CAS 2014/O/3781 & 3782 Sporting Clube de Portugal Futebol SAD v. Doyen Sports, Award of 21 December 2015

At the end of December 2015, the CAS decided on a very public contractual dispute between Sporting Clube de Portugal Futebol SAD (Sporting) and Doyen Sports Investments Limited (Doyen). The club was claiming that two Economic Rights Participation Agreements (ERPAs) it signed with Doyen were invalid and refused to pay the due share on the transfer of one of its players, Marcos Rojo, to Manchester United. Doyen, instead, was arguing that Sporting breached the ERPAs and was therefore liable to pay compensatory damages. The dispute was much publicized, as it was the first case involving a TPO deal heard by the CAS after FIFA’s ban on Third-Party Ownership (TPO), which entered into full force on 1 May 2015. In fine, the CAS award favoured Doyen and found its ERPAs to be compatible with Swiss law. Yet, I argue that the case does not affect the compatibility of FIFA’s TPO ban with EU law or Swiss law.