There is jurisprudence that goes both ways. A Scottish case in the pax' favour and a German case which was found in airline favour. I have the links somewhere I can find them for you later if you think of taking this further.

In either case the airline has to have rock solid evidence and thorough operational records. It has to prove that it had enough spare aircraft for its size etc... just claiming rotation of a single aircraft is not enough. Also the rotation offset needs to have been cause by exceptional circumstance.

The flight originating from hub as opposed to outstation and the time elapsed since original unforeseeable problem that caused the rotation to go out of whack are major factors in pax favor.