By Matthew McCormick
Legal disputes between parties involved in sporting activities are not new. However in the last 10 – 15 years, there has been a major increase in the willingness of those parties to turn to formal litigation to resolve disputes concerning organised sport.
The level of money now involved in professional sports today means that contracts concerning player employment, competition/team/athlete sponsorships, endorsements, playing arrangements, media distribution rights, agents – the list could go on and on –are now very significant and/or complex commercial agreements.
Equally (because of the size of the financial implications) there has been an increase in the awareness that losses and injuries sustained as a result of sporting activities can constitute the basis of a legal action for damages. The growing areas of litigation relating to sports include:
- Negligence claims against fellow participants;
- Breaches of player and/or endorsement contracts;
- Claims against supervisory or regulatory bodies;
- Claims against or by clubs for early termination of player contracts;
- Claims against match officials;
- Medical negligence claims in respect of medical advice and/or treatment;
- Challenges to drug test results and/or penalties flowing from them;
- Claims against schools and/or organisational bodies;
- Disputes between professional athletes and their agents.
A single blog that covered all of those topics adequately would be the length of a PhD thesis. In future posts, we will summarise particular aspects of more specific areas of "Sports Law" and relevant legal decisions, both from Australia and abroad.
However, many disputes arising out of sporting contracts and activities are not litigated, but are resolved in mediation, arbitration or other forms of alternative dispute resolution (ADR). Indeed, most (if not all) modern contracts contain specific clauses requiring any disputes to first be referred to informal ADR processes, before a party can commence formal court action. If ADR is successful (when the results often remain confidential) full details of a dispute are not reported and can be kept out of the press (never easy – but possible).
Sports disputes that are litigated are generally extremely personal, highly intensive and have potentially drastic results for the losing side. And they often also involve many "celebrity" individuals. Not surprisingly, they can attract significant media interest -particularly in cases involving the elite level of high-profile sports.
As to Sports Law itself, some within the legal profession still say there is no such thing – there is just the normal law which is applied to people involved in sport. Today, when sport is a global multi-billion dollar industry, that is a simplistic approach; parties to legal disputes involving sports need to use a lawyer with not just litigation experience and expertise, but also a very good (if not intimate) knowledge of the nuances of the industry, to get the best results for the client in what are often very high-stakes conflicts.
And Sports Law is not just a specialisation within Litigation Law. A lawyer's full understanding of the "sports" industry means that clients will often also need advice on drafting of contracts, agreements, etc; protection of intellectual property; restraint of trade; the inner workings of unincorporated associations and clubs; specific legislation (both state and federal) across a range of issues – to repeat what was said at the start of this blog, the list can go on and on.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
