4 2 February 2006

News:

The UK Government amendments to the Olympic bill have been broadly welcomed by the media industry.

Football Industry experts are downbeat at the prospects of positive results from an independent review into the state of European football announced in London on 22 February.

The Rugby Football Union (RFU) has settled its row with Premier Rugby and agreed to make outstanding Lions payments to Sale, Leicester and Wasps.

Features:

A group of smaller Serie A clubs have recently formed a coalition to challenge a law which allows the individual sale of pay broadcast rights. With the main beneficiaries of this law being Italy's `Big Three': Juventus, AC Milan and Inter Milan, the coalition want a reintroduction of the collective sale of these rights. Threats of strike action and the filing of a complaint with Italian competition authorities are just some of the issues that mean a solution may be difficult to achieve. Luca Ferrari, partner at Studio Associato LCA examines the latest developments.

At the recent Torino Winter Olympics, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), based in Switzerland, was `on circuit' to deal with the various selection and doping cases. The CAS has been fulfilling this role since the Atlanta Games in 1996. Ian Blackshaw, international sports lawyer, examines the CAS's role at these events.

Events such as `Live8' and the Ashes have highlighted the problems posed by ticket touting, particularly as tickets can now be bought and sold from various online sources and are no longer limited to sporting venues themselves. Rhodri Lewis, commercial lawyer at UEFA, assesses the current legislation in place in England and Wales to combat the problem and the changes that need to be made for future events

The huge popularity of fantasy sports leagues in the US represents a billion-dollar industry for those companies operating the leagues. However, a forthcoming court case involving Major League Baseball, which centres on whether player statistics are a protectable property right, threatens to destroy industry operators' revenue streams. Dennis M.P. Ehling and Robyn Callahan of the International Sports Group at Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Nicholson Graham LLP assess the issues.

The proliferation of new media technologies presents lucrative opportunities for rights holders in the broadcasting of sports events. However, the threat of online piracy, through the use of technologies such as BitTorrent threatens to undermine these revenue streams. Daniel Lowen and Dan Harrington of Couchman Harrington Associates explain how the lessons learned by the music industry can help to tackle the problem.

Since the first instance of a company paying for its name to be associated with a sports stadium in the US thirty-five years ago, naming rights are becoming increasingly common, with companies now paying significant fees for the privilege. However, as Robin Lightner Maisashvili and Nina Smith of Olswang explain, there are a number of legal, commercial and marketing issues for the potential parties to consider