West Ham United can confirm today that our lawyers are drafting a statement of appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, Switzerland in relation to the case involving the club and Sheffield United.
West Ham United cannot comment in detail in response to the FA arbitration panel ruling made public yesterday because of confidentiality provisions but will update supporters via whufc.com as and when appropriate.
However, the club can confirm that while we respect the judgement of the FA arbitration panel, we do not accept that one player's contribution can be placed over that of the team as a whole nor used as the basis for judging the results of a 38-game season.
This ruling undermines the significant efforts of our entire playing squad and coaching staff over the duration of the 2006/07 Premier League season and does not take sufficient account of the performances of the other 19 clubs in the competition.
We acknowledge again that the club broke Premier League rules in the original signing of Carlos Tevez but we were dealt with accordingly by an independent Premier League commission and accepted the significant punishment handed down at that time.
In light of this and the wider implications of this latest ruling for English football we have decided to ask that the case be considered by the Court of Arbitration for Sport.