UEFA FFP investigation - CAS decision to be announced Monday, 13th July 9.30am BST

[Centurions]

The allegations
- Manipulated sponsorship income
Leaked documents suggested income that was supposed to come from Abu Dhabi-based sponsors was in effect paid directly by the owners, in contravention of FFP rules.

- Third-party ownership rules may have been breached
City are alleged not to have disclosed an involvement with a fund that owned economic rights of players, including one they signed.

- Manipulated image-rights payments
A scheme called “Project Longbow” sold players’ image rights to another company, which was then reimbursed by the Abu Dhabi United Group. It meant the image rights were taken off the salary bill.

- City paid the agent of Jadon Sancho £200,000 over his move from Watford when Sancho was 14.
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From the Times.

I think -

1) Won't be something they can do anything about. It's clearly against the idea of FFP but UEFA has no jurisdiction on deciding where Etihadis allowed to get its money.

2) This seems pretty black and white because there's going to be a limit on how much they have to disclose and they've either followed that or not.

3) I think this is the most contentious one, the most grey, and it's hard to predict how bad it is without knowing more.

4) Is something that happens all the time but the stakes are pretty low. We could well get a youth signing ban just like we have before, and Liverpool, Chelsea have had before.

1) Agreed
2) Wasn't this being discussed in the emails before they outlawed 3rd party ownership? In which case you'd presume that things changed.
3) Fairly certain UEFA addressed this when they sanctioned us and asked us not to do it again?
4) If true (and they can prove it) then a 1st team ban on signings is a distinct possibility.

 

[threadkiller]

Hopefully, we'll get more ;-)

Nope, looking at this years rankings (if I've understood it right) Real Madrid will get more than us this year, even if we win it. So will Liverpool (because '5 tiimmmeeesssss la')

 

[Colin Bells Boots]

I think the only people who will benefit from this are lawyers and the club as there will be a lot of media owners worried about potential libel charges when this all blows up in their faces. Can you imagine how the first conversation in court would go.

UEFA: Your honour we would like to present the evidence but the hacker who stole them has been imprisoned for his crimes and we have to rely on a German newspaper who he gave some of the emails to before he was charged, is that ok?

Judge: Case dismissed, all fees will be paid by UEFA and I award damages of £50m to MCFC

Wouldn't that be lovely. The bitter cartel cronies would be seriously pissed off .

 

[Skip Donoghue]

If Shiek Mansour has topped up the Etihad sponsorship as is being alledged, why would he have a paper trail that shows it coming directly from him,
if I was moving money from one place to another and I didn’t want it to seem it came from me, I would simply transfer the funds to a another persons account and then ask them to transfer it to the account I wished for it to go to and I ain’t no master business man, accountant or numbers genius, or neither do have any of these advising me,
I call bullshit on the Etihad thing and if the sponsorship has been topped up by someone, there is no way it leads back to Shiek Mansour

 

[MillionMilesAway]

1) Agreed
2) Wasn't this being discussed in the emails before they outlawed 3rd party ownership? In which case you'd presume that things changed.
3) Fairly certain UEFA addressed this when they sanctioned us and asked us not to do it again?
4) If true (and they can prove it) then a 1st team ban on signings is a distinct possibility.

For 3 - I think the finesse here is:
last time - please don't sell image rights to third party companies in this manner; it's weird
now (potentially) - you sold image rights to a third party company funded from ADUG/your owner, and that's a clear attempt to invest more by creative thinking. We didn't know that that was also owner funded, and thus has a new angle to look at

 

[bellsouth]

I think we’re a real inconvenience to UEFA at the moment. They clearly have no choice to announce an investigation, they must be under intense pressure from European clubs and influential execs.
Our success this year adds to that inconvenience which is why I’m worried about VAR on Tuesday, us out of their comp will make their lives much more comfortable

 

[paulchapo]

I think we’re a real inconvenience to UEFA at the moment. They clearly have no choice to announce an investigation, they must be under intense pressure from European clubs and influential execs.
Our success this year adds to that inconvenience which is why I’m worried about VAR on Tuesday, us out of their comp will make their lives much more comfortable

Well we need to play them at their own game. Instead of passing around them all match we need to shoot st every opportunity and players and crowd scream, "Handball!!!" every single time.

 

[aguero93:20]

Well we need to play them at their own game. Instead of passing around them all match we need to shoot st every opportunity and players and crowd scream, "Handball!!!" every single time.

They'll all be ball to hand and all our players will get booked for hassling the ref.

 

[decmancity]

I think we’re a real inconvenience to UEFA at the moment. They clearly have no choice to announce an investigation, they must be under intense pressure from European clubs and influential execs.
Our success this year adds to that inconvenience which is why I’m worried about VAR on Tuesday, us out of their comp will make their lives much more comfortable

This, there is simply too much media talk for them to not do an "official investigation".

Also, I find it incredibly difficult to even imagine that there is any kind of paper trail that leads back to Sheikh Mansour, why would he be so stupid. The one email everyone seems crazy over is the one that references "His highness", unless there is a name after that it could be anyone.

I almost want UEFA to take this to court so they can be embarrassed by trying to use stolen documents as some kind of proof, what about all the investigating they did a few years back before they fined us? are they going to come out and say they didn't do enough and that they were incorrect

 

[Andrew___K]

Well we need to play them at their own game. Instead of passing around them all match we need to shoot st every opportunity and players and crowd scream, "Handball!!!" every single time.

Great plan.