Esports — electronic-sports teams, players and organizers — is not recognized as sport under the Law on Sport: the statute contains no recognition norm for esports, and this should be said plainly. The deals of players, teams and organizers are therefore ordinary civil contracts, structured by the norms of the works contract: the concept of performance, legal and material defect-freedom, avoidance for defect and the moment of payment. On this page we explain how these norms operate in esports deals.
The Concept of Performance — What the Team Buys
By the works contract the contractor undertakes to perform the work provided by the agreement, and the client must pay the agreed remuneration. In esports, the "work" is everything written into the contract: training sessions, appearances at matches, streams, promotional activities — the more precise the list of deliverables, the better the performance can be measured. The estimate rule operates here as well: the drawing-up of an estimate connected with the work is not reimbursed unless otherwise agreed — the reimbursement of equipment, internet or travel costs must be written into the contract expressly. Where the work includes the making of an article and the contractor makes it with his own materials, he transfers to the client the ownership of the article — in esports this means the transfer of content: videos, training materials and other results created by the player on his own resources pass to the team under the contract. This condition should be explained separately — what passes, when, and with which rights.