It’s a great “goal” to make sports a business

 

As it’s well known during these days the FIFA’s (Fedération Internationale de Football Association) World Cup is carried out, also known as Soccer World Cup, however, what few know is about stakeholders groups in the sports area.

Truth is that millions of on-site and digital spectators leave great sums of money to the business by virtue that are the visible face in front of the multiple actors that play on the field without being the protagonists. For example, there are companies dedicated to sports, sports federations, clubs, and athletes.

But, How do sports topics are regulated -that apparently has a certain universality as regards the rules for each of the activities- for Law?

First of all, we must acknowledge that Sports Law doesn’t cover a single and only legal branch. In such a way come together topics such as contractual agreements, corporate law, intellectual property, law and civil proceedings and, of course, criminal law and arbitration. In addition, it can be affirmed that each one of the topics previously mentioned are ruled by the sports federations’ legal frameworks, as well as each State’s legal framework (both for what it does to its internal framework in sports matters and for its statutes and international regulations on the subject).

In this sense of ideas, while it is common that the obligations established in the laws apply in a particular jurisdiction, that is, only within the borders of such jurisdiction, the

statutes and regulations in sports matter that are “promulgated” by international organizations such as FIFA, UEFA (Union of European Football Associations), FIS (Fédération Internationale de Ski), IIHF (International Ice Hockey Federation), IAAF (International Association of Athletics Federations) and WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency) have world scope.

On the other hand, the premise of national Law becomes relevant in cases of international labor relations, for example, between clubs and foreign players since, in many cases, these prohibit them from reaching contractual agreements.

Legal professionals who intend to develop their career in sporting issues and/or the Firms that pretend to advice federations, clubs, and affiliated athletes to such organizations must be familiar with these private international law rules, as well as experienced in the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), as this one is the responsible to solve the arising sports context conflicts through arbitration or mediation always according to approved proceedings.

Now, if it is to know how much money move today sports like soccer, Deloitte consulting firm estimates it reaches about 500.000 million dollars per year, a figure that exceeds the flow that moves torrents the size of Switzerland, Belgium or Taiwan.

In Mexican soccer, there are 34 teams (Liga MX and Ascenso MX) with a joint value of 2,167 million dollars.

The soccer business is thriving; whereby so many businessmen seek to buy a team to spread out their businesses and managers seek at all cost bring together a winning team.

For this and for much more it is a great goal to make sports a business.