Madrid CF v. FIFA

At the end of the month, the CAS finally published its award delivered in the arbitration procedure between the Spanish club Real Madrid CF and FIFA regarding the transfer of minor football players. Mr Michele Bernasconi, sitting as a Sole Arbitrator, partially upheld the appeal filed by Real Madrid CF against the decision rendered by the FIFA Appeal Committee on 8 April 2016. The Sole Arbitrator reduced the ban (registering new players both on a national and international level) imposed on the Spanish club by the FIFA Appeal Committee from two to one entire transfer period. Moreover, Real Madrid CF is now obliged to pay CHF 240,000 instead of the original fine amounting to CHF 360,000.

UEFA incorporates human rights and anti-corruption criteria into bidding requirements

UEFA has recently made available the Bid Dossier Template for the 2024 European Championship that will be held either in Germany or Turkey. Amongst other things, the two remaining candidates shall describe in their bid dossiers a global strategy for integrating the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights in order to protect, respect and fulfil universal human rights, including child rights and the rights of workers. On this occasion, UEFA President Mr Aleksander Čeferin stated that ‘it was imperative […] to introduce specific articles on the respect and protection of human rights in the bidding requirements for all our competitions.’ By incorporating human rights criteria into bidding requirements, UEFA joins the International Olympic Committee and FIFA in their efforts to tackle human rights abuses associated with mega sporting events.

The return of Claudia Pechstein: Bundesverfassungsgericht edition

Claudia Pechstein is back! For those who have already forgotten the case, this is a dispute involving a German Speed Skater and Olympic gold medallist challenging the validity of a CAS award imposing a doping ban (for greater detail see our previous blogs here and here, and the article by Antoine Duval and Ben van Rompuy). Nothing less than the survival of the CAS, at least as we know it, is at stake. While Claudia Pechstein lost in front of the Bundesgerichtshof, the decision was harshly criticized (here and here) and she decided to challenge the ruling in front of the German Bundesverfassungsgericht (constitutional court). Since last month, we know that the Bundesverfassungsgericht will hear and decide the claim, this as such is already a sign that the judges deem the case worthy of consideration and should be cause for concern for those wishing to keep the CAS as it currently is. The silver lining for CAS might be in the Bundesverfassungsgericht’s Solange jurisprudence, which could find a new expression in this peculiar context (as suggested here), it would preserve the CAS’s existence while forcing it to change.

Sports Law Related Decisions

CAS – Award delivered in the arbitration between Arijan Ademi and UEFA
CAS – Award delivered in the arbitration between IAAF and All Russia Athletics Federation & Vladimir Mokhnev
CAS – Award delivered in the arbitration between Real Madrid and FIFA
Supreme Court of Spain – Decision concerning the Spanish cyclist Roberto Heras

Official Documents and Press Releases

CAS – CAS maintains the temporary bans imposed on six Russian athletes until 31 October 2017, at the latest
CAS – CAS reduces the sanctions of football players Enrique Luis Triverio and Pablo Cesar Aguilar Benitez
European Commission – State Aid: Commission approves Slovak support of EUR 36 million for the construction of the national football stadium in Bratislava
European Commission – The Council approves the new work plan for sport
Federal Constitutional Court of Germany – Pechstein's constitutional complaint to be heard in 2017
FIBA – FIBA’s mid-term congress ratifies new headgear rule
FIFA – Circular no. 1583: Amendment to Article 78 of the FIFA Disciplinary Code
FIFA – FIFA welcomes outcome of NCP mediation process on workers’ welfare in Qatar
FIFA – Member associations release reports on intermediaries
FIFA – Outcome of second meeting of Governance Committee
FIFA – Suspension of the Malian FA lifted
IOC – Joint statement following the meeting of IOC President, Professor Richard McLaren and WADA President
Tennis Integrity Unit – Junn Mitsuhashi banned for life for match-fixing offences
UEFA – Bid Dossier Template for EURO 2024
WADA – WADA Foundation Board takes decisive action on the Way Forward for the Agency and for Clean Sport

In the news

Doping

Andy Brown Russia’s National Anti-Doping Plan denies institutional doping
Andy Brown Spanish police dismantle new sports doping ring
Michael Pavitt Russia in danger of missing Pyeongchang 2018 as International Paralympic Committee maintain suspension
Michael Pavitt Russian race walker Trofimov handed four-year ban

Football

Murad Ahmed FIFA ousts governance chief in ‘night of long knives’
The Associated Press FIFA says blackface in Sochi parade was ‘inappropriate’
BBC Sport Gothenburg v AIK: ‘Match-fixing attempt’ leads to Swedish fixture postponement
Simon Bradley FIFA chief Infantino seeks ‘absolute power’ after ousting ethics heads
Children Win UEFA incorporates human rights and anti-corruption criteria into bidding requirements
Simon Evans FIFA’s chief ethics investigator and ethics judge replaced
Graham Dunbar Two more members leave FIFA governance panel
Nizaar Kinsella The laws of the transfer market could be rewritten with landmark court case in Italy
James Lynch FIFA’s chance to show they put people ahead of money is now
Francine McKenna Will PwC throw the red card on its Swiss firm over FIFA
Liam Morgan Palestine threaten to take FIFA to CAS after ‘illegal’ postponement of vote by Infantino
Tariq Panja and Gaspard Sebag Soccer star homes raided in money-laundering investigation

Other

Amnesty International Qatar: Abuse of migrant workers remains widespread as World Cup stadium hosts first match
Graham Dunbar Swim body monitoring VP’s alleged role in FIFA bribery case
Daniel Etchells American tennis player Kryvonos given 10-year ban for match-fixing
Richard Martin Cycling: Authorities ordered to pay Heras compensation after appeal fails
Dave Zirin and Jules Boykoff Los Angeles residents start to organize against the Olympic bid

Academic Materials

Mark James Sports Law 3^rd edition
Nancy Leong Against Women’s Sports

Blogs

Asser International Sports Law Blog

Antoine Duval The Reform of FIFA: Plus ça change, moins ça change?
Serhat Yilmaz and Antoine Duval What Pogba’s transfer tells us about the (de)regulation of intermediaries in football
Branislav Hock Nudging, not crushing, private orders: Private ordering in sports and the role of States
Saverio Spera Exploring the Validity of Unilateral Extension Options in Football – Part 2: The view of the DRC and the CAS

Law in Sport

Phil Bonner Are England’s current home grown player requirements sufficient to produce an elite national team?
William Clerk The rebalancing of power: The need for greater transparency in sports tribunals
Daniel Geey What a hard ‘red, white and blue’ Brexit may mean for domestic football
Philip Hutchinson and Tiran Gunawardena Betting in football: Was the FA’s decision on Joey Barton a fair one?
Stephen Ridgway The 4 key issues facing sports media rights lawyers in 2017: From Head Counsel, Sky Sports
Lucien Valloni and Stéphanie Oneyser Player contracts: How contractual stability can override a liquidated damages clause

Others

Andy Brown Pressure builds to secure fair athlete rights and representation
Matt Hart ‘This does not sound legal’: Inside Nike’s Oregon project
Bonita Mersiades The past is not another country for FIFA
Léonard Stoyanov Switzerland to become more attractive for international arbitration

Upcoming Events

29-30 June – Sport & EU 12^th Annual Conference, Molde University College, Molde, Norway
31 August-1 September – EU Sports Law and Policy Summer School, Business and Law Building, Edge Hill University, Ormskirk, the United Kingdom
26-27 October – ISLJ Annual Conference on International Sports Law, T.M.C. Asser Institute, The Hague, the Netherlands (Registration is now open here!)
26-30 November – Play the Game 2017: Riding Waves of Change, Eindhoven, the Netherlands

Editor's note: This report compiles the most relevant legal news, events and materials on International and European Sports Law based on the daily coverage provided on our twitter feed @Sportslaw_asser.

The Headlines

International Sports Law Journal (ISLJ) Conference 2019

The T.M.C. Asser Institute and the Asser International Sports Law Centre held the third International Sports Law Journal (ISLJ) Conference on October 24-25. The Conference created a forum for academics and practitioners to discuss, debate and share knowledge on the latest developments of sports law. It featured six uniquely themed panels, which included topics such as ‘Transfer systems in international sports’ and ‘Revisiting the (in)dependence and transparency of the CAS’ to ‘The future of sports: sports law of the future’. The ISLJ Conference was also honored to have two exceptional keynote speakers: Moya Dodd and Ulrich Haas. To kick off the conference, Moya Dodd shared her experiences from an athlete’s perspective in the various boardrooms of FIFA. The second day was then launched by Ulrich Haas, who gave an incredibly thorough and insightful lecture on the importance, function and legal basis of association tribunals in international sport. For a detailed overview of this year’s ISLJ Conference, click here for the official conference report.

The Asser International Sports Law Centre was delighted to have been able to host another great edition of the ISLJ Conference and is thankful to all the participants and speakers who made this edition such a success.

Moving towards greater transparency: Launch of FIFA’s Legal Portal

On October 31, FIFA announced that it was introducing a new legal portal on its website that will give greater access to numerous documents that previously were kept private. FIFA explains that this is in order to help increase its transparency, which was one of the key ‘Guiding Principles’ highlighted in FIFA 2.0: The Vision for the Future released in 2016. This development comes as many sport governing bodies face increasing criticism for the opacity of its judicial bodies’ decisions, which can have tremendous economic and societal impacts. The newly available documents will include: ‘decisions rendered on the merits by the FIFA Disciplinary Committee and the FIFA Appeal Committee (notified as of 1 January 2019); decisions rendered on the merits by the FIFA Ethics Committee (notified since 1 January 2019); decisions rendered on the merits by the FIFA Players’ Status Committee and the FIFA Dispute Resolution Chamber; non-confidential CAS awards in proceedings to which FIFA is a party (notified since 1 January 2019); list of CAS arbitrators proposed by FIFA for appointment by ICAS, and the number of times they have been nominated in CAS proceedings’. The list of decisions from all the aforementioned bodies are updated every four months, according to their respective webpages. However, time will ultimately tell how consistently decisions are published. Nevertheless, this move is a major milestone in FIFA’s journey towards increasing its transparency.

Hong Kong Protests, Human Rights and (e)Sports Law: The Blizzard and NBA controversies

Both Blizzard, a major video game developer, and the NBA received a flurry of criticism for their responses to persons expressing support for the Hong Kong protests over the past month. On October 8, Blizzard sanctioned Blitzchung, a professional Hearthstone player who expressed support of the Hong Kong protest during a post-match interview, by eliminating the prize money he had won and suspending him for one year from any Hearthstone tournament. Additionally, Blizzard will cease to work with the casters who conducted the interview. With mounting disapproval over the sanctions, J. Allen Brack, the president of Blizzard, restored the prize money and reduced the period of ineligibility to 6 months.

The NBA controversy started when Daryl Morey, the general manager of the Houston Rockets, tweeted his support for the protests in Hong Kong. The tweet garnered much attention, especially in China where it received a lot of backlash, including an announcement from CCTV, the official state broadcaster in China, that it was suspending all broadcasts of the NBA preseason games. In attempts to appease its Chinese audience, which is a highly profitable market for the NBA, Morey deleted the tweet and posted an apology, and the NBA responded by saying that the initial tweet was ‘regrettable’. Many scolded these actions and accused the NBA of censorship to which the NBA Commissioner, Adam Silver, responded that the NBA remains committed to freedom of expression.

Both cases highlighted how (e)sport organizations may be faced with competing interests to either guarantee greater protection of human rights or to pursue interests that perhaps have certain financial motivations.

Major International Sports Law Decisions