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The Federal Law details the regulation of professional sports, defining the main operators of professional sports (national sport federations, professional leagues, professional clubs, referees, agents, athletes and coaches that take part in professional competitions), as well as their rights and duties. It specifies that the activities of professional sports operators should promote the development of professional sports, in particular, children and youth sports, including the training of reserve athletes, and facilitate progress in high performance sport.

Relations between professional sports leagues and relevant national sports federations are a major focus of the Federal Law.

The amendments concern, in particular, the right of a professional sports league that combines Russian and foreign professional clubs to organise international competitions with the consent of the relevant national sport federation and the international sport federation it belongs to.

In addition, the Federal Law provides for measures to prevent and counter doping in sports. Thus, the federal executive body on physical culture and sport has been removed from the founders of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency, which conforms to the new version of the World Anti-Doping Code. It clarifies that an athlete’s use or attempted use of a prohibited substance or a method prohibited shall not constitute a violation of anti-doping rules if at the time said actions occurred a permit had been issued for therapeutic use in accordance with the World Anti-Doping Agency’s international standards on therapeutic exemptions for prohibited substances, or if the circumstances envisaged by these international standards allowed a permit to be issued after said actions.