It has been reported that the European Commission met with officials from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in November to discuss rules that restrict athletes’ marketing activities during a ‘blackout’ period around the Olympic Games.
The meeting follows a recent ruling in Germany, which found that certain IOC restrictions breached antitrust rules and unlawfully limited athletes’ ability to earn money from sponsors. Following commitments given by the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB) and the IOC to loosen the rules on German athletes, it is understood that the European Commission may consider extending this approach to the rest of the EU.
The European Commission meeting also comes shortly after a group of British athletes, including Mo Farah, Katarina Johnson-Thompson, Laura Muir and Adam Gemili, sent a Letter Before Claim to the British Olympic Association threatening legal action over its blackout rules.
On the eve of next year’s Olympic Games in Tokyo, the ability of athletes to engage in their own marketing – and the right of event sponsors to protect their investment – will come under significant scrutiny. National Olympic Committees, athletes and the companies that support them will all be watching carefully.
Ajax’s run to the 2019 UEFA Champions’ League semi-final – European football’s premier club-cup competition – provided a welcome dose of nostalgia for those who remember the glory-days of Johan Cruyff in the 1970s and the Champions’ League winning team of 1995. However, in recent years, football clubs with rich histories such as Ajax, Feyenoord, Anderlecht and Club Brugge have generally struggled to reach the latter stages of the Champions’ League. Clubs from the Belgian Pro League and the Dutch Eredivisie find it difficult to compete financially with their counterparts in European football’s biggest leagues where revenues from broadcast deals and other commercial channels are much higher. As a result, it has become common for many of the Benelux clubs’ best players to move abroad in order to fulfil their footballing and financial ambitions. 
Although it is trite to say that modern football clubs are very much run as businesses, there is often little consideration paid to the nuts and bolts of how these businesses work. As businesses, football clubs are not immune from the challenge of poor cash flow, which is prevalent across many industries. As such, clubs need to consider how best to leverage the financial tools at their disposal to improve their cash flow in order to maximise output both on the pitch and off it. One such tool is debt finance. While debt-finance comes in many forms, such as an overdraft, receivables finance has become increasingly prevalent in English football over recent years. 
ere a number of decisions, which left Manchester City fans feeling aggrieved and the general football community becoming increasingly frustrated, and confused, with VAR and the new handball rule.
Liverpool Football Club (“LFC“) have been unsuccessful in their attempts to register two trade marks for the word LIVERPOOL. LFC withdrew both applications after the UK Intellectual Property Office (“IPO”) refused the registration. While the IPO’s decision has not been published, it would seem that the IPO rejected LFC’s applications on the basis that such marks would consist exclusively of indicia of geographical origin. 
When the Twenty20 (“T20”) concept was first proposed by cricket executives in 2002, as a means to freshen up the traditional game and boost viewing figures, it was met with a mixed response. However, almost 20 years on, T20 has revolutionised the game, dramatically boosting exposure to the game, both domestically and overseas.