Sporting Succession and Co-Existing Clubs: CAS Award Clarifies the Boundaries of Sporting Succession

This article examines the recent award in the case of CAS 2024/A/10308 AO Xanthi v. FIFA and Radoslav Vasilev (“Award”). The Award examined the issue of sporting continuity and sporting succession under the 2023 edition of the FIFA Disciplinary Code (“FDC”)^[1].

The Award is interesting because it analyses if sporting succession can exist when two clubs have co-existed for a long period of time and discusses the factors which are taken into consideration whilst determining if a sporting succession exists between two clubs or legal entities along with the consequences thereof.

It is particularly different from other sporting succession cases because the Original Debtor and the Alleged Successor continued to co-exist for a long time, the Alleged Successor formed a new legal entity which resulted in the formation of the Original Debtor and finally, the Original Debtor liquidated under mandatory provisions of national law, a procedure quite distinct from insolvency and/or bankruptcy.

The focus of the article will be to analyse, if and, how this case differs from the existing jurisprudence^[2] on sporting succession. In that regard, the article will focus on examining whether there can be sporting succession when two clubs/entities including the (original) debtor have continued to exist at the same time^[3] for a long period of time due to regulatory requirements deriving from national law.

The Award is available here^[4].

Article Outline

• Defining Sporting Succession
• Existing regulations on sporting succession
• Key facts and background
  • Timeline of events
• Proceedings before FIFA Disciplinary Committee
• Proceedings before CAS
  • Sporting Continuity Analysis
    • Temporal Nexus
    • Category of Competition
  • Sporting Succession Analysis
    • Specific situation of Greek football clubs and the relevance of Greek law
• Analysis of criteria under Article 21 para. 4 of the FDC
• How does this case compare to previous cases (CAS 2016/A/4918)
• Key Takeaways
• Recent Developments in FIFA Regulations