Disciplinary procedures in international football – FIFA’s and UEFA’s judicial bodies
Preamble
As a part of an ambition to obtaining a level playing field within football, the two largest international football associations, FIFA and UEFA, have developed and established disciplinary rules and procedures in order to ensure that their member associations, clubs, players and other shareholders are treated fairly when dealing with possible breaches of football regulations. The number of disciplinary cases is increasing, and during the 2019/2020 season the FIFA Disciplinary Committee alone issued more than 700 decisions for alleged breaches of FIFA regulations. The FIFA and UEFA disciplinary bodies handle alleged breaches of a wide range of cases, including breaches of competitions regulations, regulations on protection of minors, third-party ownership (TPO), match-fixing, doping and the enforcement of decisions passed by other judicial bodies.
FIFA’s judicial bodies
Article 52 of the FIFA Statutes lists FIFA’s judicial bodies as the Disciplinary Committee, the Appeal Committee and the Ethics Committees. According to the statutes, the three judicial bodies are to be composed in such a way that the members have the knowledge, abilities and specialist experience that is necessary for the due completion of their tasks. The chairperson, deputy chairperson and members of these committees need to fulfil the independence criteria as defined by the FIFA Governance Regulations. They are elected by the FIFA Congress for terms lasting four years, and for a maximum of three terms.
The Disciplinary Committee is the FIFA judicial body that produces by far the most decisions. The Disciplinary Committee consists of a chairperson, a deputy chairperson and a specific number of other members. It issues the sanctions described in the FIFA Statutes and the FIFA Disciplinary Code on member associations, clubs, officials, players, intermediaries and licensed match agents. In 2019/2020 the FIFA Disciplinary Committee issued 703 decisions regarding alleged breaches of FIFA regulations. 59 percent of these decisions were issued for not respecting past decisions, which is in breach of FIFA Disciplinary Code art. 15. Most of the decisions that were not respected, were issued by the Dispute Resolution Chamber (DRC) which is FIFA's deciding-making body that offers arbitration and dispute resolution between shareholders within football, hereunder football players and clubs. Most of the disputes are related to FIFA's transfer regulations, Regulation on the Status and Transfer of Players (RSTP), and in particular disputes related to training compensation and solidarity contribution. About 23 percent of the decisions not respected were issued by the Players’ Status Committee (PSC) which also handles disputes regulated in RSTP. Seven percent of the decisions that were not respected were issued by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), whilst two of the decisions were issued by the FIFA Disciplinary Committee itself.
The FIFA Appeal Committee is FIFA’s internal appeals body that can issue decisions on appeals against decisions taken by the FIFA Disciplinary Committee and, in principle, by the Ethics Committee. In the 2019/20 season the Appeal Committee issued 27 decisions, mainly cases concerning entering Third-Party Influence agreements (TPI) and breaches of provisions concerning protection of minors.
The FIFA Ethics Committee investigate and issues decisions regarding alleged infringements of the FIFA Code of Ethics committed by any football official, such as bribery and corruption, abuse of position and conflict of interests. The Ethics Committee is split in two chambers, the investigatory chamber and the adjudicatory chamber. The investigatory chamber investigates potential breaches of the FIFA Code of Ethics on its own initiative or based on tips made before it. The adjudicatory chamber is the deciding-making body of the Ethics Committee, as it adjudicates the cases investigated by the investigatory chamber.
Decisions from FIFA’s judicial bodies can, with certain exceptions, be appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS) within 21 days.
UEFA’s organs for the administration of justice
UEFA has established two disciplinary bodies; the Control, Ethics and Disciplinary Body (CEDB) and the Appeals Body. The two disciplinary bodies are organised as a part of is referred to in the UEFA statutes art. 32 as its ‘organs for the administration of justice’ which, in addition to the disciplinary bodies also includes the Ethics and Disciplinary Inspectors, and the Club Financial Control Body (CFCB).
According to UEFA’s Disciplinary Regulations art. 17, the UEFA’s disciplinary bodies have an exclusive competence to deal with alleged infringements of the regulations arising in relation to UEFA matters or the function of an individual which was elected, ratified or assigned by UEFA to exercise a function.
CEDB consists of a chairman, two vice-chairmen and seven other members. As a rule, CEDB issues decisions in the presence of all members, but it is entitled to take a decision if at least three of its members are present. CEDB may impose sanctions in accordance with the UEFA Statutes art. 52-57 and the UEFA’s Disciplinary Regulations art. 6. Sanctions may be imposed on UEFA’s member associations and their officials, match officials, players and all other persons elected or assigned to exercise a function for a club or national association.
Unlike FIFA, UEFA has not published reports or statistics that reveal the number of cases handled by CEBD each year. However, as a general rule, all decisions are published on UEFA’s website. An examination of the published cases reveals that CEDB issues hundreds of decisions every year. The vast majority of the decisions are related to alleged breaches of competition regulations. More specifically, most cases are the result of reports from the Ethics and Disciplinary Inspectors at matches organised by UEFA such as UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League and the European Championship (EURO). An important task for the Ethics and Disciplinary Inspectors is to report irregularities, such as late kick-off, illegal use of pyrotechnics and blocking of public passageways, which normally will lead to CEDB issuing fines to the involved clubs and national associations.
UEFA Appeals Body
The Appeals Body consists of a chairman, two vice-chairmen and nine other members. As a rule, the Appeals Body reaches decisions in the presence of three of its members. The Appeals Body may hear appeals against decisions of the CEDB in accordance with UEFA’s Disciplinary Regulations. It is worth noting that the Appeals Body cannot hear appeals against decisions of the Club Financial Control Body, as these decisions can only be appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS).
The procedure for appeals to the Appeals Body is mostly regulated in the UEFA Disciplinary Regulations. Only the CEDB ‘decisions with grounds’, i.e. decisions that express the considerations of the CEDB panel, can be appealed. Normally CEDB only communicate the operative part of the decision, i.e. the issued sanction, and the sanctioned party normally has five days to request the written grounds. Failure to do so in time will make the decision final. After a party has requested the written grounds, it could take months for UEFA to provide the written grounds, but once they are provided, the party must normally declare that it appeals the decision within three days, and submit grounds for the appeal within eight days.
The Appeals Body will check if the appeal is admissible, and notify other relevant parties, hereunder the ethics and disciplinary inspectors, who will be given the opportunity to reply to the appeal. The hearing is normally conducted in writing, although they might be conducted orally. After the hearing, the Appeals Body will issue a decision, where it upholds, amends or overturns the contested decision. A decision from the Appeals Body can be appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). It is important to note that the time limit for lodging an appeal to CAS is only ten days, as the UEFA statutes has stated a shorter time limit than the 21 days that CAS normally allow.
Club Financial Control Body
The UEFA Club Financial Control Body (CFCB) has the competence for imposing disciplinary measures for breaches of the UEFA Club Licensing and Financial Fair Play Regulations. CFCB may issue decisions regarding whether national associations and clubs fulfil the licensing criteria or the financial fair play requirements, and to decide on cases relating to club eligibility for the UEFA club competitions.
The CFCB consists of an Investigatory Chamber that investigates for the monitor the shareholders’ compliance with the club licencing and financial fair play regulations, and an Adjudicatory Chamber that will issue decisions based on the information provided by the Investigatory Chamber and the involved associations and clubs.
Although the number of decisions issued by CFCB are considerably lower than the number of decisions from CEDB, the consequences of the decisions are generally much more significant for the involved clubs or associations. The concept of Financial Fair Play (FFP) was introduced by the UEFA Executive Committee in 2010 as an attempt to improve the economic and financial capability of the clubs and to increase their transparency and credibility. Clubs that are found to have breached the FFP regulations face though sanctions from CFCB, such as when Manchester City was banned from European club competitions, i.e. UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League, although the decision from CFCB was later overturned by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
Decisions issued by CFCB are final, and cannot be appealed to UEFA’s Appeals Body, but can be appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS). As with decisions from CEDB, decisions from CFCB must be appealed to CAS within ten days.
The Court of Arbitration for Sports
Decisions from UEFA’s and FIFA’s disciplinary bodies can, with certain exceptions, be appealed to The Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS), as CAS is recognized as the appeals body for disciplinary decisions from UEFA and FIFA. An appeal before the CAS may only be brought after UEFA’s internal procedures and remedies have been exhausted, i.e the UEFA Appeal Committee or Club Financial Control Body.
An appeal to CAS will start with a party involved in the previous judicial body, i.e. the appellant, sending CAS a statement of appeal and paying an administration fee of 1 000 Swiss francs. In the statement of appeal the party should nominate an arbitrator from the list of CAS arbitrators. The parties to a case can choose from a list of just under 400 CAS arbitrators appointed by the CAS Board on the basis of their competence in sports or international arbitration. If the body which has issued the decision has not set an appeal time limit, e.g. decisions from FIFA, the appeal time limit is 21 days from the decision was received. It is important to note that decisions issued by UEFA’s bodies will have a ten-day appeal deadline, according to the UEFA statutes.
Ten days after the time limit for the statement of appeal, the appellant must send an appeal brief, were it presents the factual and legal aspects of the case. In the appeal brief, the documents and evidence of the case should be enclosed. The CAS Court Office will examine if the conditions for the appeal are met, and submit the appeal to the respondent, which will be required to submit an answer within 20 days.
Normally three CAS arbitrators will be appointed in a case, whereas each of the parties appoint one arbitrator each, while the CAS president appoints the president of the panel. The parties may also agree that only one CAS arbitrator shall be appointed, typically in cases where it is important to minimise costs. Normally there will be a hearing at CAS's premises in Lausanne, but the panel may decide that the decision will be made on the basis of the written documents of the case.
The CAS decision is final, although there is a limited possibility to appealing the case to the Swiss Supreme Court.
