Cardiff and Nantes to go to court in lieu of the Emiliano Sala case for what could be the final act in the tragic saga.
Cardiff City Football Club will make the case during a court in Nantes that they should be compensated more than £100 million for the loss of a player who they feel could have kept them in the Premier League.
Nearly seven years have passed since 28-year-old Argentine striker Sala and pilot David Ibbotson perished in an aircraft accident while crossing the English Channel to join his new team.
A few days prior, he had agreed to a £15 million contract to join Cardiff City from French team Football Club de Nantes, making him the club’s record signing.
Since then, there have been harsh allegations and recriminations, as well as a number of court cases that culminated in Monday’s hearing at the Nantes commercial court.
Cardiff and Nantes have been at odds from the crash’s immediate aftermath. The Welsh club first refused to pay the transfer fee’s first installment until after accountability investigations were completed.
Cardiff was eventually ordered to pay by the football world governing organisation Fifa as a result of the dispute, and the Bluebirds appealed the ruling to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
Cardiff ended an English Football League (EFL) transfer embargo by paying the first installment in January 2023 after CAS upheld Fifa’s decision. They then paid the remaining amount.
However, the football team has consistently insisted that they were ready to pursue more action. In April 2024, they filed a complaint with the Nantes commercial court, requesting 120.2 million euros (£104 million) in damages.
Cardiff’s team will present evidence from court-approved experts, including a statistical report from FC Analytics, a football statistics business, which the club claims indicates Sala might have given them up to a 62% higher probability of remaining in the Premier League during the 2018–19 season.
The amount of damages that Cardiff is requesting is determined by independent analysis of the revenue loss that followed relegation, the ensuing effect on the club’s total value, and the initial transfer fee.