This book comes at a critical time for the future development of sports
law. It examines key issues of both contemporary and future importance
to the administration of sporting activity in the European Union. The
book is par- ticularly pertinent coming at a time when European
Community law is playing a key role in the restructuring of football's
transfer system. This forms only one small, though highly significant,
part of the fundamental shift that has taken place in European
professional sport; away from the self-regulatory autonomy of sporting
bodies towards a system more rigidly codified and governed by main-
stream legal norms and rules. The law, in particular the economic
freedoms provided for under the Treaty of Rome, has become a key weapon
in the armoury of those who wish to exploit sport to its full commercial
potential, free of self-regulatory constraints. It is not only those
desirous of exploiting the economic potential of sport, who have made
use of European Community law. As sport has become increasingly com-
mercialised and commodified, it has also attracted the attention of the
institutions of the Community, which have been keen to ensure that
sports regulations adhere to Community law.
