A Pragmatic View into the FIFA Judicial Bodies’ Jurisprudence on Third Party Influence

This article seeks to give a practical insight into the applicability of Article 18bis RSTP through the analysis of different scenarios that the FIFA judicial bodies have been confronted with during the last years.

Introduction

Article 18bis of the FIFA Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players (RTSP) has been shadowed by the controversial Article 18ter RSTP that banned third-party ownership (TPO) from football. Nevertheless, while the experts and stakeholders have been focusing the discussion on the pertinence, legality and adequacy of the ban on TPO, the FIFA judicial bodies have been scrutinizing these TPO agreements and other types of contracts, from the perspective of this other provision - 18bis - that is frequently applicable to such transactions. In this regard, while the decisions of FIFA’s judicial bodies concerning Article 18ter par. 1 can be counted with one hand, Article 18bis has led to a much larger number of disciplinary proceedings that have enabled the FIFA judicial bodies to consolidate their approach towards such type of violations.

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