arbitration proceedings, in contrast, the parties may waive certain rights guaranteed by the Convention. However, in such situations, the submission to arbitration must be done freely, lawfully and in an unequivocal manner. In the specific case of Pechstein, the ECHR found that her acceptance of the CAS's jurisdiction had not been freely given. The ECHR compared her situation to situations of parties in previous decisions of the ECHR, in particular with regard to the economic freedom to opt for other alternatives where the arbitration agreement is imposed by one party onto the other. The ECHR held that Pechstein's only option with respect to the Athlete Agreement was to either to accept the arbitration clause or to renounce her professional activities and, as a consequence, to earn her living by practising her sport. As to Mutu, the ECHR held that he, in fact, had a choice to submit his dispute to the ordinary courts rather than an arbitral tribunal. However, given that he had challenged the arbitrator appointed by Chelsea, the ECHR considered that had not waived (in a non-equivocal manner) the right to have his case heard by an independent and impartial tribunal. Nevertheless, the ECHR specifically pointed out that the fact that Mutu had freely chosen to submit his dispute to the jurisdiction of the CAS distinguished his case from Pechstein's case. However, the ECHR found that CAS tribunals do fulfil the requirement of a "tribunal established by law" and did not accept the complaints regarding impartiality and independence made by both Pechstein and Mutu. It held that Pechstein failed to sufficiently substantiate her allegations against the CAS panel's president. Further, Pechstein failed to demonstrate that the mechanism for selecting arbitrators for the CAS arbitrators' list led (in general) to a lack of independence and impartiality of the arbitrators on the list. As to the criticism advanced that CAS lacked independence due to its funding by sporting federations, the ECHR noted that state courts are also funded by the states and yet are still considered to be independent and impartial when assessing disputes involving the state as a party. Finally, Pechstein's allegation that the Secretary General of the CAS illicitly changed the contested decision remains unproven. As to Mutu's arguments, the ECHR found that although Dirk-Reiner Martens heard both his 2005 and 2008 CAS appeals, this was not in and of itself a reason for partiality, as the legal issues to be decided had been very different. The allegation regarding Professor Luigi Fumagalli, in turn, remained unsubstantiated