LAUSANNE: Chelsea manager Frank Lampard admitted the club will be on the lookout for new faces in the January window after a FIFA-imposed transfer ban was reduced on appeal by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) on Friday.

The ban, imposed following violations in the recruitment of minors, was reduced from two transfer windows to one, which Chelsea already served in the summer.

A fine was also reduced from 600,000 Swiss francs ($607,000; 462,000) to half that amount by the Lausanne-based court.

Lampard insisted he had not yet had any conversations with Chelsea’s board about transfer plans, but will start them now in earnest.

“It’s a positive outcome for us. It allows us the potential to look at the market going forward,” Lampard said at a press conference ahead of Saturday’s Premier League trip to Everton.

“So I’m pleased from a footballing level. It was never my business to get involved in the reasons why or the legal side of it. So from my point of view, for the club moving forward, it’s obviously a good thing.”

A CAS statement said that Chelsea were guilty of violating rules related to the international transfer and registration of minors, “but for a significantly smaller number of players”, concluding that they were only guilty of one third of the violations found by FIFA.

In addition, the breaches of other transfer rules “were found to be less serious than those attributed to Chelsea FC by FIFA”.

The initial ban was announced by football’s world governing body in February, but Chelsea had always denied wrongdoing.

Only the outcome was published Friday, from a single judge who heard the case instead of the usual three-judge panel. CAS said the detailed reasons would be provided to the parties early next year.

Published in Dawn, December 7th, 2019