Editor’s note: Thomas Terraz is a third year LL.B. candidate at the International and European Law programme at The Hague University of Applied Sciences with a specialisation in European Law. Currently he is pursuing an internship at the T.M.C. Asser Institute with a focus on International and European Sports Law.

1.     Introduction

The surge of e-sports has stimulated a lively discussion on the essential characteristics of sport and whether e-sports, in general, can be considered a sport. However, one should not overlook the fact that e-sports encompass a broad range of video games that fundamentally differ from one another. Thus, as one commentator recently underlined, “the position of video games and the e-sport competitions based on them should be analysed on a case-by-case basis.”[1] In this spirit, this blog aims to provide a concise analysis of one of these e-sports, League of Legends (LoL), and one of its main competitions, the League of Legends European Championship (LEC), to assess whether it could be considered a sport in the sense of EU law. The LEC offers a fascinating opportunity to examine this issue especially since the previous European League of Legends Championship Series (EU LCS) was rebranded and restructured this year into the LEC.

2.     What is League of Legends and the LEC?

At the time of writing, LoL released nearly a decade ago by Riot Games (a game developer based in the USA) and rapidly became one of the most played video games in the world due in part to its free to play business model. This means that anyone can download and play LoL on their computer without ever having to pay anything. In-game microtransactions exist but do not provide any competitive advantage. The game itself involves two teams of five players who each control a ‘champion’, which are characters in the game that each possess unique abilities. A team only wins when it has destroyed the enemy base (‘nexus’). The game is not only a popular video game, but it is a popular e-sport. The most recent world championships finals attracted 99.6 million unique viewers. While these numbers are greatly due to its popularity in China and South Korea, there is also a sizeable European viewership of LoL. For example, the LEC regular season matches have reached a record-breaking 355,000 concurrent viewers in its 2019 spring competition.

The LEC is LoL’s highest level of European competition and is owned and organised by Riot Games who establishes and enforces the rules which apply to the teams participating in the LEC. Consequently, Riot Games is truly at the apex of professional LoL in Europe by setting both the in-game parameters (the rules of the game) and the regulations that govern its competitive play. As explained earlier, Riot Games restructured and rebranded its previous European competition, EU LCS, into the LEC. While previously the EU LCS was characterised by a pyramid structure with a promotion and relegation system familiar to the European sports world, the LEC introduced a franchise model to follow its sibling competition in North America, the League Championship Series (LCS). The LEC itself is a limited liability company registered in the Republic of Ireland as League of Legends European Championship Limited.[2] The LEC buy-in fee for teams already in the EU LCS was reportedly set at 8 million euros and 10.5 million euros for those outside the EU LCS. Additionally, big brands such as KIA, Shell, Foot Locker and Red Bull sponsor the LEC and are featured during the broadcast. Besides being produced and diffused weekly by the official Riot Games English broadcast team in a professional studio in Berlin on Twitch (an online video game livestreaming service) and YouTube, the LEC partners with other official broadcasters who provide coverage of the matches in other languages (French, Spanish, Polish, German, Italian). Nevertheless, before examining the LEC’s position under EU law, a review of the broader arguments on the fundamental traits of sport will contextualise the Court of Justice of the European Union’s (CJEU) interpretation of the concept of sport.

3.     Is LoL played in the LEC a sport competition?

The academic discourse on the definition of sport has provided a plethora of elements and conditions for an aspiring sport to meet in order to be considered a ‘real’ sport. Needless to say, this blog will not be able to address all of them. However, the characteristics identified by Suits and elaborated by Jenny et al. and Abanazir are a good starting point for this brief review.[3] Suits explains that sports are in essence games that require skill, where the skill requires physicality, that the game have a wide following, and that this following have a certain level of stability. Abanazir delved into the concept of stability in the e-sports context by explaining institutionalisation’s central role in achieving permanence.

On the first requirement, there is very little room to argue that professional LoL does not require a great amount of skill. Suits explains that games of skill provide ‘unnecessary obstacles’ (in relation to daily life) “to realize capacities not otherwise realizable” that do not rely on pure chance.[4] Playing LoL is not in any way a necessary part of human life, yet many players practicing LoL play to refine and improve their mechanical skill (the physical element of the game, e.g. muscle memory and reflexes). Chance sometimes plays a role in LoL, but it is rarely a decisive factor in determining the outcome of a competitive match. Generally, Riot Games has taken steps over the years to limit the elements of pure luck in its game.

The role of physical motor skills in e-sports has been explained in detail by van Hilvoorde and Pot, and this blog will not dive into the arguments on whether actions taken in a video game can be considered taking place in the ‘real’ world.[5] Assuming that it does, the skill required in LoL is intrinsically connected to its physicality. LoL is played on a computer with a mouse and a keyboard. High level play requires precise movement of the arm, wrist and/or hand to most effectively control one’s character with the mouse. Additionally, the clicks and inputs registered by one’s fingers on the mouse and keyboard must be timed precisely and with enough practice these movements become muscle memory. The classic example of a game that does not require this sort of physicality is chess because the manner in which one moves a chess piece from a to b does not affect the result of the game. On the other hand, LoL demands precise and timed movements of the player’s arms, wrists, and/or fingers to be played optimally. One can be a LoL strategic genius but without a sufficient level of mechanical skill, it is impossible to become a professional LoL player.

Next, a large following is probably the easiest criteria for LoL and the LEC to fulfil. Between the large viewership that watch the LoL events online and the thousands of spectators that come to watch the championships live, there is very little doubt that LoL and the LEC have a wide following at the moment. However, this point leads into the next element which arguably may be the hardest criteria for it to satisfy in the long term: stability.

Video games and consequently, e-sports, generally reach a point where they have achieved their max popularity and eventually begin to lose players and viewers. Often times, this is the result of newly released video games pushing older and ‘outdated’ games out of the spotlight. LoL has remained at the forefront of e-sports for nearly a decade and there is little suggestion that this will change in the near future. Part of this is Riot Games’ continued support of LoL by regularly updating the game. Updates are released nearly every other week and can range from graphical improvements, balancing the game to ensure the viability of new strategies, the introduction of new champions (currently 143 champions) and tweaks that improve the way the game runs on the computer. Abanazir describes that changes such as these “present a double-edged sword” because while they keep the game fresh for players, they can result in drastic changes to the best strategies (meta) to win the game.[6] Thus, professional teams and players must continually adapt their play to conform to the meta. Nevertheless, updates have never fundamentally changed the goal and overall ‘rules’ of the game. Professional LoL is always two teams of five players, each controlling one champion, aiming to destroy the enemy nexus.

From an outsider’s point of view, it may seem that the constant flux of the meta would truly damage any of LoL’s claim to stability. However, in this context, it is imperative to highlight the institutionalisation of the LEC. Institutionalisation describes the appearance of “standardisation of rules, the formalisation of learning of the games, the development of expertise and finally the emergence of coaches, trainers, officials and governing bodies.”[7] The very fact that the meta often changes have pushed professional teams to hire analysts that review the team’s play and are constantly searching for new and creative ways to play LoL. Additionally, all professional teams have at least one coach who not only define the team’s strategy before each game, but also ensure that players observe strict practice schedules. During LEC matches, referees (Riot Games employees) are always present in order to ensure that the LEC rules are observed, which greatly lends to the idea of a ‘standardisation’ of the rules.[8] In fact, Riot Games directly state that the creation of the LEC Rulebook is to help “unify and standardize the rules used in competitive play.”[9] From this outline, there are many indications that the LEC and LoL have many of the characteristics of a sport and currently have achieved a certain amount of stability and institutionalisation. The true test will be whether these structures continue to last as they have been developed and implemented over the past eight years.

4.     A Sport under EU Law?

Recently, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ruled on whether the English Bridge Union could benefit from a sports exemption under the VAT Directive and in doing so examined the concept of sport under that Directive.[10] Furthermore, in this case, Advocate General (AG) Szpunar provided an enlightening opinion to the Court examining the concept of sport in the context of the VAT exemption.[11] Both provide a good opportunity to infer how the Court would perhaps go about determining whether the LEC is a sport competition under EU law. This being said, the sport exception in the current VAT Directive would not apply to the LEC since Article 132 (1) (m) applies only to services provided by non-profit organisations. Nonetheless, should League of Legends European Championship Limited eventually restructure into a non-profit, it would not be far-fetched to imagine a situation in which it would seek to have VAT reimbursed from authorities under a sports exception in the future. After all, Riot Games has repeatedly stated that it does not make a profit on its e-sport activities.[12]

The AG’s opinion began by explaining that the concept of sport in the exemption should be “interpreted in a narrow manner, while bearing in mind the purpose and objective of the exemption.”[13] From this it is clear that the analysis of the concept of sport differs depending on the applicable provision, which could mean that the LEC could be considered a sport competition under one provision and a purely economic activity in another context. The AG goes on to identifying elements which preclude an activity from being considered a sport and states that “where a physical element is not necessary, sport is defined by competition and the fact that equipment is provided by not just one supplier -  which excludes activities without a broad basis in civil society, such as commercial products in the market place, designed by firms for pure consumption (for instance video games).”[14] If this interpretation of the concept of sport had been endorsed by the CJEU, it would have constituted a tremendous obstacle for the LEC. Indeed, if the ‘equipment’ also encompasses the game itself, it is impossible to argue that Riot Games does not hold a monopoly over the supply of LoL. Moreover, Riot Games has made and continues to support LoL in order to make money. In analysing this opinion, Abanazir explains the core issue well: “e-sport competitions based on video games created for purely consumption purposes and organised by persons aimed to profit from these activities may find themselves out of the scope as they are perceived to be devoid of social function.”[15] Indeed, it can seem difficult for the LEC and LoL to argue that it has a deeper ‘social function’ but perhaps this requirement might not be completely insurmountable. An argument could be made that the e-sports aspect of LoL is not only a commercial product made for pure consumption especially because LoL is a free to play game, and Riot Games does not seem to be making any profit in its e-sport related activities. Riot Games and the LEC have also taken steps to enhance the social function of LoL by investing in regional leagues to develop local talent.

In its ruling on the Bridge case, the CJEU sidelined the AG’s approach and decided to focus on a physicality requirement. The Court, in examining the specific VAT provision, found that sport must be “characterised by a not negligible physical element,” and the fact that an activity has elements of competition, professionality and organisation were not deemed sufficient to argue that the activity is a sport for the VAT exemption.[16] Physicality was the central criteria in the CJEU’s interpretation of the concept of sport, but in doing so, it did not give any further clarity as to the threshold of physicality required for an activity to benefit from the VAT sport exemption. It has already been contended above that LoL does have a clear physical element which is intrinsically connected to the game’s skill, yet the question remains whether the physicality would be considered more than negligible by the CJEU.

In summary, if LoL and the LEC were to be examined under the VAT Directive sport exemption, it would be confronted with several challenges. The approach endorsed in the AG’s opinion would have been the most problematic since LoL is mainly a commercial product designed to attract consumers and ultimately profit a private company. However, the CJEU chose to focus its interpretation of the concept of sport on a physicality criterion. This decision may give the LEC a wide enough window to argue that the fine motor skills involved in LoL are enough to fulfil this condition.

5.     Conclusion

In its current form, the LEC would not be able to benefit from the sport exemption in the VAT Directive, but this is just one provision of EU law, and there could be other opportunities where it could attempt to claim to be a sport. In the meantime, this gives an opportunity to Riot Games to continue to develop and emphasise the social function of its e-sports competitions, which might entail building a not-for-profit entity to run the competition and to strengthen the redistribution of economic gains to the grassroots. In any case, LoL and the LEC share many characteristics with established sports, but it remains to be seen if this will be enough to boost its recognition as a ‘real’ sport in law and society.

[1] Cem Abanazir, ‘E-sport and the EU: the view from the English Bridge Union’ (2019) International Sports Law Journal 102.

[2] ‘LEC Rules’ (LoLEsports).

[3] William Morgan, Ethics in Sport (3rd edn, Human Kinetics 2018) ch 1: Elements of Sport by Bernard Suits; Seth Jenny et al., ‘Virtual(ly) Athletes: Where eSports fit within the definition of “Sport”’(2016) Quest 1; Cem Abanazir, ‘Institutionalisation in E-Sports’ (2019) Sport, Ethics and Philosophy 117.

[4] Morgan (n 3) ch 1.

[5] Ivo van Hilvoorde and Niek Pot, ‘Embodiment and fundamental motor skills in eSports’ (2016) Sports, Ethics and Philosophy 14.

[6] Abanazir (n 3).

[7] Jenny et al. (n 3); Abanazir (n 3).

[8] See LEC Rulebook Art. 8.15.

[9] LEC Rules (n 2).

[10] Case C-90/16 The English Bridge Union Limited v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs ECLI:EU:C:2017:814.

[11] Case C-90/16 The English Bridge Union Limited v Commissioners for Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs ECLI:EU:C:2017:814, Opinion of AG Szpunar.

[12] Steven Asarch, ‘“League of Legends” cuts esports budget, can Riot Games bounce back?’ (Newsweek, 28 August 2018); Derrick Asiedu head of Global Events at Riot Games confirmed this in a Reddit post: “We’re a long way from breaking even (revenue minus cost equalling 0)”.

[13] English Bridge Union Opinion (n 11) para 21.

[14] English Bridge Union Opinion (n 11) para 38.

[15] Abanazir (n 1).

[16] English Bridge Union (n 10) para 19, 25.

On Wednesday 31 March 2021 from 16.00-17.30 CET, the Asser International Sports Law Centre, in collaboration with Dr Marjolaine Viret (University of Lausanne), is organising its fourth Zoom In webinar on the recent developments arising from the decision of the Swiss Federal Tribunal (SFT) in the case Caster Semenya v. International Association of Athletics Federations (now World Athletics), delivered on 25 August 2020.

Background
The participation of athletes with biological sex differences to international competitions is one of the most controversial issues in transnational sports law. In particular, since 2019, Caster Semenya, an Olympic champion from South-Africa has been challenging the World Athletics eligibility rules for Athletes with Differences of Sex Development (DSD Regulation), which would currently bar her from accessing international competitions (such as the Tokyo Olympics) unless she accepts to undergo medical treatment aimed at reducing her testosterone levels. In April 2019, the Court of Arbitration for Sport rejected her challenge against the DSD Regulation in a lengthy award. In response, Caster Semenya and the South African Athletics Federation filed an application to set aside the award before the Swiss Federal Tribunal. In August 2020, the SFT released its decision rejecting Semenya’s challenge of the award (for an extensive commentary of the ruling see Marjolaine Viret’s article on the Asser International Sports Law Blog).

Recently, on 25 February 2021, Caster Semenya announced her decision to lodge an application at the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) against Switzerland on the basis of this judgment. In this context, we thought it important to organise a Zoom In webinar around the decision of the SFT and the pending case before the ECtHR. Indeed, should the ECtHR accept the case, it will be in a position to provide a definitive assessment of the human rights compatibility of the DSD Regulation. Moreover, this decision could have important consequences on the role played by human rights in the review of the private regulations and decisions of international sports governing bodies.

Speakers

• Michele Krech (New York University)
• Lena Holzer (Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies)
• Prof. Frédéric Bernard (University of Geneva)
• Prof. Antonio Rigozzi (University of Neuchâtel/Lévy Kaufmann-Kohler)

Participation is free, register HERE.

Doyen (aka Doyen Sports Investment Limited) is nothing short of heroic in its fight against FIFA’s TPO ban. It has (sometimes indirectly through RFC Seraing) attacked the ban in front of the French courts, the Belgium courts, the European Commission and the Court of Arbitration for Sport. This costly, and until now fruitless, legal battle has been chronicled in numerous of our blogs (here and here). It is coordinated by Jean-Louis Dupont, a lawyer who is, to say the least, not afraid of fighting the windmills of sport’s private regulators. Yet, this time around he might have hit the limits of his stubbornness and legal ‘maestria’. As illustrated by the most recent decision of the saga, rendered in March by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in a case opposing the Belgium club RFC Seraing (or Seraing) to FIFA. The arguments in favour of the ban might override those against it. At least this is the view espoused by the CAS, and until tested in front of another court (preferably the CJEU) it will remain an influential one. The French text of the CAS award has just been published and I will take the opportunity of having for once an award in my native language to offer a first assessment of the CAS’s reasoning in the case, especially with regard to its application of EU law.

I.               The facts and procedure of the case

To cut a relatively long story short, RFC Seraing [the variation of the name of the club remains a disturbing mystery in the various proceedings in Belgium and at FIFA] entered a TPO agreement with Doyen on 30 January 2015, stipulating that the club transfers the economic rights of three players to Doyen against a sum of €300.000. At that time the transitory phase of FIFA’s TPO ban enshrined in art. 18ter RSTP was already in force and the FIFA TMS, tasked with monitoring the enforcement of the RSTP, quickly jumped on the matter. The issue was referred to FIFA’s Disciplinary Committee, which opened on 2 July 2015 proceedings against RFC Seraing for breaching arts. 18bis and 18ter RSTP. Additionally, on 7 July 2015, Seraing introduced in the TMS a request to recruit a Portuguese player, to which it attached an ERPA (on Doyen’s ERPAs see our blog here) attributing 25% of the economic rights attached to the player to Doyen against a payment of €50 000. A few days after, the FIFA TMS started another investigation into the transfer and on 21 July 2015 the FIFA Disciplinary Committee extended the existing proceedings to also cover this matter.

On 4 September 2015, the Disciplinary Committee rendered its (unpublished) decision finding that ‘FC Seraing’ breached arts. 18bis and 18ter RSTP. Consequently, it banned the club from recruiting players (at national and international level) for the next four transfer windows and handed out a fine of CHF 150.000. Seraing challenged the decision with FIFA’s Appeal Committee, which decided on 7 January 2016 to reject the appeal and confirmed the original decision. Eventually, Seraing appealed this decision to the CAS, leading to the latest award. As a side note, it feels like the disputes involving RFC Seraing (or FC Seraing or Seraing United) are a set-up prompted by Doyen to be able to challenge the validity of art. 18ter RSTP in various jurisdictions. If it were true it should not affect the question of the legality of the ban, but it is probably not of great support to the credibility of some arguments raised by Doyen, or its alter ego Seraing, in these proceedings.

II.             The CAS’ assessment of the compatibility of FIFA’s TPO ban under EU law

As the competence of CAS in this matter was not contested, the key question was against which law(s) should the compatibility of FIFA’s TPO ban be assessed. Due to the history of RFC Seraing’s key lawyer, it is no surprise that much of the award is spent assessing the EU law compatibility of the ban. In the past, as I have argued elsewhere (my CAS and EU law article is accessible for free here, download it now!), the CAS has been rather reluctant to apply EU law rigorously. This case is therefore a great opportunity to assess whether it has raised its standards in this regard.

a.    The applicability of EU law

First, is EU law applicable to the case? The CAS has rarely applied EU law (the exception confirming the rule being the rather old CAS 98/200 case, which was later challenged in front of the EU Commission leading to the ENIC decision), an absurdity in light of the Bosman (and prior Walrave) case law of the CJEU, which made clear that EU law is applicable to the regulations of Sports Governing Bodies (SGBs), even when seated outside of the EU. Additionally, in light of the centrality of the free movement rights in EU integration, it is to be expected that like the EU competition rules they be considered part and parcel of a European public policy with which arbitral awards must comply to be recognized and enforced by national courts in the EU.

Thus, the less spectacular, but probably more important, aspect of the award is the clear affirmation that EU law is applicable because it constitutes a “mandatory provision of foreign law” in the sense of art. 19 of the Swiss Federal Act on Private International Law (PILA).[1] Mandatory provisions of foreign law must be taken into account when three cumulative conditions prevail:

1. Such rules belong to a special category of norms which need to be applied irrspective of the law applicable to the merits of the case;
2. there is a close connection between the subject matter of the dispute and teh territory where the mandatory rules are in force;
3. in view of Swiss legal theory and practice, the mandatory rules must aim to protect legitimate interest and crucial values and their application must lead to a decision which is appropriate.[2]

In this case, the Panel considers that the three cumulative conditions are fulfilled because:

1. EU competition law and EU provisions on fundamental freedoms are largely regarded as pertaining to the category of mandatory rules by courts and scholars within the EU;
2. the close connections between (a) the territory on which EU competition law  and EU provisions on fundamental freedoms are in force and (b) the subject matter of the dispute results from the fact that the challenge against the legality of the RSTP has an obvious impact on the EU territory. Indeed, the RSTP aims to regulate the activity of football clubs, many of which are European. Furthermore, the particular decision affects the participation of RFC Seraing to competitions taking place on the European soil.
3. Finally, the Swiss legal system shares the interests and values protected by EU law, specifically by the EU competition rules and EU fundamental freedoms.[3]

This is a strong confirmation that EU law (mainly EU free movement rights and EU competition law), which applies almost naturally to decisions and regulations of the SGBs[4], will always be deemed applicable if invoked in front of the CAS to challenge their legality. This, as Seraing has learned in the present instance, does not mean that the SGBs rules will be automatically found incompatible with EU law. Instead, it merely subjects them to a duty of justification and proportionality, which will be assessed on a case-by-case basis.[5] The message for sports lawyers appearing in front of the CAS is then: Work hard on your EU law! But don’t get your hopes up too high… 

b.    The compatibility of FIFA’s TPO ban with EU law

The rest of the CAS award is mainly dedicated to assessing the compatibility of the TPO ban with EU law.[6] In doing so, the CAS, rightly in my view, considered that the conditions regarding the compatibility, or not, of a private regulation of an SGB with the EU free movement rights and competition rules overlap with regard to the key question: the proportionality of the rule.

The legitimacy of the objectives of the TPO ban

The Panel’s assessment focuses firstly, and therefore mainly, on a possible disproportionate restriction of the free movement of capital guaranteed under art. 63 TFEU. The Panel decides to assume, without addressing it, that article 63 applies horizontally. This is still a widely uncharted territory and the CJEU has yet to take a clear stand on it. However, the CAS decided to be better safe than sorry and, thus, followed a maximalist interpretation of the scope of application of the article by applying it horizontally to the rules of FIFA. From the outset, it is uncontested that articles 18bis and 18ter RSTP constitute a restriction to the free movement of capital in the EU.[7] Yet, as emphasized by the Panel, a restriction does not entail an automatic incompatibility with EU law. Instead, the restrictive effect might be justified by a legitimate objective and compatible with EU law if the rule or measure is a proportionate mean to attain that objective. In the present case, FIFA invoked a number of potential legitimate objectives underlying the TPO ban:

• The preservation of the contractual stability;
• The preservation of the independence and autonomy of clubs in the management of their recruitment policy;
• The securing of the integrity of football and preservation of the loyalty and equity of competitions;
• The prevention of conflicts of interests and the securing of transparency in the transfer market.[8]

Those objectives remained uncontested by Seraing and the Panel concluded that they could be deemed legitimate in the sense of the CJEU’s jurisprudence.[9] Instead, Seraing tried to argue that the ‘real’ objective of FIFA in adopting the TPO ban was to ensure that the clubs monopolize the financial streams generated by the transfers of players.[10] Yet, it failed to provide the necessary evidence to convince the Panel, which insisted that “TPO has triggered amongst many commentators and inside the various instances and organisations of football intense worries to which the objectives invoked by FIFA are a response”[11]. Additionally, the Panel considers “that this practice gives way to numerous risks, in particular: risks linked to the opacity of investors escaping the control of football organizations and who are able to freely sell-on their investment; risks of a restriction of the economic freedom and rights of players, through the influencing with a speculative interest of their transfer; risks of conflicts of interests, or even of rigging or manipulation of games, contrary to the integrity of competitions, as the same investor can have TPO deals and multiples clubs involved in the same competition; risks linked to the ethics of sport because the objective pursued by investors is purely a financial and speculative one, to the detriment of sportive and moral considerations”.[12] Hence, the arbitrators buoyed the legitimacy of FIFA’s objectives in adopting the TPO ban.

The proportionality of the ban

The key question is then whether the FIFA ban can be deemed a proportionate means to attain its legitimate objectives. It is at this most crucial stage of the evaluation of the compatibility with EU law that a number of academic commentators have denied the ban’s proportionality.[13] It is the most important part of the award, which will be most likely scrutinized and attacked in follow-up cases in front of national or European courts. It is important to note that SGB regulations have never failed in front of the CJEU because they were lacking a legitimate objective, but rather because they were not considered adequate or necessary to attain their objectives. This stage of the analysis entails political considerations and a comparative analysis of the policy alternatives (and their feasibility) available to tackle a specific problem. In other words, it is not sufficient to claim that you can think in the abstract of a less restrictive alternative, you need to factually demonstrate that this less restrictive alternative is a credible candidate to attain the objective. This is obviously a difficult task for a lawyer. Furthermore, procedural considerations connected to the rulemaking process will come into play. If a sporting rule has been devised via an inclusive legislative procedure and finds broad support amongst the affected actors, then it will in turn be more likely to be deemed proportionate. Instead, if a rule is the result of a secretive, exclusive and authoritarian procedure, then it will be easier to challenge its proportionality. Thus, both substantial (effects-based) and procedural (legitimacy-based) considerations are key to evaluate the proportionality of the TPO ban.

The Panel insists first that the TPO ban has limited effects on the freedom to invest in football. Indeed, it finds that investors are not barred from investing in clubs or to finance specific operations (such as transfers), the ban is devised only to exclude certain types or modalities of investing.[14] On the procedural/legislative side, the Panel notes that the ban has been introduced after a broad consultation and on the basis of numerous, though unpublished, expert reports.[15] This positive assessment of the adoption process could be contested, especially because FIFA did not release the expert reports to the public, which were therefore not subjected to the critical scrutiny of their peers.  Moreover, the Panel takes due note of the relatively long experimentation of a lighter measure (article 18bis RSTP), which has proven inefficient to control the widespread recourse to TPO.[16] The question was then whether Seraing would be able to come up with a credible less restrictive alternative to rein the anarchic use of TPO in football. The Belgian club claimed that FIFA’s legitimate objectives could have been attained through regulation and measures improving transparency (very similar to La Liga’s argument here).[17] Nonetheless, the arbitrators noted that Seraing failed to specify the alternative measures it envisaged.[18] Instead, the Panel sided with FIFA in finding that it lacks the capacity and legal competence to properly police investors which are not subjected contractually to its disciplinary power.[19] In such a context, the Panel finds that the risks of conflicts of interests stemming from TPO contracts cannot be properly controlled by FIFA and the national federations, and the alternative measures proposed by Seraing are bound to fail.[20] Finally, the Panel also referred to the previously existing bans in France, England and Poland, insisting that FIFA was also aiming at harmonizing the rules applicable to the transfer market in Europe to alleviate any potential discrimination.[21] Hence, the arbitrators conclude that the ban is a proportionate restriction to art. 63 TFEU and compatible with EU law. While the Panel doubts that the TPO ban has substantial restrictive effects on the free movement of players and on the freedom to provide services of agents,[22] in any case it refers to its findings under art. 63 TFEU to conclude that it must be held proportionate.[23]

Regarding the compatibility of the ban with EU competition law, Seraing argued that it constitutes an unlawful restriction to free competition under article 101 TFEU and an abuse of a dominant position under article 102 TFEU. The CAS deemed (uncontroversially) FIFA an association of undertaking for the purpose of article 101 TFEU and recognized that the TPO ban affects trade between the Member States.[24] However, the arbitrators emphasized that Seraing bears the burden of proving that the ban constitutes a restriction by object or effect of free competition in the internal market.[25] In that regard, the CAS referred to the CJEU’s analytical framework developed in its Wouters case.[26] It concluded, referring to its previous holdings, that the ban had legitimate objectives and was necessary to attain them, and therefore did not constitute a restriction in the sense of article 101 (1) TFEU. As far as the abuse of a dominant position is concerned, after criticizing the lack of serious economic analysis by the appellant,[27] the Panel simply reiterated its previous findings regarding the legitimate objectives and proportionality of the ban.[28] 

The CAS swiftly rejected all the other arguments raised by Seraing on the basis of the EU’s Fundamental Rights Charter,[29] the European Convention of Human Rights,[30] and Swiss law.[31] Nonetheless, it did held that the sanction imposed on Seraing by the FIFA Disciplinary Committee was too stringent in light of the proportionality principle and reduced Seraing’s transfer ban to three windows and a fine of CHF 150.000.[32]

III.           Conclusion

Doyen lost a new battle and, while the war is still raging on, the controversial company is slowly starting to run out of legal ammunitions to challenge FIFA’s TPO ban. I have explained elsewhere why I believe the ban to be compatible with EU law and many of the arguments of the CAS in this award resonate with my own views.  Yet, though I think banning TPO is a step in the right direction to a healthier transfer market, I also believe that FIFA is artificially sustaining a transfer market that leads to the shadowy financiarization of football brutally exposed in the recent football leaks. In other words, the fact that a challenge against articles 18bis or 18ter fails does not mean that the whole RSTP is compatible with EU law, and for various reasons I believe that the current article 17RSTP is likely to fall foul of the EU internal market rules.[33]

The broader lesson of this TPO saga is that EU law is (at last) becoming a potent tool to challenge SGBs and their rules at the CAS. However, EU law is not blind to the necessary regulatory function they exercised vis-à-vis transnational sporting activities. What EU law targets is the SGBs’ illegitimate, disproportionate, and abusive regulatory behaviour to the detriment of the affected actors. When invoking EU law, sports lawyers must be aware of the need to show concretely the disproportionate nature of the rule or decision challenged. This is a heavy evidentiary burden. In other words, one cannot be satisfied with simply pointing out a restrictive effect, instead an interdisciplinary engagement with the economic and social effects of a regulation as well as with its legislative process is in order.

On a final note, I am truly pleased to see that the CAS is finally taking EU law a bit more seriously. This is a giant step forward, which will protect its awards from challenges in front of national courts, foster its reputation in Europe’s legal communities, and empower it as a counter-power inside the system of the lex sportiva. I urge the CAS to fully embrace this change and to continue to thoroughly assess the EU law compatibility of the sporting rules challenged in front of it. In this regard, it should keep in mind that the more these rules are the result of a deliberative and inclusive (in a way democratic) transnational legislative process, the more they can be deemed legitimate in the eyes of EU law…and vice versa.

[1] TAS 2016/A/4490 RFC Seraing c. FIFA, 9 mars 2017, para. 73 : « La Formation arbitrale considère que le droit de l’Union Européenne (« droit de l’UE »), dont notamment les dispositions des traités en matière de liberté de circulation et de droit de la concurrence, doivent être prises en compte par la Formation arbitrale, dans la mesure où elles constituent des dispositions impératives du droit étranger au sens de l’article 19 de la Loi fédérale sur le droit international privé du 18 Décembre 1987 (« LDIP »).

[2] This English translation is taken from CAS 2016/A/4492 Galatasaray v. UEFA, 23 juin 2016, para. 43.

[3] TAS 2016/A/4490 RFC Seraing c. FIFA, para. 76. The French version reads as follows :

i.       Les dispositions de droit européen, concernant notamment le droit de la concurrence et les libertés de circulation, sont communément considérées comme des règles impératives par les juridictions de l’Union et la doctrine ;

ii.     Les relations étroites entre (a) le territoire sur lequel le droit européen est en vigueur et (b) l’objet du litige, tiennent au fait que la mise en cause de la légalité du RSTJ a un impact évident sur le territoire européen. En effet, le RSTJ vise à réguler l’activité des clubs de football, dont de nombreux clubs européens. De plus, la Décision attaquée affecte notamment la participation du RFC Seraing à des compétitions se déroulant sur le sol européen.

iii.    Enfin, l’ordre juridique suisse partage les intérêts et valeurs protégées par le droit européen et notamment les dispositions de droit européen en matière de droit de la concurrence et de libertés de circulation.

[4] See B. van Rompuy, The role of EU Competition Law in Tackling Abuse of Regulatory Power by Sports Associations. In general, see S. Weatherill, European Sports Law, Asser Press, 2014. For my take on the centrality of EU law to exercise a ‘counter-democratic’ check on the lex sportiva, see my PhD thesis (in French) available here.

[5] See crucially CJEU, Meca Medina, 18 July 2006, ECLI:EU:C:2006:492, para.42.

[6] See TAS 2016/A/4490 RFC Seraing c. FIFA, paras 90-144

[7] Ibid., para.97.

[8] Ibid., para 101. En l'espèce la FIFA invoque plusieurs objectifs poursuivis par les mesures en cause, et qu’il convient de reprendre : la préservation de la stabilité des contrats de joueurs , la garantie de l'indépendance et l'autonomie des clubs et des joueurs en matière de recrutement et de transferts, la sauvegarde de l'intégrité dans le football et du caractère loyal et équitable des compétitions, la prévention de conflits d'intérêts et le maintien de la transparence dans les transactions liées aux transferts de joueurs.

[9] Ibid., paras 102-104.

[10] Ibid., paras 105-106.

[11] Ibid. para. 107.

[12] Ibid., para.108.

[13] See J. Lindholm, Can I please have a slice of Ronaldo? The legality of FIFA’s ban on third-party ownership under European union law and S. Egger, Third-party Ownership of Players’ Economic Rights und Kartellrecht, in K. Vieweg, Inspirationen des Sportrechts, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, 2016, pp.307-331.  

[14] TAS 2016/A/4490 RFC Seraing c. FIFA, paras 109-112

[15] It refers to “une phase significative d’étude, de consultation, de travaux et discussions à laquelle ont participle de nombreux interlocuteurs”, at Ibid., para.113.

[16] Ibid., para.114.

[17] Ibid., para. 116.

[18] Ibid.

[19]“La FIFA ne peut pas contrôler les intérêts de personnes qui ne lui sont pas affiliées, ni les contrats qui sont conclus à l'occasion ou à la suite de transferts par d'autres personnes que les clubs, joueurs et agents et dont la déclaration est obligatoire via le TMS.” Ibid., para.117.

[20] Ibid., para.118.

[21] Ibid., para. 120.

[22] Ibid., paras 125-127.

[23] Ibid., para. 128.

[24] Ibid., para. 135.

[25] Ibid., para. 137.

[26] Ibid., para. 138.

[27] Ibid., para. 142.

[28] Ibid., para. 143.

[29] Ibid., paras 145-148.

[30] Ibid., paras 149-151.

[31] Ibid., paras 152-161.

[32] Ibid., paras 167-179.

[33] On this see R. Parrish, Article 17 of the Fifa Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players : Compatibility with EU Law and G. Pearson, Sporting Justifications under EU Free Movement and Competition Law: The Case of the Football ‘Transfer System’.

Editor’s note: Stefano Bastianon is Associate Professor in EU Law and EU sports law at the University of Bergamo and lawyer admitted to the Busto Arsizio bar. He is also member of the IV^th Division of the High Court of Sport Justice (Collegio di Garanzia dello sport) at the National Olympic Committee.

1. On the 20^th July 2018, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (hereinafter referred to as “CAS”) issued its decision in the arbitration procedure between AC Milan and UEFA. The subject matter of this arbitration procedure was the appeal filed by AC Milan against the decision of the Adjudicatory Chamber of the UEFA Financial Control Body dated 19^th June 2018 (hereinafter referred to as “the contested decision”). As many likely know, the CAS has acknowledged that, although AC Milan was in breach of the break-even requirement, the related exclusion of the club from the UEFA Europe League was not proportionate. To date, it is the first time the CAS clearly ruled that the sanction of exclusion from UEFA club competitions for a breach of the break-even requirement was not proportionate. For this reason the CAS award represents a good opportunity to reflect on the proportionality test under Art. 101 TFEU and the relationship between the landmark ruling of the European Court of Justice (hereinafter referred to as “ECJ”) in the Meca Medina and Majcen affair and the very recent case-law of the CAS.

2. According to the contested decision, AC Milan was guilty for failing to comply with Articles 58 to 63 of the UEFA Financial fair-play regulations on the break-even requirement. As a consequence the Adjudicatory Chamber has excluded AC Milan from participating in the next UEFA Europe League for which AC Milan has already qualified (2018-2019) at the end of the 2017-2018 Italian football championship. The appeal filed at the CAS by AC Milan was mainly aimed at seeking the annulment of the contested decision and ordering UEFA to enter into a settlement agreement.

3. The theory of proportionality test under Art. 101(1) TFEU in sports matters goes back to the ECJ’s ruling in the 2006 Meca Medina and Majcen case, while, in general terms, this theory was enunciated by the ECJ for the first time in the 1994 DLG case and then repeated in the 2002 Wouters and Others case although in a slightly different way.

In the DLG case the ECJ has ruled that:

«in order to escape the prohibition laid down in Article 85(1) of the Treaty, the restrictions imposed on members by the statutes of cooperative purchasing associations must be limited to what is necessary to ensure that the cooperative functions properly and maintains its contractual power in relation to producers (…). In addition, it is necessary to establish whether the penalties for non-compliance with the statutes are disproportionate to the objective they pursue and whether the minimum period of membership is unreasonable». 

Eight years later, in the Wouters and Others case the ECJ established the following principles:

(i) not every agreement between undertakings or every decision of an association of undertakings which restricts the freedom of action of the parties or of one of them necessarily falls within the prohibition laid down in Art. 101(1) of the Treaty;

(ii) for the purposes of application of that provision to a particular case, account must first of all be taken of the overall context in which the decision of the association of undertakings was taken or produces its effects; and

(iii) it has then to be considered whether the consequential effects restrictive of competition are inherent in the pursuit of those objectives.

Unlike the DLG case, in the Wouters and Others ruling the ECJ did not expressly refer to the concept of proportionality, but preferred to recall the concept of inherent restrictions. However, from the overall wording of the ECJ, it is clear that in both cases it tried to apply in the antitrust sector the same theory of mandatory requirements developed in relation to the internal market.

4. On the contrary, in the Meca Medina and Majcen case, the ECJ expressly referred to the concept of proportionality. In particular, the ECJ has literally quoted the passage of the Wouters and Others ruling where it is stated that:

«not every agreement between undertakings or every decision of an association of undertakings which restricts the freedom of action of the parties or of one of them necessarily falls within the prohibition laid down in Article 81(1) EC. For the purposes of application of that provision to a particular case, account must first of all be taken of the overall context in which the decision of the association of undertakings was taken or produces its effects and, more specifically, of its objectives. It has then to be considered whether the consequential effects restrictive of competition are inherent in the pursuit of those objectives (Wouters and Others, par. 97)». 

However, unlike the Wouters and Others case, the ECJ has added that the effects restrictive of competition must also be proportionate to the objectives pursued.

More specifically, in anti-doping issues the test of proportionality is a means to avoid the risk that a given rule (and the sanctions imposed in case of a breach of it) may prove excessive by virtue of:

(i) firstly, the conditions laid down for establishing the dividing line between circumstances which amount to doping in respect of which penalties may be imposed and those which do not, and

(ii) secondly, the severity of those penalties (in the case at issue the penalty was a two year suspension).

Regarding the first point, the ECJ has underlined that the dividing line was determined by the threshold of 2 ng/ml of urine above which the presence of Nandrolone in an athlete's body constitutes doping. Based on documents before the Court, the ECJ could conclude that the average endogenous production observed in all studies then published was 20 times lower than 2ng/ml of urine and that the maximum endogenous production value observed was nearly a third lower. As a consequence, the ECJ rejected the argument according to which the threshold was set at such a low level that it should have been regarded as not taking sufficient account of the phenomenon of the endogenous production of Nandrolone.

Regarding the second point, instead, the ECJ simply observed that: 

«since the appellants have, moreover, not pleaded that the penalties which were applicable and were imposed in the present case are excessive, it has not been established that the anti-doping rules at issue are disproportionate».

This is the most critical passage of the ruling as one could wonder what would happen if the plaintiffs had contested the proportionality of the penalties. In such a case the ECJ should have examined the substance of the plea and stated whether the two year suspension was proportionate or not. However, in the event that the ECJ had come to the conclusion that the penalty was not proportionate, the anti-doping rules at issue should have been declared null and void unless it was possible to prove that the conditions of Art. 101 (3) TFEU were fulfilled.

The same reasoning was applied by the EU Commission in the ISU decision concerning the Eligibility rules enacted by the International Skating Union. In its decision, the Commission clearly underlined that:

«even if the Eligibility rules and their consequential effects restrictive of competition were inherent in the pursuit of any legitimate objective, the sanctions imposed on athletes in case of breach of the Eligibility rules are manifestly disproportionate» (par. 260).[1]

Thus, in sports matters there seem to be no doubt that the proportionality test must involve also the sanctions imposed on athletes. As already said, in the ISU decision, the Commission has clearly underlined that the Eligibility rules were not proportionate to achieve legitimate objectives in particular in view of the disproportionate nature of the ISU’s ineligibility sanctions. More specifically the Commission has pointed out that:

«the 2014 Eligibility rules provided for the heaviest sanction of a lifetime ban, even for the first infringement of the Eligibility rules, without taking into consideration the circumstances of the case (…). For the purposes of the assessment of the proportionality of the Eligibility rules it is however not relevant how many times the ISU has actually imposed sanctions. The fact that a lifetime ban was imposed only once on an athlete may even underline the strong deterrent effect of the sanctions. Although the sanctions system has been modified in the General Regulations 2016, the sanctions remain disproportionately punitive, as they provide for periods of ineligibility that go up to five years for negligent participation in unauthorized events, up to 10 years for athletes that knowingly participate in unauthorised events and a lifetime ban for athletes participating in unauthorised events endangering, inter alia, the ‘ISU jurisdiction’. These are disproportionately heavy sanctions in particular in view of the fact that on average a professional athlete's entire career is around eight years long. Also the imposition of a five-year ban is therefore likely to impact very heavily on an athlete's career who, after years of training and sacrifices, loses the possibility to gain income through the participation in the ISU's international events». 

This reasoning clearly shows that the Commission has considered the sanctions imposed to be disproportionate, not simply the rule forbidding participation in unauthorized events.

5. To date, neither the EU Commission nor the ECJ has had the opportunity to comment on the compatibility of the UEFA Financial Fair-play rules with EU Competition law. Indeed, regarding the Striani affair, the Commission has dismissed the complaint on procedural grounds only (the lack of Community interest), while the ECJ has declared a reference for preliminary ruling send by a Belgian court manifestly inadmissible and therefore did not rule on the substance of the case. As a consequence, to date there is no European formal decision that has assessed the compatibility of UEFA Financial Fair-play rules with EU law.

This opportunity, however, was offered to the CAS in the context of the Galatasaray/UEFA award (2016/A/4492). To fully understand the case one must go back to the 2^nd March 2016 when the Adjudicatory Chamber of the UEFA Financial Control Body issued a decision in which it decided that Galatasaray has failed to comply with the terms of the Settlement Agreement and imposed on Galatasaray an exclusion from participating in the next UEFA Club competition for which it would otherwise qualify in the next two seasons.

On the 11^th March 2016, Galatasaray filed an appeal with the CAS to challenge the decision of the Adjudicatory Chamber of the UEFA Financial Control Body. Basically, the arguments put forward by Galatasaray were based:

(i) on the alleged incompatibility of the break-even rule with EU law (namely, Art. 101 TFEU on cartels, Art. 102 TFEU on abuse of dominant position, Art. 63 TFEU on free movement of capital, Art. 56 TFEU on free movement of services and Art. 45 TFEU on free movement of workers); and, in the event the first argument is rejected,

(ii) on the alleged disproportionate nature of the sanctions imposed by UEFA.

It is very interesting to note that from the point of view of Galatasaray the incompatibility of the break-even rule with EU law is something different and completely divorced from the proportionate character of the sanction. Indeed, the latter argument is invoked only in the event the first argument is rejected. In other words, according to this line of defence, the compatibility of the break-even rule with EU principles must be assessed only on the basis of the alleged restrictive effects on competition and the (alleged legitimate) objectives pursued, without considering the sanctions imposed.

In line with this approach, the CAS examined the two arguments put forward by Galatasaray separately. Regarding the relationship between the break-even rule and EU Competition law, the CAS reasoning can be summarized as follows:

(i) UEFA Financial fair-play regulations have neither the object nor the effect of restricting competition because: (a) UEFA Financial fair-play regulations do not prevent the clubs from competing among themselves on the pitch or in the acquisition of football players; (b) they prevent the distortion of competition by overspending; (c) clubs are free to pay the players as much as the wish provided that salaries are covered by revenues; (d) large dominant clubs have always existed and will always exist and therefore the alleged ossification of the structure market is a nonsense; (d) overspending is not completely prohibited because the break-even rule only applies over rolling periods of three years; and

(ii) in any case, even assuming that the break-even rule has anticompetitive effects, the objectives sought by UEFA Financial fair-play regulations do appear legitimate and their alleged restrictive effects inherent to the achievement of those objective. Put simply: if UEFA intends to control the level of indebtedness of European football clubs, the imposition of limits to spending beyond revenues is a natural element of a financial discipline seeking that objective.

By contrast, regarding the proportionality of the sanction imposed by the UEFA, the reasoning of the CAS is completely based on external factors which allegedly affected the finances of Galatasaray (i.e., the Syrian refugee crisis, the terrorist attacks in Turkey, the Turkish major match-fixing scandal, the exchange rate and rate fluctuations, the national economic downturn in Turkey, the inefficiencies of the market and the management changes). However, according to the CAS, this argument cannot be accepted because the club failed to provide the Panel with the accounting evidence of how and in which proportion each of these factors would have caused the break-even deficit. Moreover, the CAS has underlined that the sanction was not disproportionate because:

(i) it was imposed as a sanction for a second violation (i.e., after the Settlement Agreement which presupposes the previous violation of the rules on financial fair play);

(ii) an exclusion limited in time (one season) from the UEFA competitions is consistent with the principle of equal treatment and fair competition, as it protects the club respecting the UEFA Financial Fair-play regulations and does not prevent future compliance with them.

It follows from the foregoing that, according to the CAS the proportionate character of sanctions listed in the UEFA Financial Fair-play regulations cannot affect the evaluation of the legitimacy of these regulations under Art. 101 TFUE.

6. To some extent the AC Milan/UEFA case is similar to the Galatasaray case. Both clubs have failed to comply with the break-even requirement; both clubs have been sanctioned with the exclusion for one season from the UEFA competitions; both clubs have contested the proportionality of the sanction. Unlike Galatasaray, however, AC Milan was denied the possibility to enter into a Settlement Agreement[2]. On the contrary, it is worthy to note that the CAS has confirmed the decision of the Adjudicatory Chamber of the UEFA CFCB, which was rendered on the 19^th June 2018, establishing that AC Milan had failed to fulfil the break-even requirement. However, it has annulled the decision to the extent that it has excluded AC Milan from participating in the next UEFA Club competition for which it would otherwise qualify in the next two seasons (i.e., the 2018-19 and 2019-20 seasons), arguing that the sanction was not proportionate. As a consequence, the CAS has referred back the case to the Adjudicatory Chamber to issue a proportionate disciplinary measure. The press release issued on the 20^th July 2018 (the full text of the award is not yet available) indicates that the decision to annul the sanction and refer back the case to the Adjudicatory Chamber is based on the following arguments:

(i) some important elements regarding the financial situation of the Club and the recent change in the Club’s ownership have not been properly assessed by the Adjudicatory Chamber, or could not be properly assessed at the moment when the contested decision was rendered;

(ii) the Adjudicatory Chamber is in a better position than the CAS Panel to issue a new proportionate disciplinary measure on the basis of the current financial situation of the Club.

Despite the differences between the two cases, it is interesting to note that in the Galatasaray case the CAS assessed the sanction imposed by the Adjudicatory Chamber on the merits and found it proportionate. To the contrary, in the AC Milan case the CAS has assessed the sanction on the merits only to state that it was not proportionate, but refrained from saying which other sanction could be considered proportionate, arguing that the Adjudicatory Chamber is in a better position than the CAS to issue a new proportionate disciplinary measure. In other words, the CAS seems to say that it has no problem to assess the proportionality of a given sanction ; however, if it deems that the sanction is not proportionate, it is not for the CAS to replace the penalty imposed with another sanction.

7. Comparing the awards in the Galatasaray and AC Milan cases with the ruling in Meca Medina and Majcen affair some aspects deserve to be underlined. First of all, according to the case-law of the ECJ in sports matters, the evaluation of the restrictive effects of a rule necessarily presupposes the analysis of the proportionate character of the sanction imposed in the event of violation of that rule. On the contrary, according to the case-law of the CAS the analysis of the proportionate character of a sanction necessarily presupposes a positive evaluation of the legitimate character of the objectives pursued by the rule and its inherence to those objectives. In other words, it seems that according to the CAS the disproportionate nature of a sanction is not capable of affecting the legitimacy of the rule whose violation determined that sanction. Although the full text of the award is not yet available from the AC Milan/UEFA case it emerges that the disproportionate nature of the penalty imposed only resulted in the referral of the case to the Adjudicatory Chamber for the imposition of another sanction. Although apparently in line with the Wouters and Others case, this approach is clearly in contrast with the Meca Medina and Majcen case and, more generally, with the whole theory of mandatory requirements in the field of the internal market.

To this regard it is of paramount importance not to underestimate the fundamental difference between rules which are applied a priori and rules that are applied a posteriori. As also recognized by the CAS in the well-known ENIC case:

«rules that are applied a priori tend to prevent undesirable situations which might prove difficult or useless to deal with afterwards, rather than imposing a penalty on someone guilty of something. On the other hand, rules that are applied a posteriori are bound to react to specific behaviours. For example, under EC law and several national laws, rules on mergers are applied a priori, whereas rules on abuses of dominant position are applied a posteriori. Merger operations are checked before they actually take place, and are blocked if the outcome of the merger would be the establishment of a dominant position because of the possible negative consequences on the market and not because the individuals owning or managing the merging undertakings are particularly untrustworthy and the company after the merger is expected to abuse of its dominant position (…). All such a priori rules are applied on a preventive basis, with no appraisal of any specific wrongdoing and no moral judgement on the individuals or companies concerned. On the other hand, rules setting forth obligations and corresponding penalties or sanctions, such as criminal or disciplinary rules, can be applied only after someone has been found guilty of having violated an obligation». 

In this context it is clear that rules applied a posteriori (such as the UEFA Financial Fair-play regulations) consist of both the obligations set forth and the corresponding sanctions. In addition, it is not possible nor correct to arbitrarily separate the obligation from the sanction. Indeed, the fact that in the Meca Medina and Majcen ruling the proportionality test was referred precisely to the restrictive effects and not to the prohibition of doping cannot be ignored. The prohibition of doping as such, without the corresponding sanctions, does not have any restrictive effect on competition.

Secondly, the sanctioning system envisaged by the UEFA does not provide clear and transparent criteria as to how the sanctions are to be applied. There is no scale to measure and define the seriousness of the violation and no provision illustrating the relationship between the violation and the sanction that can be imposed. It is interesting to note that the same reasoning was applied by the EU Commission in the ISU decision. And everyone knows the outcome of this case.

Thirdly, the choice of the CAS to refer back the case to the Adjudicatory Chamber could mean that the AC Milan/UEFA case is not yet closed definitively. According to Art 29 of the Procedural rules governing the UEFA Club Financial Control Body in case of a breach of the UEFA Financial Fair-play regulations the clubs may be sanctioned with the following measures: a) warning, b) reprimand, c) fine, d) deduction of points, e) withholding of revenues from a UEFA competition, f) prohibition on registering new players in UEFA competitions, g) restriction on the number of players that a club may register for participation in UEFA competitions, including a financial limit on the overall aggregate cost of the employee benefits expenses of players registered on the A-list for the purposes of UEFA club competitions, h) disqualification from competitions in progress and/or exclusion from future competitions, i) withdrawal of a title or award. If the exclusion from UEFA competitions is certainly one of the most serious sanctions, there are other particularly serious penalties, such as the prohibition on registering new players in UEFA competitions or the restriction on the number of players that a club may register for participation in UEFA competitions. Consequently, since the seriousness of the ascertained infringement seems to exclude that the Adjudicatory Chamber may decide to apply a very minimal sanction (such as a warning or a reprimand), it cannot be excluded that the new sanction will also be perceived as excessive and therefore disproportionate. And in this case, at least in theory, nothing could prevent AC Milan from appealing to the CAS by challenging again the disproportionate character of the (new) sanction.

8. The Meca Medina and Majcen ruling presents many ambiguities and for this reason is rightly criticized. To say nothing else, it cannot be ignored that the extension of the proportionality test also to the sanctioning system provided for by sports regulations raises at least two fundamental problems: (a) firstly, to establish which criteria are to be used to determine the proportionate character of the sanctions; and (b) secondly, the opportunity to invest judges or arbitrators of such a task. However, the recent case-law of the CAS on the proportionality test of UEFA Financial Fair-play regulations seems to reveal no less serious concerns and perplexities.

[1] For more details, see my blog and Ben Van Rompuy’s blog.

[2] As a consequence one could argue that the decision of the panel to find that the sanction is disproportionate is probably connected to the fact that Milan was not offered a settlement.

On 24 and 25 October, the Asser Institute will host an advanced professional training co-organised by Ben Van Rompuy and Antoine Duval focused on 'EU competition law and transnational sports governance'. The training is building on their experience acting as legal advisors for the complaint submitted to the European Commission (EC) by two Dutch speed-skaters, Mark Tuitert and Niels Kerstholt, against the International Skating Union (ISU), leading to the first negative decision rendered by the EC against an international sports governing body (SGB).  

The training will consist of: 

• An in-depth introduction to the specific application of EU competition law to transnational sports governance

• Specific sessions on the different (national, European and transnational) processes (both judicial and administrative) through which EU competition law claims can be raised against international SGBs

• A concrete case study during which the group will be divided into teams representing different sides of a competition law claim involving an SGB

• A round-table with  leading experts in EU competition law and sports for an interactive discussion on future developments in this area

[More information and registration HERE]

Why this professional training? 

Transnational sports governance is not neutral, its exercise comes with considerable economic effects and consequences, which can be controversial. In recent years we have witnessed an uptick of challenges on the basis of EU competition law against the governance decisions of international SGBs. In 2017, the European Commission for the first time adopted a decision finding a sporting rule (the ISU’s Eligibility Rules prohibiting skaters from participating in third-party events) in violation of EU competition law. Since then, we have seen a string of decisions by national competition authorities and high-profile private actions being launched against, for instance, UEFA and FIFA by the European Super League Company, football club Royal Antwerp F.C. or football agents. In short, EU competition law has become the main legal avenue through which regulations and decisions of international SGBs are being contested– both from outside the Olympic family and within. It is therefore crucial that sports stakeholders become proficient in the language of EU competition law, in understanding the specificities of its application to transnational sports governance, and in grasping the intricacies of the legal processes that can be used to do so. 

Is this training for you? 

This training is primarily aimed at professionals involved in the field of sports governance, such as legal counsels of SGBs, practicing lawyers active in the sports sector, public servants involved in the enforcement of competition law in the sporting context, and representatives of athletes, clubs and other sports stakeholders.  The advanced training will be both interactive, focusing on open exchanges between experts and participants, and participative, with the preparation of a case study in smaller groups.  

[More information and registration HERE]

Speakers include:

• Prof. Stephen Weatherill
• Prof. An Vermeersch
• Mark E. Orth
• Dr. Ben Van Rompuy
• Dr. Antoine Duval

[More information and registration HERE]

Programme

Day 1 - Tuesday, 24 October

12:30 – 13:00 - Registration

13:00 – 13:30 - Welcome and introduction - Antoine Duval & Ben Van Rompuy

13:30 – 15:00 - How EU competition law applies to transnational sports governance: Key doctrines and cases  - Antoine Duval & Ben Van Rompuy

15:00 – 15:30 Coffee Break

15:30 – 16:30 - Bringing a competition law case against SGBs before the European Commission: Lessons from the ISU case  - Ben Van Rompuy & Antoine Duval

16:30 – 17:30 - Bringing a competition law case against SGBs in national courts: The German experience -  Mark E. Orth

17:30 – 18:00 - Bringing a competition law case against SGBs before the CAS: Opportunities and challenges -  Antoine Duval

19:00 - Dinner

Day 2 - Wednesday, 25 October

9:00 – 12:00 - Case study on FIFA’s Football Agent Regulations and EU competition law - Antoine Duval, Ben Van Rompuy, Mark E. Orth

12:00 – 13:00 Lunch

13:00 – 15:00 - Case study on FIFA’s Football Agent Regulations and EU competition law - Antoine Duval, Ben Van Rompuy, Mark E. Orth, An Vermeersch and Stephen Weatherill

15:00 – 15:30 - Coffee Break

15:30 – 17:00 - Closing discussion on the future of EU competition law and transnational sports governance - Antoine Duval, Ben Van Rompuy, Mark E. Orth, An Vermeersch, and Stephen Weatherill