Croissant Sportif Chebbien v. Fédération Tunisienne de Football (FTF)

At a glance

Parties

Club Croissant Sportif Chebbien (Tunisia) v. Fédération Tunisienne de Football (FTF)

Case no.

CAS 2023/A/9470

Forum and rules

Court of Arbitration for Sport, appeal arbitration under the Code of Sports-related Arbitration (2023 edition); hearing in Lausanne

Treaty

None. Jurisdiction was claimed under Article R47 of the CAS Code and Article 76 of the FTF Statutes

Tribunal

Olivier Carrard (President), Gérald Simon, Alexander McLin

Sector

Football; league standings and relegation

Outcome

CAS declared that it lacked jurisdiction over the club's appeal (operative part 28 July 2023; reasoned award 7 November 2023).

The dispute

Croissant Sportif Chebbien is a football club from Chebba. A CAS order on provisional measures of 29 September 2022 in CAS 2022/A/8986 reinstated it in the Tunisian Ligue 1 for the 2022/2023 season. The FTF placed the club in group A and kept the existing match calendar. It also refused to extend the player transfer period and turned down the club's requests about the appointment of referees. During the season the FTF sanctioned the club to play three matches behind closed doors at a distant stadium. It also gave financial aid to other clubs but not to this one. On 8 February 2023 the FTF published the final standings of the first phase, which placed the club last in group A and led to its relegation to Ligue 2. The club appealed that publication to CAS. It alleged a campaign of persecution and breaches of equal treatment, equal opportunity and non-discrimination, and asked to be reinstated in Ligue 1. The FTF's main defences were these: CAS lacked jurisdiction because the publication was only informative and not a decision; the club had not used the internal remedies against the 20 February 2023 approval of results by the national professional football league (LNFP); and the FTF was not the proper respondent.

Key holdings

1. Under Article R47 of the CAS Code, CAS has jurisdiction over an appeal against a sports body only if three conditions are met: (1) the body issued a decision; (2) its statutes provide for an appeal to CAS, or the parties agreed to CAS jurisdiction; and (3) the appellant exhausted the internal remedies. ¶ 59
2. A communication is a decision if its author intends to change the legal position of the addressee or of others, and if it was communicated to the party appealing. Its form does not matter. Where a 'result decision' sums up earlier 'initial decisions', a party that did not challenge an initial decision cannot attack its content in an appeal against the result decision. It can only challenge the process by which the final result was reached. ¶¶ 62–66
3. The communication of 8 February 2023 brought together all the decisions of the season and was therefore a 'result decision'. These included the club's placement in group A, the calendar, the transfer period, the referee appointments, the referees' decisions on the field, the choice of venues, the sanctions, and the grant of financial aid. ¶¶ 67–68
4. The club did not argue that the initial decisions had been wrongly aggregated in the standings. It attacked the initial decisions themselves. It should have challenged each of them in time, under the FTF's procedures, and it did not claim to have done so or to have been unable to do so. ¶¶ 69–71
5. The initial decisions were themselves appealable decisions and had been communicated to the club. Those on group placement, calendar, transfers, referees and venues were communicated at least tacitly when the club played its matches. The sanction was communicated in October 2022, and the financial aid on the FTF's Facebook page in August 2022. ¶¶ 72–73
6. The communication of 8 February 2023 is therefore not an appealable decision, and CAS lacks jurisdiction. The Panel did not need to examine the other jurisdictional or admissibility conditions. It declared itself without jurisdiction and dismissed all other requests; the paragraphs of the operative part on costs are redacted in the published text. ¶¶ 74–75; operative part

Procedural history

1. 29 September 2022In CAS 2022/A/8986, CAS orders on provisional measures that the club be reinstated immediately in Ligue 1 for 2022/2023.
2. 8 February 2023The FTF publishes the final standings of the first phase, with the club last in group A.
3. 28 February 2023The club files its statement of appeal with CAS against the publication of 8 February 2023.
4. 21 April 2023The Panel is constituted.
5. 12 June 2023Hearing in Lausanne.
6. 28 July 2023Operative part of the award notified: CAS lacks jurisdiction.
7. 7 November 2023Reasoned award issued.

Tribunal, counsel and experts

Decided by

• Olivier Carrard President, CAS Panel
• Gérald Simon Co-arbitrator, CAS Panel — appointed by the claimant
• Alexander McLin Co-arbitrator, CAS Panel — appointed by the respondent

For the claimant

Marc Cavaliero · Nicolas Zbinden · Mohamed Manoubi · M'hamed Ben Brahem

For the respondent

Olivier Ducrey · Amine Mougou · Hichen Dhib

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Keywords

• CAS jurisdiction
• appealable decision
• Article R47 CAS Code
• result decision
• initial decision
• exhaustion of internal remedies
• relegation
• league standings
• Tunisian Ligue 1
• Tunisian football
• LNFP
• approval of results
• transfer period
• referee appointment
• equal treatment
• animus decidendi

Summary generated with AI from the published documents — refer to the award for the authoritative text.