2023-10-06 17:06:40
This Monday a new chapter of the war that Javier Tebas has been fighting for years will take place. y Florentino Pérez, with the usual company of the Barça president on duty, in this case Joan Laporta. Starting at 10:30, the Court of First Instance number 63 of Madrid will host the civil trial for the lawsuit filed by Real Madrid y Barcelona Soccer Club against LaLiga for preventing the right of the two clubs to participate in deliberations and votes of the Control Body for the Management of Audiovisual Rights, as El Periódico de España has learnedfrom the Prensa Ibérica group, from legal sources.
This body is an internal LaLiga body intended to “manage the commercialization and exploitation of audiovisual rights respecting the statutory and regulatory standards”, as reflected in its statutes. The two clubs with the most audiovisual income in the last five years (Madrid and Barça) are part of it. two First Division clubs and one Second Division chosen by the rest (Atlético, Osasuna and Ponferradina) and the president of LaLiga, Javier Tebas, who also has the casting vote.
Clifford Chance’s Demand
The civil lawsuit formulated by the two clubs was admitted for processing last February, as this newspaper reported, and has to do with three meetings held by the aforementioned body, of which Real Madrid and Barcelona are members with voice and vote, the March 12, April 12 and May 19, 2022. The lawsuit was filed by Clifford Chance, the same law firm hired by the Super League.
In these meetings, Tebas, president of LaLiga, prevented them from participating in the deliberation and voting on several points on the agenda. The reason given for making this decision, which the clubs describe as “unilateral” and “illegitimate”, is an alleged conflict of interest to decide on audiovisual matters of the Spanish competition, given its participation in the European Super League.
One of the arguments of both clubs to consider their veto illegitimate is that Atlético de Madrid, “one of the founding clubs” of the Super League and participant in the Champions League, also participates in that body. a competition that “occupies an analogous position” to that of the tournament promoted by Madrid and Barça together with Juventus. Atlético participated normally in the three reported meetings.
The arguments of Barça and Madrid
As described in the lawsuit, a meeting of the Control Body was held in September 2021 in which Tebas already raised this conflict of interest, although Neither Real Madrid nor Barcelona were excluded from the deliberation and vote on the points included in the agenda.participating normally.
Between October 2021 and February 2022, the body met on four other occasions, in which the president of LaLiga, supported by legal reports from KPMG and Uría y Menéndezput the conflict of interest back on the table, again without Madrid and Barça seeing their rights as members restricted.
Everything changes in the meeting on March 1, held electronically, and in which the body was going to decide on the marketing of secondary television lots in Spain (bars, open matches, Second Division) and on the opening of the sales processes for the entire competition in several countries in Asia and Oceania.
Tebas informed the representatives of Real Madrid and Barça that they had to leave the room for deliberation and voting on three points on the agenda, given that they “strategic and very important data is given in the audiovisual field that evidently serves as information for the issue of Super League”. “There is a clear conflict of interest, since they are competitions that are clearly competing with each other and here information is being given that obviously serves to create that Super League in that commercial company,” the executive argued.
The RFEF of Rubiales, against
The two clubs refused to leave the meeting and did not do so, but were unable to participate in the deliberation and participation of those three points. As reflected in the lawsuit, the RFEFwho has a voice but no vote in that body (like the CSD), disagrees with the existence of a conflict of interest wielded by Thebes.
Related news
His then general secretary, Andrew Fieldsdescribed the decision of the president of LaLiga as “atrocity”, in a subsequent meeting, held on April 12, 2022, in which The representatives of Madrid and Barça were expelled from the Zoom video call which hosted the conclave during two of the items on the agenda. The same thing happened at the meeting held on May 19, according to the plaintiff clubs.
A day later, Real Madrid and Barcelona presented the joint lawsuit that will be settled this Monday in the court of first instance number 63 of Madrid, understanding that their “fundamental right of association” has been violated, also requesting the “challenge of agreements” taken at said meetings without their vote.
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