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

[jrb]

I wonder if Rick Parry is having a night out in Liverpool soon?

“Hi Rick.”

“Fancy meeting you here.”

“So, what happened?”

 

[MillionMilesAway]

Where he moves on to the various options for conclusion.
"It is understood that investigators are confident they can show this decision was not rushed because of this 'statute of limitations' deadline."
Understood by whom? The investigators, the IC? Why are UEFA briefing on a supposedly confidential process.

Thanks. The 'thoughts' and 'understoods' certainly allow various interpretations.

To me, this sounds like an answer to a question "did you rush to meet the deadline" "the committee is confident that we can show this is not true". The answer couldn't be "yes"!

 

[blue b4 the moon]

I certainly don't expect it but if one of the 'big 4' were getting this shit from UEFA the FA, Prem & media would be releasing statements left right & centre in support after all this reflects badly on both the former organisations.

 

[blue ranger]

All I can think is they are in receipt of damning emails with evidence we loopholed FFP. I’m certain the club are watertight on the financial evidence but perhaps these emails show how we skirted round it? They obviously think we have deceived them. It was all quiet until these Spiegel emails came to light.

It was mate. I have to be honest I’m not as confident as others but have got everything crossed we come through this unscathed.

 

[Marvin]

In a good way? Or is it ominous

The BBC's Dan Roan says that "Portuguese judge Jose Narciso da Cunha Rodrigues is the chairman of the adjudicatory chamber and will look at the case with at least three of its four members - vice-chairmen Christiaan Timmermans, of the Netherlands, Switzerland's Louis Peila, English QC Charles Flint and Adam Giersz, Poland's former sports minister.

I assume he has been reading UEFA's disciplinary processes. They publically detail their structure and members of their committees. It maybe that Charles Flint does not play a part?

 

[hammocity]

Surely it's a different thing to PSG though?

City broke FFP losses - got sanctioned.
PSG broke FFP losses - got sanctioned.

City alleged to have tried getting round owner investment rules - being investigated.
PSG - haven't been accused of this as far as I know.

You only have to look at the Neymar and Mbappe deals and the hugely overvalued Qatar sponsorship deals to realise PSG are still flouting the laws. Infantio who was at Uefa at the time and Laurent Platini who is essentially employed by the Qataris were involved in dodgy deals, google those names, there is plenty of speculation on PSG’s misdemeanours but Uefa seem to be very quiet on their issues.

Also when we were fined we got the same punishment as PSG even though they over inflated their sponsorship deals far more than we were supposed to have done.

 

[Skip Donoghue]

This has probably already been mentioned but UEFA are clearly briefing journalists about the nature of their case against City.

First there was the NYT, now the BBC.

If you read the Dan Roan report, he's appears to have a source close to the investigation.

For example,

"And it is thought that Uefa's investigators feel more confident that they have a solid argument this time.

That may be because this case is unusual in that City stand accused of misleading Uefa's investigators, rather than simply a conventional FFP breach of inflating the value of a sponsorship deal and failing to break even.

It has been noted by some at Uefa that City are insisting they have provided evidence that proves that the "accusation of financial irregularities remains entirely false", but in their statements they do not refer to the more pertinent allegation that they may have misled investigators."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/48296885

I don't quite understand the distinction between financial irregularities and misleading investigators. If City's documentation proves the sponsorship agreements are valid, and sourced from Company funds, then how have we misled investigators? I don't understand what they mean by misleading investigators. Do they mean misleading them as to the source of the money? I am very confident that Etihad Airways will be able to corroborate their sponsorship and that does not leave much else of significant value so what is UEFA's case.

Dan Roan leaves it as misleading investigators, but what does that mean. It's supposedly pertinent but it's not obvious to me what their concern is.

I am tempted to think that City have actually been able to refute their main allegation of inflated sponsorships, so they have in UEFA style, changed tack again.

I hope I'm totally wrong with this

But could the misleading investigators part, be that some of the money for the Etihad deal may well have come from the Emir (HH) and even though this is nothing to do with SM, Uefa feel that this was not disclosed originally and so by definition on Uefa's part City have misled them

I'm just putting this out there as we know Uefa like to move the goal posts

 

[Ardwick Green Blue]

All I can think is they are in receipt of damning emails with evidence we loopholed FFP. I’m certain the club are watertight on the financial evidence but perhaps these emails show how we skirted round it? They obviously think we have deceived them. It was all quiet until these Spiegel emails came to light.

I've said this before but it's worth saying it again. The hugely frustrating part of all this is that to a large extent it's self-inflicted. A club of our size, knowing we have lots of enemies in football, should have had state level security in place. That means a fully secure server and high level encryption of emails. We had neither so an individual accessed everything with absolute ease and that really is unforgivable.

 

[BlueAnorak]

For CAS to get involved, City and UEFA have to agree a CAS decision is final. City will probably take the CAS route on any judgement, but it is not the end of the proces. Under certain circumstances City can still go through the Swis Federal courts - the legal jurisdiction of UEFA - especially on procedure related matters. See CAS FAQ:
https://www.tas-cas.org/en/general-information/frequently-asked-questions.html

 

[blueparrot]

I've said this before but it's worth saying it again. The hugely frustrating part of all this is that to a large extent it's self-inflicted. A club of our size, knowing we have lots of enemies in football, should have had state level security in place. That means a fully secure server and high level encryption of emails. We had neither so an individual accessed everything with absolute ease and that really is unforgivable.

We have no idea how easy it was and as millions of e-mails were stolen from many clubs it doesn't sound that self inflicted.