The Crystal Palace supporters who watched their team win twice at Wembley to claim their first-ever major trophy will never forget how it felt.
Winning the FA Cup is its own prize but the associated qualification for European football quickly turned sour and the Eagles have spent the summer fighting against demotion from the Europa League to the Conference League.
Palace were found in breach of UEFA’s multi-club ownership rules over the involvement of John Textor. Another of his clubs, Lyon, won their own appeal in France to retain their Europa League spot.
Crystal Palace's Europa League ban confirmed by CAS
Palace paid the price after UEFA found that Textor still owned a large percentage of the club when the deadline passed at the start of March, long before the Eagles’ Europa League qualification materialised.
“The Premier League club insisted that Textor had no influence in running Palace – and has since sold his stake to fellow American Woody Johnson,” reports The Mirror.
“The Eagles also claimed [Nottingham Forest] owner Evangelos Marinakis, who controls Olympiakos, had been given extra time to place his Forest shares in a blind trust to skirt the rules.”
Palace took their case to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, where a panel found that Textor had a ‘decisive influence’ over both Palace and Lyon at the March deadline, upholding Palace’s demotion to the Conference League.
Forest are the beneficiaries of the decision, further agitating relations between the two clubs after Marinakis raised the matter with UEFA.
The idea that the governing body would have dealt with it differently without Forest’s intervention is fanciful but feelings are running hot and their first Premier League meeting of the new season, a ‘feisty affair’ in the making, is just 12 days away.
Steve Parish, Palace’s co-owner and chairman, said before Monday’s ruling that: “I am determined to get the right outcome. If we don’t we will have to look at the steps afterwards.”
Sky Sports reported on Monday that the Eagles would now be considering their legal options.
While the Eagles are ‘resigned’ to their Conference League fate on the pitch, they plan to explore the possibility of seeking significant damages.
PALACE PREVIEW Eagles eye Europe and uncharted territory amid backdrop of UEFA fallout
Palace are expected to miss out on revenue of up to £20 million as a result of dropping from the Europa League to the Conference League, a major dent in any club’s income and especially detrimental in the age of Premier League Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR) and UEFA squad cost ratio limits.
The south London club’s Premier League season begins with a visit to Chelsea on Sunday, August 17.
Before they welcome Forest to Selhurst Park a week later they’ll face the first leg of their Conference League play-off against Fredrikstad or Midtjylland on Thursday, August 17.
