Sanctions to be ratified on 20-21 March in Istanbul 7 Feb 2012

At the 24/25 Jan Executive Committee in Nyon, a number penalties for failing to meeting FFP criteria were agreed. Three sanctions are still to be approved and will be tabled at UEFA EXCO in Istanbul at the end of March.  The Media Pack has been attached at the foot of this article and outlined the penalties as follows:

Potential Sanctions
  • Reprimand / Warning
  • Fine
  • Deduction of Points
  • Withholding of Revenue from UEFA competition
  • Prohibition to register new players for UEFA competitions;
  • A restriction on the number of players that a club may register for UEFA competitions
  • Disqualification from a competition in progress
  • Exclusion from future competitions
*shaded blue - new sanctions still to be approved by UEFA congress next March

The 'Deduction of Points' sanction is interesting in that it has not been tabled previously by UEFA or publicly proposed by Platini. This punishment would seemingly apply to Group games in the both the Europa League and Champions League and offers a rather ingenious way of punishing clubs whilst still allowing them to compete in competitions at full strength.  It is interesting that this new punishment has been proposed and agreed at Nyon, suggesting that may well be be a favoured punishment.  

The 'Disqualification from competition in progress' punishment is rather perplexing and it is difficult to envisage a situation where UEFA would apply this sanction for FFP transgression.

Of the punishments that will be ratified in Instanbul, it is interesting to see the much-touted 'Transfer Ban' punishment has, as expected, been watered down so that player registration restrictions would apply to UEFA competitions only. UEFA have previously been concerned about the
about restraint-of-trade issues that would arise following a full ban on player registration.

The 'Restriction on the number of players that a club may register for UEFA competitions' offers some interesting possibilities. However the delightful prospect of a team being forced to field a team of fewer than 11 players seems unlikely!

Although the menu of punishments has nearly been finalised, we are yet to find out what level of non-compliance would trigger a particular punishment.