Football leagues, unions file EU complaint against FIFA in calendar dispute

Major bodies representing footballers and football clubs in Europe on Monday filed a complaint to the European Commission accusing FIFA of abusing its position over changes to the international match calendar and tournament expansions.

Football’s world governing body “holds conflicting roles as governing body and competition organiser, which give rise to a conflict of interest,” FIFPro Europe, the European Leagues body and Spain’s La Liga said in a statement.

The bodies presented their complaint at a press conference in Brussels, saying that FIFA’s “imposition of decisions on the international calendar is an abuse of dominance and violates EU law”.

FIFPro is the global players’ union while European Leagues brings together more than one thousand clubs from 33 countries around Europe.

Its member leagues include the English Premier League, as well as the leagues in Italy, Germany and France, but not La Liga, which joined the complaint separately.

Citing recent European court rulings related to the breakaway Super League and the Lassana Diarra case, the bodies said FIFA’s rules and conduct “harm the economic interests of national leagues, and the health and safety of players in European football”.

“A legal challenge before the European Commission has become a necessary course of action to safeguard the European football sector,” they added.

FIFA has been accused of a failure to consult over recent changes to the calendar, such as the introduction of a 32-team Club World Cup.

The first edition of the expanded Club World Cup will take place in the United States in June and July next year and 12 European clubs are due to feature.

Many of the continent’s leading players will therefore be obliged to participate at a time when they would otherwise have been afforded a long close-season break, a year ahead of the expanded 48-team World Cup in North America.

A recent FIFPro report accused football’s governing bodies of putting players’ health at risk amid a constantly growing calendar, while some leading players have evoked the possibility of going on strike to protest against the increasing demands being made of them.

Representatives of domestic leagues, meanwhile, have voiced concerns that their competitions will suffer the most as top players will inevitably miss more domestic matches in order to rest, damaging their brands.

FIFA has previously hit back at criticism and accused leagues of acting with “commercial self-interest (and) hypocrisy”.

“Those leagues apparently prefer a calendar filled with friendlies and summer tours, often involving extensive global travel,” the body said in July after it first emerged that legal action was planned.