In this crazy Covid-19 year, all sport, including the Tokyo Olympic Games, was either cancelled or postponed as the world went into lockdown. Elite sport has started to get back on our screens and alongside Liverpool winning their first league title since 1990 and Ronnie O’Sullivan picking up his 6th World Snooker Championship, one of the biggest sporting stories of the year came from a Swiss court room.
Manchester City Football Club
Manchester City Football Club (MCFC) have had a decade of domestic success. In the period, the club have won four Premier League titles as well as a host of domestic cup competitions and have been widely acknowledged to have played stylish football in doing so. Nonetheless, to really be considered as an English football giant with the likes of Liverpool and local rivals Manchester United, MCFC, and their manager Pep Guardiola, know that they need to win the UEFA Champions League, Europe’s premier football club trophy. Having only reached the semi-final in one campaign, MCFC have not had lots of success in Europe. This continued in 2020 following defeat to Lyon in the quarter finals.
Before this defeat, however, saw arguably the Club’s most important “victory” in Europe. This came off the pitch in a legal trial in Switzerland. On the 13th July 2020, the Court of Arbitration for Sport overturned a decision which would have seen MCFC banned from playing any European football for two seasons and reduced a 30 million euro fine to 10 million euros. MCFC fans have the likes of the 2020 Premier League player of the year Kevin De Bruyne to thank on the pitch, but off the pitch they have a team of top lawyers to thank for potentially allowing the club’s recent success to continue.
Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS)
CAS is the highest appeal court for dispute settlement across all sport, set up in 1984 in Lausanne, Switzerland, with offices in Sydney and New York.
CAS can hear all disputes that are linked to sport. For instance, the Olympic Charter (Rule 61) provides CAS with exclusive jurisdiction over “any dispute arising on the occasion of, or in connection with, the Olympic Games”. Whilst CAS can hear cases at first instance, most cases are appeals from decisions made from sporting bodies (75-90%, per Lindholm), such as the International Olympic Committee. Most cases are heard with three arbitrators, though it is possible for a single arbitrator to sit.
Types of Cases
The majority of cases and the subject matter of cases are dominated by a few sports and issues. Football leads the way with 38% of all CAS cases, with Athletics, Cycling and a couple other sports making up the remaining majority and 45% of case subject matter is related to doping (per Lindholm). However, the famous doping case involving cyclist Lance Armstrong was not heard in CAS as he rejected an opportunity to appeal sanctions handed to him which included stripping him of all his results from 1998-2012. Other issues tend to involve contract disputes, player transfers and eligibility and disciplinary matters.
MCFC v UEFA
MCFC owe a lot of their recent success to the investment the club has received since 2008. MCFC was bought by Abu Dhabi based billionaire Sheikh Mansour in 2008. Since then, the club has been able to sign elite players and has spent £1.52bn from 2009/10 to the 2019/20 seasons. MCFC would not have achieved the success they have without the money that has been injected.
It seemed earlier this year that MCFC’s spending practice had caught up with them. On the 14th February 2020 the Adjudicatory Chamber of the Club Financial Control Body fined MCFC 30m euros and banned the club from playing European football for two seasons, for breaching UEFA’s Financial Fair Play Regulations (FFPR). This sanction was imposed following an investigation by UEFA that began after numerous media sources, originally from Germany, published leaked emails from people in connection with MCFC. A few days after UEFA passed down the sanction MCFC filed for an appeal to CAS.
MCFC are known on the pitch for their attacking ability, but the 93-page case shows a much needed defensive performance from their legal team. There are a lot of technical issues involved in the case, including a lot of the leaked email evidence being time barred and therefore inadmissible evidence in the trial. But the main issue was that UEFA claimed the leaked emails (which MCFC allege were obtained through a criminal hacker) show that MCFC tried to “disguise” money being injected from the club’s owner (Sheikh Mansour) as legitimate income from sponsors. This, UEFA claimed, allowed MCFC to falsely meet the FFPR “break –even” requirement of European clubs which places limits on teams spending by only allowing them to spend 5m euros more than they earn in a given period.
The CAS Decision
The CAS panel, made up of three arbitrators, decided that UEFA’s argument based on the email evidence did not meet the panels standard of proof requirement of “reasonable satisfaction”. The panel, therefore, decided that the evidence did not convincingly prove MCFC had disguised funding from owners as legitimate income from sponsors and overturned the original sanctions. The panel did impose a 10m euro fine on MCFC for not cooperating with UEFA’s investigation.
The Aftermath
This legal decision is so important to MCFC’s future because by being able to play European football they can retain their star players as well as continue to attract top players to join the club. Additionally, had the decision gone against MCFC then manager Pep Guardiola may have left, as his main goal has always been to win the Champions League. Whilst the decision has cleared MCFC of wrongdoing, many experts and football pundits have voiced concern with the decision and in particular with the effectiveness of UEFA’s financial regulations. Furthermore, as Paris Saint-Germain almost showed in the 2020 Champions League Final, it is not just MCFC spending large amounts in short periods to try and lift Europe’s top crown. It is likely CAS will continue to hear future cases on similar issues, as European elite football clubs continue to spend record amounts.
Conclusion
The case highlights how the law and sport can interact at a major level. If MCFC really want the decision to be significant then the players and manager need to go and lift the Champions League. Doing so would prove that all the legal time and effort was not for nothing. Clearly sport lawyers are vitally important to elite football.
Matt Cleary is a final year Law student at Newcastle University from the Wirral. Outside of studying, he likes to play football and enjoys a trip to the mountains, either skiing or walking.
Amazing article! Extremely well written and a really fun read. Massive well done to the writer, Matthew Cleary! Good luck for whatever endeavour you face next sir!! :)