Gareth Farrelly

Gareth Farrelly is a commercial litigator at Bermans, an Independent Football Panel Member of The Football Association and member of the Premier League Judicial Panel. He also acts as a CAS Arbitrator and Visiting Practitioner in Law at Edge Hill University. 

Prior to his legal career, Gareth was a professional footballer, having played for the likes of Aston Villa, Everton and Bolton Wanderers, as well as the Republic of Ireland. 

1. When did your interest in a career in law begin? 

I suffered an illness twelve and a half years ago. I had a stomach aneurysm on the M40 and was rushed into hospital to have emergency surgery. I had quite a considerable recovery, I was part of the 10% that recover from the type of aneurysm that I had. So, I was only 32 and still playing football. I was still desperate to play, as all athletes are, and my primary concern after my operation was whether I would be able to play football again. However, I soon realised that despite doing my rehabilitation and getting back to a really good fitness level, there were going to be questions over my fitness, so I started to think about what I was going to do next. This kind of corresponded with me having visits to my home from HMRC around debt that was due to them that I knew nothing about, based on investments that my financial advisor had put me into whilst I was playing football. The truth is that’s where my interest in the law came from because whilst trying to recover from that life-threatening illness, I also then had to deal with these issues that I knew nothing about and wasn’t even aware of. The challenge was to try to piece together the investments I’d been sold over a number of years, seek to understand everything that sat behind that, and then try to think about a potential way of being able to not only recover, but navigate a way forward for me personally. Obviously, I went to see a lawyer to discuss all of this and found the meeting really difficult because they were talking to me in terms that I was completely unaware of and didn’t understand. I wanted to understand what had happened to me and also understand what I could do moving forward.  

2. How has your career as a professional footballer helped you as a solicitor? 

I think that’s been really funny because, in some ways, I was very fortunate to have had the first career that I had and it’s unusual for a former professional footballer to go into the law. There are some people who have done it and are exceptionally talented lawyers, such as Stuart Ripley and Udo Onwere, who ‘walked the walk’ before I did. It possibly creates some opportunity in the fact that people are interested in knowing what you’ve done but I don’t think there’s any real shortcut to anything you have gone through or are going through. The same challenges exist: completing your degree, contemplating what your next move’s going to be (solicitor or barrister), applying for training contracts, looking to secure interviews, the buzzwords of ‘commercial awareness’ and trying to upskill yourself as best you can. So, I think it’s helped me, but fundamentally you still have to learn the law, and when you’ve been at a high level in one career, that’s where athletes are quite strong, there is a drive and desire to excel. Stiliyan spoke about being resilient and driven [see previous interview], you want to get to that same level again. As I say, the law is different in that regard as there’s no shortcuts in developing your knowledge and skill, but that’s obviously what I strive for in the legal area as well. 

3. How have you found being on the Premier League Judicial Panel?

The Premier League Judicial Panel was a really positive thing for me. As I say, there are some exceptionally talented, experienced and capable people from across the legal world and other sectors; people that have expertise in accountancy and different other skill sets. It’s unusual to turn around the challenges you faced as a professional footballer and go against the ‘normal’ route of being a coach or a manager. To have been appointed to the Premier League Judicial Panel is something that I am incredibly proud of. There haven’t been a lot of cases so far, but it’s been a really positive experience because, again, you’re sat with people that you’re looking to spend time with and learn from as much as you can. 

4. What do you see as the most significant legal developments in sport today? 

I think the fascinating thing about sports law, for me over the last five years, is how much more legalised everything is becoming. We spoke about athlete activism [with Stiliyan] and the athlete’s voice being involved in their respective sports, I think that’s imperative. However, I think it’s the speed at which everything moves. Everybody may have a case or a specific point that they like to refer to, but for me, what I’ve seen and am experiencing, is that everything is becoming more legalised. Therefore, it’s critically important that athletes are well-read, have a basic understanding of their rights and all of the different elements of the law relevant to their sport. Also, that they have support when needed.

5. What are the rewards of being a sports lawyer? 

The rewards are being involved in cutting-edge legal cases. We can talk about this and try to narrow it down to one particular issue, but we’ve spoken about how quickly everything moves. In the summer, the conversation was around Financial Fair Play, but then you blink and we’re now into the symptoms and consequences of COVID and the challenges that is bringing to not just football, for example, but all sports. It doesn’t discriminate; so many sports and jurisdictions are going through unprecedented challenges. With regards to football, what COVID has done is accelerate a whole host of issues that people were aware of but didn’t want to address yet. In turn, I think that has challenged the leadership of these sports, and that’s what I think we are seeing at the moment. People who are potentially ‘front of house’ are having a very difficult time in dealing with an unprecedented situation, though this is not just limited to sport. In the political world as well, there’s a challenge for leaders. Who are the leaders that are stepping up? Who are the statesmen that we look to in order to [not only] help deal with what we have now, but also ask a different question regarding what we want society and sport to look like as we recover? That can be a short-term question with regards to how we deal with COVID but then, moving forward, what do we want the game to look like? We can go to yesterday [10/11/20] with everything that happened with regards to the appearance in front of the DCMS and the consequences of that, which everyone is trying to process and deal with today. So, I think being a sports lawyer and being a part of that in some small way, there’s a stimulation to that, but for me you will always have your pathology or programming if you like, which was ‘you’ve been an athlete’. Therefore, I’m obviously very athlete-centric and want to see athletes be at the forefront of what those things are going to look like. Their voice has to be a key stakeholder voice, and that’s critical. 

6. What advice would you give to aspiring sports lawyers? 

Good question! I’d say try to develop as much knowledge as you can, through platforms and resources like LawInSport, for example, their conference being on at this time. I myself will be going onto one of the panels later on and I have panels to listen to over the next ten days or so. There’s a degree of being diligent and researching, and everybody will talk to you about the generic application and interview process. However, I think it’s about being willing to ask a different question and look a little bit deeper. Also, think about if you have a passion for a particular area of the law. One of the other points about sports law is that it’s so incredibly broad, so I think it’s about trying to map out what you would like to do. These things; progress doesn’t happen in straight lines and you might have to take a step that is not viewed as the ideal step in your youthful, utopian picture of where you want to get to at that time, but it may invariably help you get to where you really want to. I think it’s all about developing intelligence and knowledge around the sector and the legal firms that are prominent within that, and then trying to navigate your way towards them. The other part of that is not being afraid to speak to people who are there already. One of the things that people will find is you never know unless you ask. Again, each person will have their own, unique experience. I was a mature student when I went back to university, I was thirty-two and had been out of education for sixteen or seventeen years. There’s a humility there in that you realise you don’t know everything, and I still don’t know everything, but it’s having the confidence or that lack of ego to be able to say ‘I don’t understand this, so I need to pick the phone up to somebody who does’. Equally, if there’s somebody in a position that you would invariably like to engage with or speak to, you have to look to make an introduction or not be afraid to ask for assistance. That comes back to not sending someone a generic email by just replacing their name or [falling for] all of the different mistakes or pitfalls that everybody’s open to, but taking a genuine interest in what people are doing. Don’t look at just the abstract or headline, but be willing to actually look into those things in a bit more detail, especially if you have an interest in them – it’s always a little bit easier if you have an interest in a particular subject. However, sports law is ever evolving and will only continue to do so, and it’s incredibly broad, so you don’t have to be ‘limited’ in any way. 

7. Please can you describe a typical ‘Day in the Life of Gareth Farrelly’? 

I don’t think anybody’s got a normal day at the moment with the COVID lockdown and working from home! My practice area is split across litigation and sports law. I deal with the mis-selling of financial products, a lot of which is relevant to current or former sportspeople who may have disputes with their agents or had issues with their financial advisors and are trying to unravel and deal with investments or products that they may have been sold at a different time during their career or subsequently. Day-to-day for me at the moment, I’m very fortunate that I have a number ongoing cases with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), which I love. I’ve done a lot of work as an Independent Football Panel Member with the FA for a number of years, but the CAS work is still new so you’re still learning a new system and having to process and get your head around that, which I’m really enjoying. You have the pleasure of sitting with some incredibly experienced and talented people and learning from them. So, I have CAS work ongoing, I have some judgments to be written in relation to some of the FA cases I’ve been involved with, and then I’m dealing with the day-to-day practice around some of the mis-selling of complex financial products, namely tax avoidance schemes. I’ve also got the LawInSport conference later on, which I’m looking forward to! LawInSport is an incredible resource for those aspiring to a career in sports law. I’m fortunate that I’m still busy at the moment. 
 
8. How do you balance your various commitments? 

I think that’s a challenge for me still, as a young lawyer. The first part of that is I work in a very supportive law firm. Bermans are incredibly supportive of the work I do. Then it becomes a case of trying to manage your workload and diary well. To be honest, I haven’t got that cracked yet! That’s ongoing but there is an art to balancing that and maintaining control of your workload, which is still a challenge, but I’m fortunate that I’m in a situation where I have lots of interesting work to deal with. 

9. What is the best piece of career advice that you have been given? 

They have the old saying, ‘when the pupil is ready, the teacher will appear’. In football, you will have mentors or role models along the way, and they may come in many forms, it could be coaches, managers or other players. My football experience was slightly different, not all good so whilst experiencing a lot of different people, you pick out the ‘goods and bads’ in each one of them. The law has been no different for me. I’ve met people at different times within the law that have helped me greatly and I’ll always be hugely appreciative of that help, and those people are still there now. In recognising what you don’t know, I’m fortunate that there’s still people I go to now, and am comfortable going to, to say, ‘what do you think, how would you approach this, can you help me out or would you advise?’. I am keen to continue to learn and excel in the law. I consider myself very fortunate.