Hylands Assists National Youth Men's Basketball Player to Terminate Player Employment Contract with Club

Recently, a settlement has been reached between the two sides in a player contract dispute between Jiao Boqiao, a star player of the Chinese National Youth Men's Team, and Shanxi Guotou Professional Basketball Club Ltd. in a retrial review process, with the player contract terminated.

Hylands was appointed by Jiao Boqiao to act as a litigation agent in his contract dispute with the Club, claiming the termination of the player employment contract between Jiao Boqiao and the Club on the grounds of the breach of contract by the Club. Restricted by the legal gap related to professional sports and the absence of reference cases, the case has undergone labor arbitration, first trial, second trial and retrial procedures, with the unremitting efforts of the team of Hylands, after two years, the case was finally supported by the judge at the retrial stage, and the termination of the contract between the player and the Club was achieved. Following the termination of the original contract, Jiao Boqiao signed a new professional player contract with his preferred club under the witness of the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) and Yao Ming, President of CBA. In recent years, disputes over contracts between professional basketball players and clubs have been common, however, the laws related to professional sports, especially the administrative law and labor law systems, are still not well developed. Once a dispute related to professional sports arises, legal practitioners are significantly challenged in terms of substantive laws as well as procedures.

The Project has been led by Ming WAN and Guodong WU from Hylands, and team members including lawyers Qing LIN, Yao XU and Zhao WANG (apprentice lawyer) have provided overall process legal services.