Leeds United's day in court arrives over £18m Jean-Kevin Augustin RB Leipzig transfer dispute
Leeds United's £18m Jean-Kevin Augustin dispute with RB Leipzig will be heard by the Court of Arbitration for Sport [CAS] today in Switzerland.
The case of Leeds United v RasenBallsport Leipzig is listed for today's hearings, more than two years after the striker joined the Whites on loan from the Bundesliga outfit.
Leeds struck a deal to take Augustin for the second half of their 2019/20 campaign, with an obligation to buy if promotion to the Premier League was secured.
But the Covid-19 pandemic struck, shutting down football for three months, and with Augustin not featuring in Marcelo Bielsa's plans, Leeds essentially sent the Frenchman back to his parent club, electing not to extend the loan deal to the end of the season. Augustin had struggled for fitness, picking up a calf problem having played just three times in the Championship as a substitute and failing to return to the conditioning levels required of Bielsa's players. The Whites subsequently argued that the season being extended should void the obligation to buy Augustin, who then signed for Nantes in Ligue 1.
"When he finished [his loan spell], we evaluated if it was convenient that he stayed with us or went back to his original team," said Bielsa at the time.
"We thought that the most convenient thing was to take the decision we did."
Leipzig appealed to FIFA to intervene and the governing body found in their favour last summer, telling Leeds to pay the transfer fee in installments, before the Premier League outfit appealed to CAS.
Meanwhile Augustin's career is still not back on track. Last season he played 33 minutes of league football, with Ouest-France revealing he had been suffering from both long Covid and Guillain-Barré syndrome, a condition causing muscle weakness. This season he has played 35 minutes, all as a substitute, but not featured in the Nantes squad for their last three games.