Editor’s note: This
report compiles all relevant news, events and materials on International and
European Sports Law based on the daily coverage provided on our twitter feed @Sportslaw_asser. You are invited to complete this survey via the
comments section below, feel free to add links to important cases, documents
and articles we have overlooked.
The Headlines
The McLaren Report on Russia’s State Doping System
It is difficult not to start this monthly
report without referring to the never-ending Russian doping investigation that
is shaking the sporting world. On 18 July, the independent investigation on
Sochi 2014 winter Olympics led by Prof. McLaren, a Canadian law professor, and requested
by the World Anti-Doping Agency (“WADA”), released its report. It confirmed
evidence of widespread, State-sponsored doping in Russian sports and called for
a full ban on the country from the next Rio Olympics. In response to the report,
the International Olympic Committee (“IOC”) vowed to take the “toughest sanctions available”. However, and despite the race against time in the
run-up to Rio 2016, the IOC delayed its decision for several days amid a WADA statement and several press articles
calling for a ban of Russia from Rio Olympics. Meanwhile, it did open an investigation
against Russia’s sports minister, Vitaly Mutko, the head official who allegedly supervised the overall doping cover up and explored all possible
legal actions against Russia. On 21 July, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (“CAS”) rejected the
appeal of the Russian Olympic Committee and 68
Russian athletes against the International Association of Athletics Federations
(“IAAF”) decisions to suspend All Russia Athletics Federation (ARAF) from IAAF
membership given the evidence of a state-sponsored doping system. As a
consequence, Russian track and field athletes were also banned from Rio 2016
Olympics. With the IAAF
welcoming this decision, one could think that nothing was standing in the way
of a full Olympic ban for all Russian athletes. While some Russian athletes announced
that they would appeal the CAS award to the Swiss Federal Court. Yelena
Isinbayeva, the banned pole vault champion, even took it a step further by
claiming that she would challenge the IAAF decision as far as the European Court of
Human Rights. Yet, it is very improbable that any of
these challenges be decided in time for the Rio Games.
On 24 July, the IOC Executive Board finally handed out its decision on the question of the participation of
Russian athletes to the Rio Olympics. The
decision left no one satisfied, least of all WADA. In
a nutshell, the IOC passed the buck to international federations by deciding
that the evidence uncovered by the report is not sufficient to adopt a general
ban of the Russian Olympic Committee. Instead, it is for every international sports
federation to judge on a case-by-case fashion whether a Russian athlete is
eligible to be qualified for the Olympics. Sports governing bodies have to
decide following two criteria, namely whether the athlete was previously
controlled by laboratories situated outside of Russia and whether he/she was
never convicted of anti-doping breach in his/her career. The International
swimming federation (“FINA”), for example, decided to ban seven swimmers, some of them have already announced their intention to appeal
before CAS. And this is just the beginning. The IOC
decision not to decide has been highly criticized (see for example here and here), but it is probably
the IOC Olympic ban on Yulia Stepanova, the Russian whistle-blower through whom
the scandal emerged, that was criticized the most. A global online petition was
set up to draw attention to her case and athletes from around the world
launched a crowdfunding
appeal. For more information on this sprawling
case you can read our blog.
The CAS before German courts
The next very salient sports law issue of
the month is the ongoing challenges against CAS awards and their enforcement in
Germany. Early July, Claudia Pechstein announced that she would be challenging BGH ruling in
front of the German constitutional Court around two main arguments, namely, the
access to justice and the freedom to exercise her profession. On 7 June the highest German civil court ruled that CAS was sufficiently independent and that
an arbitration agreement in favour of CAS was legal under German civil and
competition law (see our blog). CAS swiftly published
an English version of the judgment (though we are still waiting for the
official translation of the previous OLG München decision) that you can find here. Another important
case, but this time concerning the application of EU free movement law in the
framework of the enforcement of a CAS award, is the BGH ruling in the SV Wilhemshaven case. The BGH announced early July that it would release
its judgment on 27 September. As a quick reminder, this case is concerning an Argentinian-Italian
football player transferred to a German club. The latter is refusing to pay
training compensations imposed by the FIFA Regulations for the Status and Transfer
of Players and challenged the enforceability of the CAS award in this case (see
our blog).
EU Commission State Aid Decisions
The other big sports law story of this
month was the long awaited European Commission decisions on State aid granted
in favour of Spanish professional football clubs. The Commission decided that public
support measures granted by Spain to seven football clubs gave those clubs an unfair advantage leading to
distorted competition and, as a consequence, the amounts at stake have to be recovered
(i.e.: for example, Real Madrid - €18.4 million and FC
Valencia - €20.4 million). For a full commentary on the
“Spanish recovery decisions” see our blog. On the exact same day,
the European Commission also cleared
municipal support measures for five professional football clubs in the
Netherlands (FC Den Bosch, MVV Maastricht, NEC
Nijmegen, PSV Eindhoven, and Willem II in Tilburg). In
the case of PSV, the Commission determined that the municipality’s purchase of
the land on which the PSV stadium stands, and the subsequent lease-back
agreement, was in line with the so-called “Market Economy Investor Principle”.
The measure, therefore, did not constitute State aid. The remaining Dutch
football clubs did receive State aid, according to the Commission. However,
these measures were granted in accordance with the Community Guidelines on State
aid for rescue and restructuring firms in difficulty, and were consequently
regarded as compatible State aid. Notwithstanding these eight State aid
decisions, it also became apparent that the Commission does not foresee other State aid
investigations on EU football clubs at this point.
Case law
The Court of Arbitration for Sport (“CAS”) released
two decisions on Rio 2016 selections. The first one concerns Australian trap
shooter Mitchell Iles (CAS A1/2016)
challenging the Australian men’s trap shooting selection for Rio 2016 and,
ultimately, his non-selection. The arbitrator has found that the Appeals
Tribunal of Shooting Australia rejecting the athlete’s appeal had erred in a
question of law. CAS upheld the appeal, set aside the decision taken by the
Appeals Tribunal of Shooting Australia, and referred the case of Mitchell Iles
back to Shooting Australia.
In the second case CAS has upheld a request for provisional measures
filed by Korean swimmer Tae Hwan Park. The
swimmer was sanctioned by FINA for an anti-doping breach (sanction that ended
on 2 March), but was prevented from participating in Rio 2016 by
Korean Sport and Olympic Committee regulations imposing a three-year ban from
national teams after the completion of a doping sanction. CAS ruled that Tae
Hwan Park is eligible for selection for the Korean national team for Rio 2016.
CAS also delivered its award concerning
Norwegian cross country skier Martin Johnsrud (CAS 2015/A/4233).
The International Ski Federation’s (“FIS”) Doping panel did not sanction the
skier after two in-competition doping controls that revealed levels exceeding
the applicable limits for salbutamol. The WADA referred the case to CAS. The
arbitrators found that use of a substance beyond the applicable limit without a
Therapeutic Use Exemption was a breach of anti-doping rules. They sanctioned
the skier with a two-month period of ineligibility and disqualification for the
competitions concerned as there were medical justifications in that case.
Official Documents and Press Releases
In the news
Football
Doping
Match-fixing
Olympics
Academic materials
Blogs
- James Bunting, Applying team sanctions for doping: what Essendon has
told us about the use of evidence at CAS
- Sean Cottrell, Key legal issues ahead of the Rio Olympic and
Paralympic Games
- Tom Cripps, Ground sharing arrangements in the Premier League and
Premiership: Regulations
- Jon Elphick, Playing the game: The UK’s approach to taxing sports
stars
- Nick De Marco, The dichotomy and future of sports arbitration -
Appointment of arbitrators (part 1)
- Nick De Marco, The dichotomy and future of sports arbitration -
Appointment of arbitrators (part 2)
- Nick De Marco, The dichotomy and future of sports arbitration -
Appointment of arbitrators (part 3)
- Nick De Marco, The dichotomy and future of sports arbitration -
Appointment of arbitrators (part 4)
- Antoine Duval, The rules of the game: The need for transparency in
sports governance
- Antoine Duval, Kester
Mekenkamp and Oskar van Maren, With or without them? Russia’s State doping system and
the Olympic fate of Russian athletes
- Pete Hackleton, The current legal status of image rights companies in
football
- Joseph M. Hanna, Major League Baseball considers action against the
Cardinals over database hack
- Nandan Kamath, Fighting sports corruption in India: A review of the
National Sports Ethics Commission Bill 2016
- Benoît Keane, State aid in European football: A review of the EC’s
ruling on Real Madrid, FC Barcelona and Valencia CF
- Charles Maurice and Tom
Collins, Why football players and managers should own their own
trade marks
- Despina Mavromati, The Legality of the Arbitration Agreements in favour
of CAS (Pechstein) Part 1
- Despina Mavromati, The Legality of the Arbitration Agreements in favour
of CAS (Pechstein) Part 2
- Marine Montejo, Brexit and EU law: Beyond the Premier League (Part 1)
- Marine Montejo, Brexit and EU law: Beyond the Premier League (Part 2)
- Nicola Parkinson, 7 key tax law issues affecting sports today
- Ariel Reck, A review of Argentina’s new sports
training-compensation law
- Tom Rudkin, Maria Sharapova: Key facts of the ITF doping decision
and her chances on appeal
- Hugh Southey, Road to Rio: Immigration and Sport
- Oskar van Maren, The EU State aid and sport saga: The Showdown
- Jeremy Whiteson, Football Creditors Rule: Is The Football League’s new
insolvency policy a step in the right direction?
Books
Upcoming Events September