EA Responds to Footballers' Accusations Aimed at FIFA 21
Electronic Arts has referred to allegations of illegal use of the image of certain players in FIFA 21. EA Sports representatives have assured that the presence of virtual image of Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Gareth Bale, etc. is completely legal based on agreements signed by the publisher.
Recent months have been full of announcements of subsequent lawsuits against Electronic Arts. Most of them concern charges related to FIFA Ultimate Team, but against their background stands out Zlatan Ibrahimovic's suit for allegedly illegal use of his image in the last installment of the popular football series. As with previous accusations, the publisher did not fail to address the case. In a statement for The Guardian and several other websites, the team at EA Sports confirmed that they have the right to use the images of Ibrahimovic, Gareth Bale and other players in FIFA 21based on agreements with entities such as FIFPro and the Premier League:
"To be very clear, we have contractual rights to include the likeness of all players currently in our game. As already stated, we acquire these licenses directly from leagues, teams, and individual players. In addition, we work with Fifpro to ensure we can include as many players as we can to create the most authentic game. In these instances, our rights to player likenesses are granted through our club agreement with AC Milan and our long-standing exclusive partnership with the Premier League, which includes all players for Tottenham Hotspur."
The statement by EA Sports leaves pretty much no room for discussion. We wrote about the questionable nature of Ibrahimovic's accusations (and the alleged hundreds of players who followed in his footsteps) yesterday, drawing attention not only to the agreements mentioned by Electronic Arts but also to a handful of other bizarre elements of the accusation. However, this does not mean that the case is closed. Bale's representative Jonathan Barnett said in his commentary for The Guardian that the problem boils down to FIFA introducing "many rules and regulations" to ensure that the interests of the players are taken care of, but in practice, these regulations do nothing:
"At the moment, the players don’t get paid. Our big gripe is that Fifa are coming out with lots of rules and regulations saying that they are looking after the best interests of players but obviously they don’t."
Apparently, this time the accusations are not only directed at Electronic Arts, but also at other players connected with football. Is the case of the football players in the FIFA series just a pretext for taking action against the organisation to which the series owes its name? Eitherway, we look forward to further developments.
