Third Party Ownership in the Field of Professional Football : A Critical Perspective

The objective of this paper is to analyse the phenomenon of Third Party Ownership in the field of professional football, by starting with an analysis of existing literature on this topic, focusing attention on its characteristics, on its possible regulations and on the effects that it may have on the financial fair play regulations. With a qualitative approach, having investigated into the strong and weak points of the Third Party Ownership, the contribution ends by making a proposal aimed at resolving problem related to the nature of this procedure, as well as limiting the negative impact on norms in this field. The main conclusion is that the phenomenon of Third Party Ownership can be introduced into the future football business model that includes an adequate discipline in its operation by federations and international leagues. The latter are in charge of identifying profitable solutions for growth of the field, in observance of transparency and integrity of sports competitions with regards to ethical and moral principles doubted by the diffusion of this phenomenon