CAS counsel for clients abroad
Your case runs to Lausanne, and you are still looking for counsel
Your federation has decided against you. You have days, not weeks. And the sports bar in your country is thin or fully booked. Article R30 of the CAS Code answers the first question: the parties may be represented or assisted by persons of their choice. The Code does not require admission in Switzerland or local co-counsel. Everest Sports Law acts for you before the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, from Ghent. We already run these cases. Our name appears in published CAS awards, and we also act for the International Tennis Integrity Agency, often in London.
Article R29 makes French, English and Spanish the working languages of CAS. We plead in French and in English, and we correspond with you in English, so your appeal reaches the panel in a language the panel already works in. Your own regulations are the other half of the case. They are written in your language, and someone has to read the part that matters. Where a lawyer in your country knows the sport, we work alongside that lawyer. We act for athletes, for clubs and for national federations. A federation can be on either side of a CAS case, and we act on both.
What we take on
These are the cases this page is written for.
The appeal to CAS
Article R49 gives you twenty-one days from receipt of the decision, unless your federation’s own rules set another period, and they often do. Article R32 excludes it from the extensions it allows for other time limits, and Article R37 does the same for the periods that keep a provisional measure alive. The appeal brief is due ten days after that deadline expires. We draft the statement of appeal and the request for relief, we choose the arbitrator with you, and we conduct the arbitration that follows.
Your federation’s own procedure first
Article R47 opens the CAS route only once you have exhausted the remedies your federation’s rules provide. Skip the internal step and CAS can declare the appeal inadmissible. The internal time limit is usually shorter than the CAS one. Latvian football requires written notice within three working days of the decision taking effect, and then the appeal within a further seven working days. Lithuanian football requires the appeal within seven days. We run that disciplinary stage and protect the route to Lausanne.
Whether the CAS route exists at all
An appeal to CAS exists where the statutes of the body provide for it, or where the parties agreed to it separately. That line in Article R47 does more work than clients expect. The Lithuanian football code sends decisions to Lausanne within thirty days, but excludes the decisions listed in the federation statutes. We read the statutes against the regulation, before you pay a Court Office fee.
Urgent and provisional measures
Article R37 lets you ask CAS to stay the decision. In a case of utmost urgency the Division President can order the measure on the application alone, and hear the other side afterwards. The internal remedies must be exhausted first. The request costs the CHF 1,000 (about EUR 1,065) Court Office fee once, and the measure falls away if the appeal does not follow within the Article R49 period.
When the federation is the respondent
We also act for the other side. A national federation whose decision goes to Lausanne has to defend that decision, the procedure that produced it and the rule it applied. That is different work from an athlete’s appeal, and it is work we take on for sports federations. Neither CAS fund is open to a federation, so the cost stays with the body itself.
What it costs, and who pays nothing
Article R65 makes an appeal free of arbitration costs only where the decision is exclusively disciplinary and an international federation or international sports body rendered it. A national federation’s decision falls under Article R64, with an advance of costs and administrative costs from CHF 100 to CHF 25,000 (about EUR 107 to EUR 26,625) on the value scale. The CHF 1,000 Court Office fee is due in both cases. Article R64.1 and Article R65.2 both make it non-refundable, and under Article R65.2 non-payment means the appeal is deemed withdrawn. CAS legal aid and the Football Legal Aid Fund reach natural persons, and exceptionally a football club in the lowest FIFA training category. The euro amounts use the European Central Bank reference rate of 3 September 2026. We set out our own cost position before we start.
Cases we acted in
- CAS 2023/A/9961, tennis. We acted for the International Tennis Integrity Agency.
- CAS 2024/A/10295 and CAS 2024/A/10313, tennis, two appeals running against each other. We acted for the International Tennis Integrity Agency.
- CAS 2025/A/11178, cycling, an appeal against the Union Cycliste Internationale. We acted for the rider.
- A disciplinary decision under the Tennis Anti-Corruption Program. We acted for the International Tennis Integrity Agency.
Who this page is written for
The Baltic states and Central Europe
Latvian football tries to exclude the national courts by contract. Paragraph 5.7 of the LFF disciplinary regulation sends a domestic dispute to the LFF appeals committee and from there to CAS alone, so far as Latvian law allows that exclusion. A Latvian club has already taken that route: CAS 2024/A/10627 Valmiera FC v. LFF. Lithuanian football gives seven days inside and thirty days to Lausanne, and neither appeal suspends the sanction by itself. You have to ask: the Appeals Committee chairman can stay the first decision on a reasoned request, and either the Appeals Committee or CAS can stay the second. Slovakia set up a national Sports Arbitration Tribunal at its Olympic and Sports Committee in 2025. Its jurisdiction depends on each federation writing it into its own founding documents, so the route to Lausanne still has to be read out of the statutes. In Estonia, Latvia and Slovakia we found no national sports law association.
Where you already have counsel
We do not present these markets as empty. Slovenia has had a sports law society since 2004, and it now has more than 120 members. Croatia and Malta each have a chapter in the Legal 500 sports law guide. In Lithuania, a firm has advised national federations since 2018. Where that counsel exists, we work alongside them and take the part of the case that runs in Lausanne.
Latin America and the Caribbean
In October 2020 the Court of Appeal of Trinidad and Tobago held that CAS had exclusive jurisdiction over a dispute with the country’s football association. In Paraguay, Venezuela, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Panama we found no specialised sports bar. We state one limit at the start: Spanish has been a CAS working language since 2020, and we do not work in Spanish. We work in Dutch, French and English. French is one of the three CAS working languages.
Frequently asked questions
How long do I have to appeal to CAS?
Article R49 gives you twenty-one days from receipt of the decision, unless your federation’s own rules set another period, and they often do. Article R32 excludes that period from the extensions it allows for other time limits. The appeal brief is due ten days after that deadline expires.
Do I have to exhaust my federation’s own procedure first?
Yes. Article R47 opens the CAS route only once you have exhausted the remedies your federation’s rules provide. Skip the internal step and CAS can declare the appeal inadmissible. The internal time limit is usually shorter than the CAS one.
Is the CAS route always open?
Not always. An appeal exists where the statutes of the body provide for it, or where the parties agreed to it separately. Some regulations do send decisions to Lausanne but expressly exclude a list of them. We read the statutes against the regulation, before you pay a Court Office fee.
Can I have the contested decision stayed?
Article R37 lets you ask CAS to stay the decision. In a case of utmost urgency the Division President can order the measure on the application alone, and hear the other side afterwards. The internal remedies must be exhausted first, and the measure falls away if the appeal does not follow within the Article R49 period.
What does a CAS procedure cost?
Article R65 makes an appeal free of arbitration costs only where the decision is exclusively disciplinary and an international federation or international sports body rendered it. A national federation’s decision falls under Article R64, with an advance of costs. The CHF 1,000 Court Office fee is due in both cases and is not refundable. CAS legal aid and the Football Legal Aid Fund reach natural persons.
Sports we handle this domain in
Football ↗
Everest Sports Law is your football lawyer in Belgium for clubs
Cycling ↗
Everest Sports Law is your cycling lawyer in Belgium for riders
Athletics ↗
Everest Sports Law is your athletics lawyer in Belgium for selection, doping
Tennis ↗
A tennis lawyer in Belgium for players, coaches and organisers: contracts, prize
Basketball ↗
A basketball lawyer in Belgium for players, clubs, agents and federations: contracts
Volleyball ↗
A volleyball lawyer in Belgium for players, coaches and clubs: contracts, transfers