Asser International Sports Law Blog

Our International Sports Law Diary
The Asser International Sports Law Centre is part of the T.M.C. Asser Instituut

New training - University of Amsterdam Masterclass on Sports Law and Governance - October 2025-January 2026

Dear readers,

The University of Amsterdam is organising a Masterclass on 'Sports Law and Governance' between October 2025–January 2026.


The hybrid training is structured around 6 modules dealing with key legal issues related to athlete representation. With my colleague, Dr Daniela Heerdt, we are hosting one module at the T.M.C. Asser Instituut, which will be focused on the human rights of athletes.

You'll find more information about the training at https://www.uva.nl/en/programmes/professionals/sports-law-and-governance/sports-law-and-governance.html?origin=7k8gIZTOQA211FZ1DnDUow

Join us to discover what human rights can (and cannot) do for athletes!

Call for contributions - Sporting Succession in Selected Jurisdictions - Edited by Jacob Kornbeck and Laura Donnellan - Deadline 1 October 2025

  

Expressions of interest are invited from colleagues who would like to contribute to an edited book on Sporting Succession in Selected Jurisdictions. Interested colleagues are invited to send their abstracts jointly to laura.donnellan@ul.ie and klausjacob.kornbeck@gmail.com. If you are unsure about how your research would fit in, please feel free to reach out to us via email before writing your abstract. Abstracts received will be included into a book proposal to be submitted to a major English-speaking publisher. Colleagues will be notified by us once we have received the reaction of the publisher, at which point we shall decide about further steps to be taken in the process. 

 

The book will be edited by Jacob Kornbeck, BSc, MA, LLM, PhD, DrPhil, Programme Manager in the European Commission (but acting strictly in a private capacity) and external lecturer at the University of Lille, inter alia, and Laura Donnellan, LLB, LLM, PhD, Associate Professor in the School of Law, University of Limerick.

 

The following incorporates the most salient ideas from a presentation made by Jacob Kornbeck at the Sport&EU Conference in Angers (June 2023). 

 

The concept of sporting succession permits making claims against sporting entities which can be considered as sporting successors to previously existing sporting entities, even where the previous entities have been wound up and have been dissolved under normal bankruptcy and succession rules. No fault is required for sporting succession to be invoked and considered, and the concept may even apply in certain cases where the previous entity has not even been dissolved legally (CAS 2023/A/9809 Karpaty FC v. FIFA, Cristóbal Márquez Crespo & FC Karpaty Halych. 18 July 2024). While the implementation of the relevant FIFA rules by national FAs has been documented comprehensively in a recent edited book (Cambreleng Contreras, Samarath & Vandellós Alamilla (eds), Sporting Succession in Football. Salerno, SLPC, 2022), no known book or article addresses the overlap, interplay and potential conflict of norms between the lex sportiva of sporting succession and the public law or successions, etc. 

 

Provisions on sporting succession were first inserted into the FIFA Disciplinary Code 2019 with the effect that, whenever a sporting entity declares bankruptcy or is otherwise wound up, the notion of sporting succession applies to its unpaid financial liabilities and may be imputed to a so-called sporting successor, even if that successor is an entity legally distinct, according to the usual rules under public law, from the previous entity. Article 14 of the FIFA Disciplinary Code 2023 governs ‘failure to respect decisions,’ understood as failure to ‘pay another person (such as a player, a coach or a club) or FIFA a sum of money in full or part, even though instructed to do so by a body, a committee, a subsidiary or an instance of FIFA or a CAS decision (financial decision), or anyone who fails to comply with another final decision (non-financial decision) passed by a body, a committee, a subsidiary or an instance of FIFA, or by CAS.’ Article 21(4) extends the scope of the provision to the ‘sporting successor of a non-compliant party’ who ‘shall also be considered a non-compliant party and thus subject to the obligations under this provision. Criteria to assess whether an entity is to be considered as the sporting successor of another entity are, among others, its headquarters, name, legal form, team colours, players, shareholders or stakeholders or ownership and the category of competition concerned.’ Further provision is made in Article 21(7). In practice, this means that a club which carries on the legacy on a previous club, drawing on its cultural capital, fan base, etc., may be liable to paid unpaid debts of that previous club. These arrangements seem unusual prima facie.

 

Organs of FIFA have power to enforce these rules and to hear appeals against such decisions, while their decisions may be appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and/or to the Swiss judiciary (see Victor Piţurcă v Romanian Football Federation & U Craiova 1948 SA (CAS 2021/A/8331) (2023) as well as well as the rulings of the Federal Tribunal in the cases Youness Bengelloun (2022) and Júlio César da Silva et Souza (2022) based on Article 190 LDIP (Federal Act on Private International Law). 

 

While the concept of sporting succession offers a striking example of a provision for specificity enshrined in a sporting regulation and applied within the sports community, its pertinence under public law remains largely unaccounted for. With the (apparent) exception of one Swiss PhD thesis (Derungs, 2022), the issues which it raises seem so far to have failed to trigger the scholarship which they might deserve, especially in a comparative legal research perspective. The aim of the envisaged edited book is to explore the issue in a comparative perspective, not only across jurisdictions but also across different branches of the law. We hope in particular to receive abstracts on the following:


  • Examples from the most representative European (and possibly extra-European) countries of overlap, interplay and potential conflict of norms between the lex sportiva of sporting succession and the public law or successions, etc. Ideally, the book should include chapters from and about the biggest European countries which are most relevant to the football industry while, at the same time, it would seem crucial that the most important legal traditions (French and German civil law, common law, Nordic law) should be represented. 
  • Perspectives of players and other stakeholders.
  • Examples from other sports than football, if appropriate.
  • Examples of overlap, interplay and potential conflict of norms between the lex sportiva of sporting succession and other branches of lex sportiva, if applicable.
  • Examples of overlap, interplay and potential conflict of norms between the lex sportiva of sporting succession, on the one hand, and new developments in sports such as AI and esports, on the other.
  • If we have overlooked a meaningful nuance, please feel free to flag this in your submission and make corresponding proposals to us. 

Please send us your abstracts jointly to laura.donnellan@ul.ie and klausjacob.kornbeck@gmail.com no later than 1 October 2025. 

Reflecting on Athletes' Rights on the Road to the Olympic Games: The Unfortunate Story of Nayoka Clunis - By Saverio Paolo Spera and Jacques Blondin

Editor's note: Saverio Paolo Spera is an Italian qualified attorney-at-law. He holds an LL.M. in international business law from King’s College London. He is the co-founder of SP.IN Law, a Zurich based international sports law firm. Jacques Blondin is an Italian qualified attorney, who held different roles at FIFA, including Head of FIFA TMS and Head of FIFA Regulatory Enforcement. He is the co-founder of SP.IN Law. The Authors wish to disclaim that they have represented Ms. Nayoka Clunis before the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne in the context of the proceedings which led to the Award of 31 July 2024.

 

  

Every four years since more than a century,[1] a spectacular display of sportsmanship takes place over the course of a few weeks during the summer: the Olympic Games.[2]

         For thousands of athletes around the globe, the Olympic Games are “the pinnacle of success and the ultimate goal of athletic competition”.[3] In their quest to compete in the most important stage of their sport, they endure demanding and time-consuming efforts (often including considerable financial sacrifices). These endeavours occasionally lead to everlasting glory (the exploits of athletes of the calibre of Carl Lewis, or more recently, Usain Bolt[4] still resonate among sports’ observers), more often to a shorter gratification. Whether their gestures end up going down the sport’s history books or last the span of a few competitions, athletes are always the key actors of a magnificent event that continues to feed the imagination of generations of sports fans. 

And yet, situations may occur when athletes find themselves at the mercy of their respective federations in the selection process for the Olympic Games and, should the federations fail them (for whatever reason), face an insurmountable jurisdictional obstacle to have their voice heard by the only arbitral tribunal appointed to safeguard their rights in a swift and specialised manner: the Court of Arbitration for Sport (the “CAS”).[5]

This is the story of Nayoka Clunis, a Jamaican world class hammer throw athlete who had qualified for the Olympic Games of Paris 2024 and yet, due to no fault of her own, could not participate in the pinnacle of competitions in her sport. Though eligible in light of her world ranking, she was failed by her own federation[6] [AD1] [SPS2] and ultimately found herself in the unfortunate – but legally unescapable – vacuum whereby neither the CAS Ad Hoc Division in Paris nor the ‘regular’ CAS division in Lausanne had jurisdiction to entertain her claim.  

The aim of this paper is not to discuss whether Ms. Clunis would have had a chance to successfully prove her claims and compete in Paris had her case been heard on the merits, nor to debate about the appropriateness of a national federation’s selection process (also because Ms. Clunis never challenged it, having been eligible ‘from day one’).[7] Retracing the story of a sportswoman’s dramatic misfortune, this paper aims at providing an opportunity to reflect on how effective the safeguard of athletes’ rights in the context of the Olympic Games actually is. More...

Call for Papers - Long-term contracts in sport: The private foundations of sports law and governance - University of Inland Norway - Deadline 15 June

The University of Inland Norway and the Asser International Sports Law Centre invite the submission of abstracts for a workshop in Lillehammer on 4 and 5 December exploring the role of long-term contracts in sport and their characteristics through a variety of theoretical and methodological lenses.

Contracts play a crucial role in the world of sport, particularly long-term contracts. Contractual agreements form the foundation of transnational sports governance, SGBs are all formally the product of a specific time of contract (be it in the form of an association or corporation) often justifying the autonomy of sport and its private governance at a (more or less far) distance from the state.

Moreover, contracts establish long-term commitments between the parties involved, raising a variety of questions regarding the asymmetry in their positions, the scope of party autonomy, contractual mechanisms for addressing uncertainty, and their interaction with domestic and international mandatory regulations, among others. In short, it is impossible to fully understand the operation and limitations of transnational sports law and governance without investigating the many ways in which it is embedded in long-term contracts ruled by a variety of contract laws.

This workshop proposes to explore the role of long-term contracts in sport and their characteristics through a variety of theoretical and methodological lenses.

We welcome proposals touching on the following issues/case studies:

  • The concept of time in sport and the definition of ‘long-term’ in sport-related contracts;
  • The function of long-term contracts in transnational sports governance;
  • The function of long-term contracts in the operation of private dispute resolution mechanisms (CAS, BAT, FIFA DRC);
  • The transactional nature of long-term contracts in sport;
  • The relational nature of long-term contracts in sport;
  • The conflict between private autonomy and long-term contracts in sport;
  • The intersection between private and public in the operation of long-term contracts in sport;
  • Specific contractual arrangements, including:
    • Contracts of association and SGBs
    • Long-term (labour) contracts with athletes and coaches;
    • Contracts related to the organization of mega-sporting events, including host city contracts;
    • TV and media long-term contracts;
    • Sponsorship agreements;
    • and more.

Abstracts must be sent to Yuliya Chernykh (yuliya.chernykh@inn.no) by 15 June. 

New Training - Summer Programme on International sport and human rights - Online - 21-28 May

Since 2022, the T.M.C. Asser Instituut, in collaboration with the Centre for Sport and Human Rights, is organising the first yearly summer course on the intersection of sport and human rights. This 4th edition brings together scholars specialised in the intersection between sport and human rights with professionals working in international sport to ensure respect for human rights. We will explore contemporary human rights challenges in sports, such as the protections of human rights at mega-sporting events, access to remedy in human rights cases within the world of sport, the intersection between human rights and gender rights in international sporting competitions, and many more. 


The programme is designed to provide both deep background knowledge and actionnable insights, which will be relevant to a range of participants committed to defending human rights in international sport, including students, junior researchers, representatives of CSOs, sporting organisations, and athletes. It is structured around half days taking place online meant to accommodate as many participants as possible throughout the world. 


Check out the latest draft programme below and register HERE


Call for Papers - 20 Years of the World Anti-Doping Code in Action - ISLJ Conference 2025 - 6 & 7 November 2025


 


Call for papers

20 years of the World Anti-Doping Code in Action

International Sports Law Journal Conference 2025

Asser Institute, The Hague

6 and 7 November 2025

 

The Editors of the International Sports Law Journal (ISLJ), the Asser Institute and the Research Chair on Responsible Sport of the University of Sherbrooke invite you to submit abstracts for the ISLJ Conference on International Sports Law, which will take place on 6 and 7 November 2025 at the Asser Institute in The Hague. The ISLJ, published by Springer and T.M.C. Asser Press, is the leading academic publication in the field of international sports law and governance. The conference is a unique occasion to discuss the main legal issues affecting international sports with academics and practitioners from all around the world. 

 

The 2025 ISLJ Conference will focus on assessing the first 20 years (2004-2024) of operation of the World Anti-Doping Code (WADC) since its entry into force in 2004, while also discussing its future prospects, in light of the new version of the Code due to be adopted at the Busan Conference in December 2025 and the 10th Conference of the Parties to the International Convention against Doping in Sport, to be held in Paris from 20 to 22 October. The aim of the conference will be to take a comprehensive stock of the operation of the private-public transnational regulatory regime which emerged in the wake of the WADC.  This regime is structured around a complex network of national and global institutions engaged in anti-doping work (WADA, NADAs, IFs, accredited laboratories) and guided by an equally complex assemblage of norms located at the global (WADC and the WADA Standards), international (UNESCO Convention against Doping in Sport), regional (Council of Europe Anti-Doping Convention), and national (various national anti-doping legislations) level. This makes for a fascinating and convoluted transnational legal construct in need of being studied, analysed and criticised by scholars. 

 

Reviewing 20 years of implementation of the WADC warrants a special edition of the ISLJ Conference and of the journal, which invites scholars of all disciplines to reflect on the many questions and issues linked with it. We welcome proposals touching on the following subjects (and more): 

  • The governance of the world anti-doping regime
    • The public-private nature of this governance
    • The transparency of this governance
    • The legitimacy of this governance
    • The participatory nature of this governance
    • The role of scientific experts in this governance
  •  The normative content of the WADC and the international standards
    • The strict liability principle 
    • The privacy rights of athletes under the WADC
    • The sanctioning policy under the WADC
    • The role of the international standards in implementing the WADC
    • The compatibility of the WADC with human rights
  • The glocal implementation of the WADC
    • The role of local institutions (NADOs/Labs/NOCs) in the implementation of the WADC
    • The tension between global (WADA) and local (NADOs/Labs/NOCs) in the implementation of the WADC
    • The role of the IFs in the implementation of the WADC
    • The role of the ITA in the implementation of the WADC
    • The role of judicial bodies (national courts, disciplinary committees of IFs, CAS) and their jurisprudence in the implementation of the WADC 
  • The effectiveness of the world anti-doping regime
    • The evaluation and evolution of the effectiveness of the world anti-doping regime in preventing doping
    • The role of the media in unveiling the ineffectiveness of the world anti-doping regime
    • The role of states in hindering the effectiveness of the world anti-doping regime
    • The world anti-doping regime as a regime with a variable geometry of effectiveness
  •  The future of the world anti-doping regime: Revolution, reform or more of the same?
    • Do we need a world anti-doping regime? 
    • If we do, should it be reformed? How? 


Abstracts of 300 words and CVs should be sent no later than 1 June 2025 to a.duval@asser.nl. Selected speakers will be informed by 30 June 2025. The selected participants will be expected to submit a draft paper by 15 October 2025. Papers accepted and presented at the conference are eligible for publication in a special issue of the ISLJ subject to peer-review. The Asser Institute will provide a limited amount of travel and accommodation grants (max. 350€) to early career researchers (doctoral and post-doctoral) in need of financial support. If you wish to be considered for a grant, please indicate it in your submission.  


Zoom-In Webinar - The Aftermath of the Diarra Judgement: Towards a New FIFA Transfer System? - 20 November - 16:00-18:00 CET

On 4 October, the Court of Justice of the European Union shook the world of football with its Diarra ruling. The decision questions the compatibility of a key provision of the FIFA Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players (RSTP) with European Union internal market law. The RSTP, and in particular its article 17, are the bedrock of football’s transfer ‘market’ and regulate the conditions for the transnational movement of players between clubs. In 2023, based on FIFA’s numbers, 21 801 players were transferred internationally (of which 3279 with a fee) for transfer fees amounting to USD 9.63 bn. In short, this is a market that affects a considerable number of players and is linked with the movement of large sums of money between clubs and other actors (such as intermediaries).

Register HERE

Join us on 20 November from 16:00 to 18:00 CET to take stock of the ruling's impact and discuss the steps ahead in a free Zoom-In webinar in which there will be time for a Q&A session with the speakers. The ruling has already been much commented on (see hereherehere, and here), and this zoom-in webinar will be an opportunity for participants to engage with two experts on the economic and legal intricacies of the regulation of labour relations in football. We will mostly focus on the aftermath of the judgment and the question, 'what comes next?'

Moderator: Marjolaine Viret (Université de Lausanne)

Speakers: 


Register HERE

Free Webinar - The impact of the Diarra case on the football transfer system - 18 October 2024 - 15:00 CET

The Court of Justice of the European Union has recently handed down its judgement in the Lassana Diarra case (C-650/22 FIFA v. BZ).

Given the importance of this case to the sports industry, LawInSport, the Asser Instituut and the Association for the Study of Sport and the EU (Sport & EU) are hosting a joint webinar to bring together experts to unpack and provide clarity on the complex legal, regulatory & commercial issues stemming from this case. This free webinar will be hosted from 14:00 UK time (15:00 CET) on 18 October 2024.


Register HERE 


Speakers

Our expert speakers come from academia, law and sport. Our confirmed speakers are:


Register HERE 

Conference - ISLJ Annual Conference 2024 - 24-25 October - Asser Institute - The Hague

On 24 and 25 October 2024, the Asser Institute in The Hague will host the 2024 edition of the  International Sports Law Journal (ISLJ)  Conference. The ISLJ is the leading academic journal in transnational sports law and governance and is proud to provide a platform for transnational debates on the state of the field. The conference will address a number of issues of interest to the ISLJ and its readers. 

Register HERE

Drivers and effects of reform in transnational sports governance 

Transnational sports governance seems to be in a permanently unstable state of crisis and reform. At regular interval, international sports governing bodies face scandals triggered by corruption investigations or human rights violations, as well as adverse judidicial decisions. These are often followed by waves of institutional reforms, such as the creation of new bodies (E.g. the Athletics Integrity Unit), the adoption of new codes and regulation (such as Codes of Ethics) or human rights commitments (e.g. FIFA and the IOC’s Human Rights Policy/Strategy). This dynamic of crisis and reform will be at the heart of this year’s ISLJ conference, as a number of panels will critically investigate the triggers, transformative effects and limited impacts of reforms in transnational sports governance.  

Football in the midst of international law and relations 
As the war in Gaza and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continue to rage, it has become even clearer that the football world can hardly be entirely abstracted from international relations. Yet, FIFA and UEFA continue to insist on their neutrality and to deny that their governance is (or should be) affected by the world’s political affairs. During the conference, we will engage with case studies in which football is entangled with international politics and law. In particular, the speakers will delve into the role of FIFA and UEFA in such situations and on the legal standards and processes that should be applied throughout their decision-making.  

Olympic challenges of today and tomorrow 
While the Paris 2024 Olympics have come to a close, the legal questions they have raised are far from exhausted. Instead, the Olympics have highlighted new issues (such as the question of the legality of the hijab ban imposed by the French Federation on its athletes) or old ones (such as the question whether Olympians should be remunerated by the IOC or the international federations), which will be discussed by our speakers. Finally, with the help of our keynote speaker, Prof. Jules Boykoff, a longstanding critique of the current Olympic regime, we will explore the IOC’s capacity to adapt to challenges while resisting radical change to the current model of olympism.   

Download the full programme 

Online participation available 
Following the success of our webinar option in the past years, we are once again allowing online participation to the conference at an affordable price. Thus, we hope to internationalise and diversify our audience and to reach people who are not in a position to travel to The Hague.  

We look forward to welcoming you in person in The Hague or digitally to this new iteration of the ISLJ conference. 

Register HERE

Speakers 


Register HERE


Asser International Sports Law Blog | Why the European Commission will not star in the Spanish TV rights Telenovela. By Ben Van Rompuy and Oskar van Maren

Asser International Sports Law Blog

Our International Sports Law Diary
The Asser International Sports Law Centre is part of the T.M.C. Asser Instituut

Why the European Commission will not star in the Spanish TV rights Telenovela. By Ben Van Rompuy and Oskar van Maren

The selling of media rights is currently a hot topic in European football. Last week, the English Premier League cashed in around 7 billion Euros for the sale of its live domestic media rights (2016 to 2019) – once again a 70 percent increase in comparison to the previous tender. This means that even the bottom club in the Premier League will receive approximately €130 million while the champions can expect well over €200 million per season.

The Premier League’s new deal has already led the President of the Spanish National Professional Football League (LNFP), Javier Tebas, to express his concerns that this could see La Liga lose its position as one of Europe’s leading leagues. He reiterated that establishing a centralised sales model in Spain is of utmost importance, if not long overdue.

Concrete plans to reintroduce a system of joint selling for the media rights of the Primera División, Segunda División A, and la Copa del Rey by means of a Royal Decree were already announced two years ago. The road has surely been long and bumpy. The draft Decree is finally on the table, but now it misses political approval. All the parties involved are blaming each other for the current failure: the LNFP blames the Sport Governmental Council for Sport (CSD) for not taking the lead; the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) is arguing that the Federation and non-professional football entities should receive more money and that it should have a stronger say in the matter in accordance with the FIFA Statutes;  and there are widespread rumours that the two big earners, Real Madrid and FC Barcelona, are actively lobbying to prevent the Royal Decree of actually being adopted.

To keep the soap opera drama flowing,  on 30 December 2014, FASFE (an organisation consisting of groups of fans, club members, and minority shareholders of several Spanish professional football clubs) and the International Soccer Centre (a movement that aims to obtain more balanced and transparent football and basketball competitions in Spain) filed an antitrust complaint with the European Commission against the LNFP. They argue that the current system of individual selling of LNFP media rights, with unequal shares of revenue widening the gap between clubs, violates EU competition law.


Source:http://www.gopixpic.com/600/buscar%C3%A1n-el-amor-verdadero-nueva-novela-de-televisa/http:%7C%7Cassets*zocalo*com*mx%7Cuploads%7Carticles%7C5%7C134666912427*jpg/


The complaint will surely be frowned upon in Brussels. First, Spain is on the verge of introducing a joint selling arrangement. So what is the point of using competition law as an instrument to obtain … a joint selling arrangement? Second, the argument that a horizontal agreement, preventing LNFP clubs from individually competing in the sale of their media rights, is needed to ensure fair and effective competition seems, to put it mildly, counterintuitive. Third, who files an antitrust complaint on 30 December?

The complainants essentially target the polarization of revenues between the two top clubs (Real Madrid and FC Barcelona) and the other clubs. This is a well-known and long-standing feature of the LNFP, which is only in part attributable to disparities in the clubs’ media rights income. The complainants point out, however, that media coverage is also an important driver of other main revenue streams (e.g. value of sponsorship deals, ticket sales, and merchandising). 

Since the end of the 1990s, clubs have been selling the LNFP media rights individually. In a system of individual selling, a club’s bargaining power is evidently determined by the market potential of the matches of a specific club and not by the collective attractiveness of the competition as a whole. This has resulted in a pronounced imbalance between the two top clubs Real Madrid and FC Barcelona, who are able to extract supra-normal profits, and the other clubs.

For the 2010-2011 season, for example, the two Spanish giants both received around €125 million for their live media rights, leaving their domestic peers fighting over the scraps (i.e. the next biggest clubs earned around €40 million and the majority of the clubs sold their rights for about €15 million). In other words, Real Madrid and FC Barcelona generate ten times more revenue from their media rights as compared to the smaller clubs.

While it is easy to see why this situation may be considered unfair from the perspective of the majority of the clubs, it is less evident to find a competition law problem. 


A competition law perspective 

As stated above, the complaint is launched against the LNFP who, according to FASFE, by means of authorising the individual selling of TV rights system, is violating EU competition law.

First, the complainants argue that the system of individual selling strengthens the dominant positions of Real Madrid and FC Barcelona and, subsequently, undermines the competitive position of the other clubs. So far so good. But then they jump to the conclusion that Article 102 TFEU is being violated, not by the LNFP, but by Real Madrid and FC Barcelona. 

There they lost us – and presumably anyone remotely familiar with EU competition law. But let’s be a good sport and contemplate this line of reasoning a bit further.  

It might be argued that Real Madrid and FC Barcelona hold a (collective) dominant position on certain product markets in Spain and, by extension, in a substantial part of the internal market – even though the complaint fails to properly define those relevant markets. On the upstream market for the acquisition of media rights of La Liga, both clubs behave to a certain extent independently of their competitors. Spanish broadcasters first seek to acquire the media rights to their matches, which undercuts the bargaining position of the other clubs in the subsequent negotiations for the purchase of their rights. A more fundamental flaw is that the complainants contend that the possession or even strengthening of a dominant position by way of competition falls within the prohibition of Article 102 TFEU. The complaint does not put forward a single argument substantiating how both clubs engage in abusive conduct. 

Second, the complainants argue that the LNFP, according to Article 49 of its statutes, must look after the common interests of the competitions that it organises and of its members. In their view, the 1996 decision of the LFNP General Assembly to re-introduce a system of joint selling, which has negatively affected the majority of clubs and a large majority of fans, does not comply with this objective. 

While it can be argued that the LNFP’s decision constitutes a decision of an association of undertakings within the meaning of Article 101(1) TFEU, it is difficult to see how it has an anti-competitive object or effect. Quite on the contrary, the decision lifted the competitive constraints on the clubs’ independent decision-making that were in place up until the season 1997-1998. 

It should be noted that a system of joint selling of media rights does not necessarily bring about an equitable distribution of the revenues among the clubs. Albeit connected, the distribution mechanism is a separate measure, which is typically for the most part performance-based. Moreover, financial solidarity can also be implemented through other mechanisms, such as a taxation system or the redistribution of voluntary contributions. That said, it must be acknowledged that a system of joint selling does facilitate the sharing of revenues among clubs. The ability of sports organisers to impose alternative financial solidarity mechanisms might be constrained by the pressure of the larger clubs (which evidently wish to see a larger share of the revenues flow back to them because they are primarily responsible for generating these revenues). The clubs’ media rights income ratio in the other top European football leagues, where media rights are sold collectively, illustrates this point. In the season 2011-2012 the earnings ratio of the top to the bottom club was as follows: Premier League (1,55 to 1); Serie A (4,35 to 1); Bundesliga (2,3 to 1); and Ligue 1 (3,2 to 1).[1] 

Considering that joint selling only creates incentives for horizontal solidarity, the financial solidarity justification in itself could not outweigh the anti-competitive effects of a joint selling arrangement. The restrictions of competition are considerable. First, joint selling agreements prevent clubs from individually competing in the sale of their media rights. Access to the market can therefore be foreclosed to competing buyers. Second, joint selling leads to uniform prices and other trading conditions. Price-fixing is a hard-core restriction that is normally prohibited. Third, joint selling could lead to output restrictions when certain rights are withheld from the market. 

As the discussion of the competition law decisional practice below will demonstrate, it is even unclear whether the financial solidarity argument can be invoked as a partial legal defence against the prohibition of restrictive agreements. 


The financial solidarity conundrum

One of the key assumptions underlying the complaint is that the EU institutions advocate the joint selling of media rights. This is presumably one of the main reasons why they are turning to Brussels for help. While it is true that the European Council (e.g. in the 2001 Nice Declaration) and the European Parliament have always been supportive of the link between joint selling and the principle of financial solidarity, the same cannot be said about the European Commission. In policy documents, the Commission has refrained from making (strong) pronouncements on the solidarity benefits of joint selling vis-à-vis individual selling. In the Helsinki Report on Sport (1999) the Commission underscored the need to examine the precise link between the joint selling of media rights and financial solidarity between professional and amateur sport. In its White Paper on Sport (2007) the Commission acknowledged that joint selling “can be a tool for achieving greater solidarity within sports”, but immediately added that also a system of individual selling by clubs can be linked to a robust solidarity mechanism. Only in the Communication on Developing the European Dimension of Sport (2011) the Commission expressed some general support for a system of joint selling. Surely some of the Commission’s press releases coinciding its decisions in this area mention benefits for financial solidarity (see e.g. here). If the complainants had looked at the actual decisions, however, they would have realised that that rhetoric is inconsistent with the legal argumentation.

After the need to address competition issues in relation to joint selling arrangements for football media rights emerged in the 1990s, several National Competition Authorities (NCAs) found that the system was incompatible with the national competition rules. The NCAs were sceptical about the necessary link between joint selling and revenue distribution and, subsequently, did not consider it to be a pro-competitive benefit capable of offsetting the identified restrictive effects. Even though the NCAs spoke out uniformly against the joint selling of football media rights, in three Member States their decisions were either overruled by a national court (United Kingdom) or circumvented through legislative action (Germany) or executive orders (the Netherlands).[2] This created uncertainties regarding the circumstances under which joint selling could be considered compatible with EU and national competition law. 

In the UEFA Champions League decision (2003) the European Commission for the first time assessed the compatibility of the joint selling of football media rights with Article 101 TFEU. In two subsequent decisions, German Bundesliga (2005) and FA Premier League (2006), the Commission raised similar competition concerns and imposed similar remedies to address these concerns. 

In all three decisions, the Commission found that joint selling arrangements are caught by the prohibition of Article 101(1) TFEU, but may create substantial efficiency gains so that Article 101(3) TFEU could be invoked as a legal defence. It identified three main benefits: (1) the creation of a single point of sale (which creates efficiencies by reducing the transaction costs for sports organisers and media content operators); (2) branding of the output by one entity (which creates efficiencies as it helps the media products receive wider recognition and distribution); and (3) the creation of a league product focused on the competition as a whole rather than individual clubs. 

To ensure that the efficiency benefits outweigh the toxic cocktail of anti-competitive effects (i.e. price-fixing and considerable risks of market foreclosure and output restrictions), the Commission carefully prescribed the way in which the rights must be marketed by imposing a list of behavioural remedies. 

Competition concern

Remedy

UEFA

DFB

FAPL

Risk of foreclosure effects in downstream markets

Non-discriminatory and transparent tendering procedure

X

X

X

Independent monitoring trustee overseeing tender process

 

 

X

No conditional bidding

 

 

X

Risk of market foreclosure effects in downstream markets as a result of exclusivity and bundling of media rights.

Limitation of scope of exclusive contracts:

-       a reasonable amount of different rights packages

-       no combination of large and small packages

-       earmarked packages for special markets/platforms (new media rights)

 

X

 

X

 

X

 

X

 

X

X

X

Limitation of duration of exclusive contracts: max. three football seasons

X

X

X

Risk of output restrictions

Fall-back option to clubs for unsold or unused rights

X

X

X

Parallel exploitation of less valuable rights by clubs

X

 

 

Risk of monopolisation

“No single buyer” obligation

 

 

X

In all three of the Commission’s investigations, the parties put forward the financial solidarity argument as the main justification for an exemption of their joint selling arrangements under Article 101(3) TFEU.[3] Yet the Commission never substantially addressed that argument. Only in the UEFA Champions League decision, the point was briefly considered. The Commission simply noted that UEFA had failed to substantiate the indispensability of a joint selling agreement for the redistribution of revenue and, subsequently, for the organisation of the Champions League.[4] Since it could exempt the joint selling agreement on economic efficiency grounds, however, the Commission concluded that “it is not necessary for the purpose of this procedure to consider the solidarity argument any further”.[5] As such, the Commission conveniently got round the issue.

The national decisional practice subsequent to the Commission’s precedents equally refrained from addressing the issue. The NCAs started focusing their assessments exclusively on efficiency benefits, as instructed by the Commission.  

In short, in competition law proceedings related to joint selling arrangements, the financial solidarity defence has never been very compelling – it was either considered unsound (early national enforcement practice) or remained unaddressed. Of course, one may still argue that the elephant in the room was surreptitiously taken into account (bearing in mind that the acceptance of a similar price-fixing cartel in other sectors would be difficult to imagine).[6] 


Redistribution formulas for media rights income  

After the European Commission de facto legitimized the joint selling of football media rights, the system became the common practice for marketing such rights in Europe. Since Italy reintroduced the system of joint selling in 2010, Cyprus, Portugal, and Spain are now the last EU markets in which first division football clubs sell their rights individually. 

To put the distribution key foreseen in the pending Spanish Royal Decree into perspective, we will first summarize how the other four big European leagues redistribute the media rights income. 

England: Since 1992, the year in which the Premier League was formed, it was decided that 50% of the revenue is split equally between the 20 clubs, 25% is paid in Merit Payments (depending on where a club finishes in the final League table), and the final 25% is paid in Facility Fees (based on each time a club’s matches are broadcast in the UK). All international broadcast revenue, and central commercial revenue, is split equally amongst the 20 clubs. For the season 2013/2014, the ratio between the top (Liverpool at €132 million Euros) and the bottom earning club (Cardiff City at €84 million) was 1.57:1.

Germany: Within the German Bundesliga clubs, the criteria for the distribution of revenues will be determined by a 2:1 ratio between the top-ranked and the bottom-ranked teams in an ad hoc distribution ranking for the years 2013 – 2017. This means that the revenue sharing distribution will range from a maximum of 5.8% of the total amount for the first place team to at least 2.9% for the 18th place team. The Bundesliga’s international media rights income distribution, however, remains based on both international and domestic sport performance.

Italy: Italy’s Serie A joint selling system had an earnings ratio of the top to bottom club of 5.25:1 for the season 2013/2014. Juventus, the top earning club, had an income from TV rights of €94 million, whereas the bottom earning club, Sassuolo, of €17.9 million.[7] Out of the total amount distributed, 40% is distributed to all the clubs as a fixed amount. Furthermore, 30% is distributed on the basis of past results (15% on results during last five seasons, 10% on historical results[8], and 5% on last season’s final league position); and 25% according to club supporters base.  

The planned Royal Decree in Spain will have a distribution system that guarantees Real Madrid and FC Barcelona an amount that is very close to what they earn now. The income ratio of the clubs will start at 4:1 and diminishes as the total amount of income increases. From the total income, about 3% will be deducted for the Spanish FA and for non-professional sports. Additionally, 10% will be assigned to the Second Division. The remaining amount will be distributed as follows: 50% as fixed amount for all the clubs, 25% depending on sports results while taking into account historical results. The other 25% will be distributed in relation to public awareness similar the Italian system (calculated on the basis of TV audiences, city population, and number of fans of the club).  


Conclusion

It is safe to say that the competition complaint launched by FASFE will not lead to the European Commission opening a formal investigation. The complainants fail to demonstrate how the current Spanish individual selling system breaches, or even potentially breaches, Article 101 and/or 102 TFEU. In that regard, it should be noted that they already tried their luck with the national competition authority (CNC), alleging infringements of national competition law. On 8 January 2013, the CNC decided to reject the complaint because it only prescribed the results of the current media rights sales process without demonstrating violations of the national competition rules. 

Whether FASFE is aware of the same judicial inaccuracies in its Commission complaint is unknown. On the other hand, it is quite evident that invoking competition law to argue for the introduction of a cartel with significant anti-competitive effects is paradoxical. The ex post fairness (i.e. the outcome of market competition) that FASFE is looking for is quite different from the ex ante fairness in the market place that competition policy is concerned with. One can therefore interpret the complaint as an attempt to add pressure on the involved Spanish parties (the CSD, the LNFP, and the RFEF) to introduce the new Royal Decree once and for all. Although the Spanish public is provided daily episodes full of jabbering, backstabbing and other drama, as with all Telenovelas, the soap is dragging on and on and should have ended ages ago. 

Whether the switch to a joint selling arrangement will significantly improve the competitive balance in La Liga remains to be seen. Since FC Barcelona and Real Madrid are guaranteed an amount similar to what they receive now, this will ultimately depend on how much the total income from the sale of the media rights will increase. The inexorable rise in the value of the broadcasting deals in the UK, which is the unique result of a duopoly of two powerful deep-pocket players (i.e. the incumbent dominant pay-TV operator Sky and new market entrant BT) that emerged after the introduction of the “no single buyer” obligation, cannot be realistically expected – at least not in the short term. Yet it is relatively certain that the overall income from media rights will go up – ultimately to the benefit of all the clubs. A (minimum) earnings ratio of the top to bottom club of 4:1 is not overly ambitious, but surely is a welcome step towards remedying the current imbalance between the two top clubs and their less fortunate competitors.


[1] See T.M.C. Asser Institute and Institute for Information Law, “Study on Sports Organisers' Rights in the EU”, Commissioned by the European Commission, DG Education and Culture, February 2014.

[2] Idem.

[3] See e.g. Commission, “Case No IV/37.214 - DFB - Central marketing of TV and radio broadcasting rights for certain football competitions in Germany” (Notice) (1999) OJ C/610, para. 7; Commission, “Notice published pursuant to Article 19(3) of Council Regulation No 17 concerning case COMP/C.2/38.173 and 38.453 - joint selling of the media rights of the FA Premier League on an exclusive basis” (2004) OJ C 115/3, para. 10.

[4] UEFA Champions League (Case COMP/37.398) Commission decision 2003/778/EC (2003) OJ L291/25, para. 131.

[5] Idem, para. 167.

[6] See e.g. Giorgio Monti, “Article 81 EC and Public Policy” (2002) 39 CMLR 1057 (calling it a “sector-specific exemption”).

[7] FASFE Antitrust Complaint of 30 December 2014, page 11

[8] In other words, this revenue is determined by overall league placings since 1946. In this category, Juventus, AC Milan and Inter Milan are the top earning clubs. For more info see: http://www.financialfairplay.co.uk/latest-news/tv-revenue-distribution-%E2%80%93-comparing-italian-and-english-models.

Comments (2) -

  • José Antonio Rodríguez Miguez

    2/17/2015 1:09:50 PM |

    Congratulations for this very interesting and solid post. A Spanish sayung days that “Barça is more than a club”; we can say that football is more than a sport, it’s basically a bussness, and a level playing field must be guaranted. It’s the best and only way to go forward as a sport and as bussness.  

  • Count of Egmont

    2/19/2015 2:13:50 PM |

    FASFE's complaint is indeed quite weak and amateurish (more posturing than anything else as they fail to raise some well known issues that could have significantly strengthened their case) but you forgot to mention that, irrespective of the merits of the complaint, their chances of succeeding against Real Madrid in a competition case would be near zero at the moment since the current EC Deputy Director-General for Antitrust, Mr. Cecilio Madero-Villarejo is a die-hard Real Madrid fan and club member who regularly attends football games at the VIP area of the Bernabeu Stadium. It is therefore highly unlikely that he will be very keen to open an investigation into this issue as it would go against his own personal interests. Could this be the reason why a series of unfortunate events has surrounded all Real Madrid related investigations?

    The British newspaper, The Independent, reported about this situation two years ago:

    "After Real Madrid’s victory in the 2000 Champions League final, a supporter of the club who identified himself then as a 43-year-old European Union official living in Brussels wrote to the newspaper El Pais to convey his joy at the club’s eighth European title.

    In the letter published in the newspaper on 14 June 2000, he described how after the match, in a state of some emotion, he placed a Real “Campeones” flag on the balcony of his Brussels flat. To some eyes, it looked uncomfortably like a reference to the Spanish phrase “poner una pica en flandes” – literally “putting a pike in Flanders” – which refers to the Spanish occupation of the territory in the 16th and 17th centuries.

    Not in the best taste, but given the individual’s euphoria and the memories he said it brought back of his childhood, perhaps it was understandable. The letter was written by Cecilio Madero Villarejo, who still lives in Brussels but has a better job than he did 13 years ago.

    These days, Madero is one of the four men who make up the directorate-general at the European Commission under the leadership of commissioner and fellow Spaniard Joaquin Almunia, whose job it is to enforce the rules on big business, from anti-trust, to mergers and, of course, state aid."

    Real Madrid is safe for as long as he is in DG-Comp, in any case safer than the reputation of the EC's competition policy that will surely face some scrutiny in the light of the UK's EU referendum .

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