Premier League faces new legal battle – and nemesis barrister
The Premier League is facing another legal battle with top players and clubs over its financial rules, having already suffered bruising defeats to Leicester and Manchester City this season.
Footballers’ union the PFA has hired leading barrister Nick De Marco KC to challenge the top flight’s plans to introduce a new system of “anchoring” next season, and is also in talks with a number of unhappy clubs.
Under the proposed new rules Premier League clubs would be limited to spending around five times the income of the bottom team, which the PFA argues is illegal on the grounds that it is a de facto salary cap, prohibited under EU competition law.
The PFA previously succeeded in blocking plans by the EFL to introduce salary caps in League One and League Two three years ago by winning a case at an independent arbitration panel. De Marco represented the PFA in that case.
He was also working for Leicester when they overturned the Premier League’s plans to charge them with PSR financial breaches at an arbitration hearing earlier this year.
The 57-year-old barrister of Blackstone Chambers also defended Nottingham Forest against the Premier League in a PSR case last season, while he has recently been engaged by West Ham to help Lucas Paqueta’s fight against FA spot-fixing charges.
The Premier League’s proposed new rules could also face a legal challenge from some clubs, as Manchester City, Manchester United and Aston Villa voted against anchoring last season, while Chelsea abstained.
While precise figures for anchoring have yet to be agreed, a cap of five times the bottom club’s centrally-distributed income is thought most likely.
Bottom-club Southampton earned £103.6m in the 2022-23 season, the last campaign for which figures are available, which would put the spending limit at £518m.
Chelsea spent more than that last season so would have breached the rules and faced disciplinary charges.
The Premier League have already suffered two legal defeats this season. Leicester escaped PSR charges and a points deduction after Di Marco persuaded an independent commission that the rules were “flawed”.
City also scored a significant victory over the Premier League earlier this month when an arbitration panel ruled that three aspects of the competition’s Associated Party Transaction [APT] rules were unlawful.
ECB faces fight to reach Hundred sale target
England cricket chiefs will do well to raise £200m from selling 49 per cent of the eight Hundred franchises, a source who has put together one of the bids told City PM.
The first round of bidding closed last week with two more rounds due to take place before Christmas.
The ECB is targeting between £400m and £500m from the sell-off, which people involved in the process have claimed is unrealistic, on the grounds that claims made in the Hundred tender document do not stand up to scrutiny.
Among the most eye-catching projections made by bankers the Raine Group on behalf of the ECB are claims that overseas TV revenue raised by the Hundred will increase by 1,050 per cent and sponsorship income by 390 per cent between 2024 and 2029.
While the eight franchises have not been given a reserve price in the bidding process, the ECB has said it will not sell teams if it does not receive offers deemed to be of fair market value.
Indefinite wait for automated offsides
The introduction of semi-automated offside technology in the Premier League has been delayed indefinitely due to problems encountered in installing its operating system at all 20 grounds.
With venues varying hugely in size, from over 74,000 at Old Trafford to Bournemouth’s capacity of around 11,000 at the Vitality Stadium, putting in a system that delivers a uniform service has proved challenging.
The Premier League awarded the SOAT contract to American AI firm Second Spectrum in the summer, with the company pledging to show replays of all decisions sent to VAR in stadiums in real-time.
But testing at several grounds has revealed tiny black spots in the coverage, and top-flight chiefs have insisted that it cannot be introduced until it is at least 99 per cent accurate.
SAOT removes the manual element of placing the lines onto players and to pitch level, making it quicker and more precise.
The technology also provides a much-improved graphical visualisation of an offside decision, rather than the current method of displaying lines on the broadcast camera.
This has also caused issues for the Premier League, however, with some of their TV rights partners disagreeing over the graphics to be used in their broadcasts.
Serie A was the first European domestic league to switch to SAOT, introducing it in January 2023 after a high-profile VAR error earlier that season saw a stoppage-time winning goal for Juventus incorrectly disallowed.
LaLiga became the second top European league to move over to SAOT at the start of this season, but there remains no firm date for the Premier League to follow.
Club World Cup hosts angry at Fifa
Fifa’s controversial Club World Cup continues to be plagued by problems with the 12 host venues announced last month now battling it out to secure the most attractive matches.
Sources at several of the chosen US stadiums have expressed unhappiness to City PM at a lack of clarity over the tender process moving forward, not least as the attractiveness and commercial value of staging fixtures in the group stages will vary enormously.
Real Madrid, Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain are among the teams that all of the venues want to host, with other qualifiers from Asia and Africa in particular seen as less attractive.
The hosts’ hopes of obtaining details of a transparent bidding process have hardly increased following the row this week over Fifa granting the final participating spot to Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami, despite the fact that the Major League Soccer play-offs have yet to finish.
Following months of talks with MLS over qualifying criteria, Fifa took the decision to give the final place to the winners of the Supporters Shield at a Fifa Council meeting on 3 October, the day after Inter Miami sealed the regular-season title.
Fifa’s late call angered many MLS clubs, who claim there was clear criteria for who would get the spot, and accused Fifa of doing anything to ensure Messi’s involvement due to the commercial value he will bring to the expanded tournament.
Inter Miami have also been told they will play in the Club World Cup’s first game, scheduled to take place in Miami, on 15 June.