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

[KS55]

Makes it even more staggering that we’re up before the beak then!

Well, we don't know exactly what the charge details are.

 

[Mazzarelli's Swiss Cheese]

Well, we don't know exactly what the charge details are.

There aren't any - charges can only be brought against someone when they break a law.

 

[ballinio]

I reckon we're innocent

Me too, just got a feeling

 

[WRicko]

We'd have been very stupid if that was the case and I've said before, it'd serve us right if it could be clearly shown that we'd accepted money separately and lumped it in with Etihad's contribution. But the emails seemed to make it clear we didn't do that, and that we were asking that things be done by the book, so that all the money was seen to come from Etihad and them alone. I suspect we've got emails that Der Spiegel conveniently forgot to print which show that beyond reasonable doubt.

The issue of related parties wasn't actually dealt with properly in 2014. UEFA seemed to be claiming Etihad were a related party whereas we denied that. This was never settled. I've said on a number of occasions that, in my view, the smart move would have been to say to UEFA that for the purposes of FFP and FFP alone, we would accept them to be related. Then, if as is suggested, UEFA accepted that the Etihad sponsorship was broadly OK in terms of value, the problem would have been solved. And if we had to write down some of the others by a few million, it only meant we failed FFP by a few more million than we actually did.

I agree we would be stupid to do so and I agree with what you say in relation to the emails but I am not sure they could go after us as much as a two year ban even if we had done this because the money would still be fair value and on behalf of ETihad for money we where owed it would just have come from someone else’s let’s say Stoke where owed 5 million by bet 365 for stadium sponsorship but they had financial difficulty so so Coates paid it he owns both would anyone give a fxxx no interesting aside has anyone been consider related party for FFP ? Never get mentioned in the media but I can think of lots of examples that I might think might be don’t know if they are in the accounts I.e the German clubs Stoke Juventus Newcastle with Sports Direct

 

[Shaggy]

 

[tolmie's hairdoo]

We are relaxed about the CAS case being via video link if needs be.

I want to draw a positive from that, as surely it is always better to see the whites of their eyes.

 

[Aytoun]

Thanks P_B for your response. It is pretty much what my guess would have been based on previous articles from these people. I was tempted to rejoin but it seems they are still the same old, same old.

 

[nmc]

Such funding is common: Arse and Emirates: every Russian club sponsored by companies that are either in receipt of gov funds, are nationalized, or reassured that the gov will step in: PSG and Qatar 'world branding' etc etc.

Chevrolet had US government funding until 2014 (I think) so that straddles certainly the time when they agreed their deal with United - which was 2012, Cant see UEFA having any issues with that deal - despite General Motors admitting the deal was overvalued !

 

[Gordyola]

They're masking the fact that gross indebtedness hasn't decreased though. It's probably increased in fact. So clubs may be better able to support their debt but that's because revenues, profitability and therefore equity has increased. FFP still doesn't outlaw or restrict leveraged buyouts.

Now that the clubs’ income has been hit the service of the debt will be more difficult, thus exposing how inadequate FFP is in protecting clubs from financial problems

 

[ZanteWeatherman]

Thanks for posting this. It answers a couple of questions I've had since we appealed. The two paragraphs above I find the most interesting.

Unless I'm misinterpreting it, the first suggests that we aren't restricted to just the grounds we initially appealed on. That we could, if so minded, include the fact that FFP, itself, is a bogus construct used to prevent investment. This would dovetail nicely with the noises coming out of UEFA concerning "modernising" FFP and Wenger's Damascene conversion to our view of FFP.

Secondly, witnesses. The transition from being an investigator with the various powers that involves and making a written witness statement, to standing in the box giving oral evidence before a Court whilst being cross-examined by top QC cannot be underestimated. Believe me, there is nowhere to hide in the witness box notwithstanding that the pressure is eased slightly by not being in an actual Courtroom. We all saw Platini eviscerated by Martin Samuel in a voluntary interview. Multiply that by 50 and you'll have some idea of the pressure the UEFA witnesses will be under when Lord Pannick starts doing his stuff. God, I wish I could be a fly on the wall for this hearing.

Should be serialised as an "All or Nothing" sequel...............

 

[remember arthur mann]

I reckon we're innocent

So was he...

 

[franksinatra]

I joined " The Athletic " paper on trial very early, but I cancelled quickly as it soon became clear it was little better than a raggy/dipper PR exercise & any articles about us were childish nonsense.

However they still kept my Email address & contact me, usually to offer another trial. This happened yesterday & again as usual they start an article & it then vanishes. This one was about FFP & what it means to MCFC after they spoke to leading experts.

Does anyone have details about what this said & what does it mean to us. I would be very interested to know if P_B has seen it.

There was very little detail in the article to be honest

They outlined what we were charged with which were considered ‘serious breaches’

Overstating sponsorship revenue between 2012-2016 and stated City had failed to cooperate, in this case, with the CFCB.

And then the other point of interest was the fact it stated we could be charged by the Premier League under regulation J7 which relates to falsifying documents when applying for a European Licence. It was stated this could be a points deduction.

Everything else was speculation about the time it would take to release a decision and the effect on champs league places.

 

[Pablo ZZZ Peroni]

I don't know whether CAS even need to decide that. That sounds like a point of law to me, with CAS asked to decide exactly who a 'related party' was. They can decide on points of law I understand but only Swiss Law (as UEFA are Swiss-based) and I can't see how that relates to FFP or accounting standards.

It's possible our defence consists of evidence of the receipt from Etihad in 2013 and maybe a statement from Etihad that this money was all theirs and that no part of it came from ADUG or Sheikh Mansour or at his request.

Re-reading some of the leaks articles from 2018 I can't find reference to the HH email but did find this email from Chumilas to Pearce about the money flow through Etihad:

“I need to understand the mechanism by which additional sponsorship flows through ADUG:
Is it: ADUG Shareholder->>ADUG->>Etihad->>MCFC?

Or is it rather: ADUG Shareholder->>Etihad->>MCFC?"

In this context who is ADUG Shareholder? Logically it is Sheikh Mansour unless it is code for something else.

 

[Dirty Harry]

So was he...

isn’t he the one who claimed a man with no arms strangled his wife ?

 

[remember arthur mann]

isn’t he the one who claimed a man with no arms strangled his wife ?

 

[nmc]

Now that the clubs’ income has been hit the service of the debt will be more difficult, thus exposing how inadequate FFP is in protecting clubs from financial problems

FFP has no interest in Spurs £640m debt because it was borrowed to fund infrastructure. With a stadium that might be closed for more than a year - servicing those bonds could be an issue... or do UEFA turn a blind eye to bankruptcies in some circumstances?

 

[Paladin]

Re-reading some of the leaks articles from 2018 I can't find reference to the HH email but did find this email from Chumilas to Pearce about the money flow through Etihad:

“I need to understand the mechanism by which additional sponsorship flows through ADUG:
Is it: ADUG Shareholder->>ADUG->>Etihad->>MCFC?

Or is it rather: ADUG Shareholder->>Etihad->>MCFC?"

In this context who is ADUG Shareholder? Logically it is Sheikh Mansour unless it is code for something else.

Isn't the more pertinent part of this, the answer to the question? What was the answer?

 

[blueyorkie]

Sorry to pick up on your post particularly but there's a general point I wanted to make so be assured I'm not having a go at you here.

People are talking about us being "guilty". That's nonsense. We haven't killed or assaulted anyone, we haven't stolen anything. We haven't broken any laws at all in fact. CAS won't find us "guilty" or "innocent". What we've allegedly done is contravene some rules. I can't even find evidence of how these rules were accepted by the majority as all I can see is that a body appointed by UEFA, the Club Financial Control Panel, came up with the rules, which were endorsed by the Executive Committee. So anyone who also says "We signed up to them" is also wrong. They were imposed on UEFA associations whether they liked them or not as far as I can see.

The thing with rules and laws, particularly financial ones, is that they're always open to interpretation. That's why we have commercial courts, tax tribunals, employment tribunals etc. Because when sorting out tax, an acountant may take one view and HMRC an opposing one. It's about interpretation and that often involves deciding what the spirit of the rule was. It's also about what you think you can legally get away with.

The central question with our alleged breach is does it matter where Etihad and the other two Abu Dhabi-based sponsors got their money from? And the answer is, as I've shown, yes it could well matter, depending on the circumstances. But my interpretation of the FFP rules is that if Sheikh Mansour didn't pay that money, then we haven't broken any rules and, even if he did, we might not have.

I assume that UEFA's interpretation of the Der Spiegel stories will be one of our key lines of defence (although it might not be) with us arguing they were wrong and we can show that quite categorically. People are also talking about false accounting, which is ridiculous. If Etihad gave us £50m and we recorded that as £50m sponsorship then we've done things quite correctly. If, on the other hand, Etihad gave us £10m and Sheikh Mansour gave us the other £40m, which we recorded as being fom Etihad, then we could have been seen to have misreported the income. but I'm pretty confident we did things by the book.

So please can we not talk about us being "guilty" and this being some sort of court case that will establish our guilt or innocence. It will, I believe, establish if UEFA's interpretation and implementation of its own processes and procedures was correct and whether they had any genuine grounds for re-opening our case.

Probably the most interesting & cogent posting there has been on this topic, as Colin has indicated elsewhere it would be worth listening to him for the Accountancy side & Stefan Borsan for the legalities. 93:20 did an excellent couple of podcasts & written report earlier this year.

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Re-reading some of the leaks articles from 2018 I can't find reference to the HH email but did find this email from Chumilas to Pearce about the money flow through Etihad:

“I need to understand the mechanism by which additional sponsorship flows through ADUG:
Is it: ADUG Shareholder->>ADUG->>Etihad->>MCFC?

Or is it rather: ADUG Shareholder->>Etihad->>MCFC?"

In this context who is ADUG Shareholder? Logically it is Sheikh Mansour unless it is code for something else.

The ADUG sole shareholder is Sheikh Mansour., according to City's accounts. So on the surface that could be seen as damning I guess. But as I've said ad nauseas, it's all about context.

I spoke to two high profile football finance commentators about those articles. One was Kieran Maguire of Liverpool University (who's a Brighton lad not a scouser). Him and Swiss Ramble are the two people people I look up to when it comes to football financial stuff. His considered view was that there was no smoking gun in those articles. I also spoke to David Conn, who isn't exactly known for going out on a limb to defend City, despite being a fan. His view about the articles was "So what?". In other words, there was nothing particularly sensational in them. Again, no smoking gun.

Now think about it. Simon Pearce's reply could have been that smoking gun if it confirmed the money was coming from ADUG. Yet was that reply shown in the article? It wasn't that I can recall. And if it was, it certainly wasn't a smoking gun. Maybe his reply said something like "The money isn't coming from ADUG. It's coming from Etihad via the Executive Council so that's not our problem". Or something else that didn't incriminate us.

The fact they didn't print it suggests that not only did it really not help their case but possibly strengthened ours. So maybe that reply is part of our defence to this.

Edit: just seen Paladin's answer, which is somewhat less wordy than mine but says the same thing.

 

[WRicko]

Re-reading some of the leaks articles from 2018 I can't find reference to the HH email but did find this email from Chumilas to Pearce about the money flow through Etihad:

“I need to understand the mechanism by which additional sponsorship flows through ADUG:
Is it: ADUG Shareholder->>ADUG->>Etihad->>MCFC?

Or is it rather: ADUG Shareholder->>Etihad->>MCFC?"

In this context who is ADUG Shareholder? Logically it is Sheikh Mansour unless it is code for something else.

Perhaps Prestwhich is best to answer this but either way looks bad for us surely it has to be Etihad to MCFC no ADUG shareholder or ADUG or it’s inflated or related party or perhaps or both