F.I.F.A. – Players’ Status Committee / Commissione per lo Status dei Calciatori – coach disputes / controversie allenatori (2020-2021) – fifa.com – atto non ufficiale – Decision 22 September 2020
Decision of the
Single Judge of the Players' Status Committee
passed on 22 September 2020,
regarding an employment-related dispute concerning the coach Aleksandar Stanojevic
COMPOSITION:
Castellar Guimarães Neto (Brazil), Single Judge of the PSC
CLAIMANT:
MR ALEKSANDAR STANOJEVIC, Serbia
represented by Mr. Jan Schweele
RESPONDENT:
BEIJING RENHE FC, China PR
I. FACTS OF THE CASE
1. On 18 December 2018, the parties concluded an employment contract (hereinafter: “the contract”) valid as from 20 December 2018 until 19 November 2019, for which the Claimant was entitled to a total remuneration of EUR 550,000 net payable in 11 instalments.
2. In addition, on 18 December 2018, the company “Capital Trade Limited” (CTL), the Respondent and the Claimant concluded a “License Agreement for the right to use professional football coach’s name, nickname, voice and image” (hereinafter: “the image rights agreement”), for the same duration as the employment contract.
3. The image rights agreement included the following:
“CTL, a company of the group of companies to which the Club belongs, participates in important professional football competitions and has its activities and games widely publicized in the print media and broadcast on TV;
THE COACH is a professional football Player who is employed at the club and has regular visibility in the media as a well-known person in the society, therefore his image, voice. Name and nickname may odd commercial value to goods and service.”
4. Following art. 4 of the image rights agreement, the Claimant was entitled to receive from CTL the total amount of EUR 785,000. Moreover, said clause provides that: “[…] Any delay in the payment of the license fee will accrued a 15% p.a. interest rate in favour of the coach”.
5. Clause 5 of the image rights agreement states that said agreement “constitutes an essential and determining factor of this contract, without it the present document would not have been executed by the parties”.
6. On 8 July 2019, the parties signed two documents, i.e. a termination agreement of the employment contract (hereinafter: “the employment contract termination”) and a termination agreement of the coach’s image rights agreement (hereinafter: “the license agreement termination”, signed between the coach, the club and CTL).
7. In accordance with clause 2 of the employment contract termination, the Respondent undertook to pay to the Claimant the amount of EUR 31,620 net as overdue match bonuses by 15 July 2019.
8. The employment contract termination also stipulates that the contract was mutually terminated based on art. 7.1.1. of the contract (cf. “In 2019 Party A undergoes 4 CSL matches lost in a row”).
9. Clause 5 of the employment contract termination stipulates that “after this agreement is effected, Party A and Party B do not have any further disputes under the employment contract”.
10. In accordance with clause 2 of the license agreement termination, CTL undertook to pay to the Claimant the amount of EUR 250,000 net by 15 July 2019.
11. On 1 June 2020, the Claimant put the Respondent in default of payment of the amount due as per the license agreement termination, i.e. EUR 250,000, granting the Respondent a 10-days deadline to remedy the default, to no avail.
12. On 12 June 2020, the Claimant lodged a claim against the Respondent before FIFA.
13. In his request for relief, the Claimant requested to be awarded outstanding remuneration in the total amount of EUR 250,000 –corresponding to the amount due as per the license agreement termination, plus 15% interest p.a. as from 16 July 2019 until the date of effective payment; or, subsidiarily, interest of 5% p.a. as from the said date until the date of effective payment.
14. In support of his claim, the Claimant explained that, in the “whereas” of the image rights agreement, it is expressly stated and acknowledged what follows: “due to the coach’s employment contract and the possible enhanced use of his image, the parties are interested in paying a fixed amount worth signing the employment contract increasing the amount paid for the coach’s image”. Thus, according to the Claimant, it is undisputed that the intent of the parties when signing the image rights agreement was to consider it as part of the employment relationship between the parties, with the purpose of increasing his wages.
15. As to the non-payment of the amount of EUR 250,000 by the Respondent, the Claimant held that the latter did not reply to his default notice and did not comply with its financial obligations towards him without providing any valid reason.
16. In its reply, the Respondent stated the following:
“Now the Novel Coronavirus pandemic is still raging around the whole world. Our club was shut down twice, the first period was from 30 January to the end of March, and the second period was from 10 June till now. All divisions of Chinese professional football league are suspended. As a professional football club, we lost our most important source of income, share of the broadcast rights. Even we have not receive the full amount of share of the broadcast and commercial rights of 2019 China Super League. Currently our financial status is very fragile. We promise that once we receive all overdue payments of 2019 China Super League season, we will pay the coach, Aleksandar Stanojevic the overdue salary and bonus of 2019 immediately”.
II. CONSIDERATIONS OF THE PLAYERS' STATUS COMMITTEE
1. First of all, the Single Judge of the Players' Status Committee (hereinafter also referred to as the Single Judge) analysed whether he was competent to deal with the case at hand. In this respect, he took note that the present matter was submitted to FIFA by the Claimant on 12 June 2020. Furthermore, the Single Judge noted that the matter was submitted for decision on 22 September 2020. Consequently, the Single Judge concluded that the 2020 edition of the Rules Governing the Procedures of the Players’ Status Committee and the Dispute Resolution (hereinafter: “the Procedural Rules”) is applicable to the matter at hand (cf. art. 21 of the Procedural Rules).
2. Subsequently, the Single Judge recalled that in accordance with art. 3 par. 1 of the Procedural Rules in combination with art. 23 par. 1 and art. 22 lit. c) of the 2020 edition Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players (hereinafter: “the Regulations”) he is, in principle, competent to deal with employment-related disputes between a club or an association and a coach of an international dimension.
3. With the aforementioned in mind, the Single Judge turned his attention to the fact that the Claimant bases his claim exclusively on the termination of the image rights agreement concluded with the Respondent and a private company (CTL).
4. At this stage, the Single Judge noted that the image rights agreement and its termination (i.e. the license agreement termination) only refer to payments related to his image rights and not to his services as a coach.
5. In this context, the Single Judge highlighted that in accordance with his well-established jurisprudence he is not competent to deal with agreements regulating solely image rights.
6. Moreover, the Single Judge observed that the image rights agreement and its termination were concluded, inter alia, with CTL, which was the party responsible to pay the relevant amounts to the Claimant and that “CTL a company of the group of companies to which the Club belongs” is not the only company to be linked with the Respondent.
7. At this stage, the Single Judge in referring to art. 6 par. 1 of the Procedural Rules in combination with art. 22 c) of the Regulations noted that, CTL, the company responsible to pay the relevant amounts is not under the FIFA jurisdiction and therefore does not fall within the competence of the decision-making bodies of FIFA.
8. In view of all the above, the Single Judge decided that the claim of the Claimant is not admissible in view of the fact that it is only based in the license agreement termination and that the party responsible for making the relevant payments under said agreement is not a party admitted in front of the FIFA decision-making bodies.
9. Lastly, the Single Judge referred to art. 18 par. 1 i. of the Procedural Rules according to which “For any claim or counter-claim lodged between 10 June 2020 and 31 December 2020 (both inclusive), no procedural costs shall be levied”.
10. Thus, considering that the present claim was lodged in the relevant period, the Single Judge concluded that no procedural costs can be awarded in this matter.
III. DECISION OF THE PLAYERS' STATUS COMMITTEE
1. The claim of the Claimant, Aleksandar Stanojevic, is inadmissible.
2. The present claim is rendered without costs.
For the Players' Status Committee:
Emilio García Silvero
Chief Legal & Compliance Officer
NOTE RELATED TO THE APPEAL PROCEDURE:
According to article 58 par. 1 of the FIFA Statutes, this decision may be appealed against before the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) within 21 days of receipt of the notification of this decision.
NOTE RELATED TO THE PUBLICATION:
FIFA may publish this decision. For reasons of confidentiality, FIFA may decide, at the request of a party within five days of the notification of the motivated decision, to publish an anonymised or a redacted version (cf. article 20 of the Procedural Rules).
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