PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

[Chris in London]

I thought the six year rule applied from the date of the cause of action, in this case Feb 2023 and not the date the PL had 'knowledge' of it?

Generally it runs from the date the cause of action arises - eg you breach a contract, you have six years from the date of breach - but there is an exception where the wrongful act has been deliberately concealed. In such a case the six year rule applies from the time at which the 'victim' discovers the deception.

I don't get why it would be Feb 23 either way, though.

 

[Chris in London]

But why would we do that? What would the gain be?

Fuck knows. Don't ask me to make sense of why they are bringing charges, its hard enough keeping on top of what it is they are actually alleging.

 

[LeonardoDaVnci]

One aspect we just don't is will MCFC park the legal bus or go on the attack ? There is plenty of historical evidence how competitors manavoured their employees into positions of influence to target rules at MCFC. Just read the comments from Gill ex MUFC
CEO as he takes up his new exciting role in UEFA. In hindsight its so obvious what his intentions are...

Manchester United's David Gill elected to European Club Association

Manchester United chief executive joins Real Madrid president on the 15-man board

www.theguardian.com

In addition I can recall on the day of the announcement of the sponsorship with Ethihad Airways the owners of LFC immediately started to cast aspersions re the integrity of the deal, eg demanding details of the negotiations were published in the public domain and details of 2nd and 3rd biders, an absolutely unprecedented response. This war has been on going for a decade, the PL case will end it one way or another for good.

 

[LeonardoDaVnci]

One aspect we just don't is will MCFC park the legal bus or go on the attack ? There is plenty of historical evidence how competitors manavoured their employees into positions of influence to target rules at MCFC. Just read the comments from Gill ex MUFC
CEO as he takes up his new exciting role in UEFA. In hindsight its so obvious what his intentions are...

Manchester United's David Gill elected to European Club Association

Manchester United chief executive joins Real Madrid president on the 15-man board

www.theguardian.com

There's video footage of Gill making a key note speech whilst in his dual MUFC/UEFA roles where he coined the phrase "state owned clubs'. This slur was picked up by the MSM and has been wheeled out ever since as their goto slur aganst MCFC. if anyone has a link to the speech please could you post in a reply.

 

[diamondmonkey]

It was always a requirement that we have to file accounts showing a true and fair view of the club's finances. The allegation is that we didn't do it even before FFP came in.

True, but the value of the sponsorships being too high wouldn’t be relevant before FFP, as long as we stated the correct amounts in the accounts.

 

[Chris in London]

True, but the value of the sponsorships being too high wouldn’t be relevant before FFP, as long as we stated the correct amounts in the accounts.

Yes, but the allegation is that we didn't.

All I'm trying to make sense of is what they charged us with. I'm not saying the charges themselves make any sense..

 

[Jazzman]

Fuck knows. Don't ask me to make sense of why they are bringing charges, its hard enough keeping on top of what it is they are actually alleging.

Yeah, sorry for asking you mate. I was just thinking that it made no sense to do what they accuse us of. No motive I think. I assume you also do not see any sense in that part of the accusations.

 

[meltonblue]

But why would we do that? What would the gain be?

I’ve always thought a lot of it wasn’t actually for our gain, it was for the sponsors.

 

[Maly]

I don’t have your level of knowledge but I thought we were accused of disguising sponsorships. My interpretation is as long as it’s not money laundering if the revenue came from our legitimate sponsors who have ties to Abu Dhabi it wouldn’t matter to HMRC who stumped the cash up.

Anyway, we all know why this is happening, I wish the Sheik had just propped up the Club with a continuous 1.6b soft loan as the Chavs did, then write the debt off, Leicester did it as well the other week for way more money than we are being challenged on, circa 200m in their case.

Money laundering? You only need to launder ‘dirty’ money mate, as in money obtained illegally by criminal activity

100% certain that SM doesn’t need to launder his money bud

 

[hammocity]

Money laundering? You only need to launder ‘dirty’ money mate, as in money obtained illegally by criminal activity

100% certain that SM doesn’t need to launder his money bud

I was stating it as a general rule, as in someone investing in any business, I wasn’t referencing Sheik Mansour, now, if we’re taking the Dippers and their sponsors it’s a different matter.

 

[BrianW]

One possibility is simply that the money isn't the Sheikh's.

My reasoning is he could easily have given a 'soft loan' had he wished to do so, and we would not be having this discussion.

Therefore it seems more likely that the sponsorship money came from someone else, whether a relative or the UAE state I haven't a scooby. But why would the Sheikh disguise something he could have done openly? That makes no sense at all.

 

[WRicko]

One possibility is simply that the money isn't the Sheikh's.

My reasoning is he could easily have given a 'soft loan' had he wished to do so, and we would not be having this discussion.

Therefore it seems more likely that the sponsorship money came from someone else, whether a relative or the UAE state I haven't a scooby. But why would the Sheikh disguise something he could have done openly? That makes no sense at all.

A soft loan wouldn’t count as revenue revenue helps with FFP

 

[WRicko]

I don’t think fair value has anything to do with anything mate as Etihad isn’t a related party

I agree and our auditors also an agree but I think others more clued up on here who also agree have said that UEFA have had advice to opposite affect.

I don’t think he is but if the Premier league are alleging that the Sheik is funding sponsorship and if they could prove it would that not make then defectors related party ? Even if they wouldn’t normally meet the criteria I mean non related parties wouldn’t inflate sponsorships for companies they where sponsoring via funds from the owner of the company they where sponsoring

I think if the Premier league had proof of anything we would be in trouble a hiding the source of the money and b not calling it related even if we could argue it was not above market rate.

 

[Chris in London]

Yeah, sorry for asking you mate. I was just thinking that it made no sense to do what they accuse us of. No motive I think. I assume you also do not see any sense in that part of the accusations.

None

 

[WRicko]

But if any alleged cover up only matters to the PL ( I.e. it is only an FFP matter) AND is not illegal then any such allegation is time barred prior to February 2017?

But submitting false accounts is still illegal / fraud even if it results in paying more tax

 

[Jacko1956]

Money laundering? You only need to launder ‘dirty’ money mate, as in money obtained illegally by criminal activity

100% certain that SM doesn’t need to launder his money bud

Yes like the 1b$ Standard Chartered were fined a few years back when a certain J W Henry was their on their board and low and behold look who the victims main sponser is nowadays ! There's dirt everywhere as long as you dig deep enough!

 

[Jacko1956]

I’m increasingly convinced this is simply about inflicting maximum reputational damage on the City “brand” to stunt its growth and devalue its achievements. I don’t think it’s about the PL achieving a verdict. It’s a clever strategy that ticks a number of boxes for the PL and its “most influential” clubs. The incoming Regulator should largely stop these behaviours in the future, but by then a lot of damage will have been inflicted. I would not be surprised to see these charges shelved at some point, and I can see City defending themselves vigorously until the issues are resolved - though I can’t realistically see them achieving any redress.

I'm certainly not any expert on the details of these charges like some others on here ! But to me the PL have used the old adage if you throw enough mud some of it might stick ! I agree this is totally aimed at damaging our reputation and hoping it deters reputable companies associating themselves with our brand. The UEFA case was convened with CAS as UEFA banned us from European Comps for two years so the case had to be heard quickly by CAS ! This is different there is no time stipulation put on it, City are allegedly paying Pannick 350k a week and can afford it the PL have already paid a legal team to build a case up in 4 years. This will have already cost them. Now they're paying their KC at the commission not the same as Pannick I would imagine! SM can pay for this as long as it takes but I'm pretty sure that the PL wont want to pay for a case that as suggested could take years not months ! Therefore I would imagine the more time City push to clear their name the longer it goes on ! Wouldn't be surprised they suddenly decide that the charges are dropped but by then their hoping the damage to our brand will already have been done ! Therfore we've no case to answer but the stigma will remain and so the slander will continue !!!

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

What do you think about the fact the charges start in 2009 before the first PL monitoring period of 2013 season. Surely the first 4 years of charges can’t be related to any FFP rules?

Clearly that's based on the Mancini Al Jazira contract and I assume they're saying we falsified the accounts by keeping that £1.75m off the books. In the first full year of Mancini's tenure that was about 1% of our turnover, plus we lost nearly £200m.

Even in the event that the commission find that was a dodge, so what? It's completely insignificant. But why would we even try to hide £1.75m in the context of that scale of losses? It's hardly on the Enron scale of fraud.

I presume the PL rule they're citing however is the one where we have to give full details of the manager's remuneration, hence the charge. But they'd need to show that Mancini (and City) had no intention of him fulfilling that contract.

 

[feedmpenzaandhewillscore]

Clearly that's based on the Mancini Al Jazira contract and I assume they're saying we falsified the accounts by keeping that £1.75m off the books. In the first full year of Mancini's tenure that was about 1% of our turnover, plus we lost nearly £200m.

Even in the event that the commission find that was a dodge, so what? It's completely insignificant. But why would we even try to hide £1.75m in the context of that scale of losses? It's hardly on the Enron scale of fraud.

I presume the PL rule they're citing however is the one where we have to give full details of the manager's remuneration, hence the charge. But they'd need to show that Mancini (and City) had no intention of him fulfilling that contract.

How does the panel decide if Mancini did or not did four days of work a year which was stated? That’s going to tough to find concrete evidence for them to screw City over with. All of this up against very heavy losses is a mere drop in the ocean for what City have been accused of.

 

[Chris in London]

Clearly that's based on the Mancini Al Jazira contract and I assume they're saying we falsified the accounts by keeping that £1.75m off the books. In the first full year of Mancini's tenure that was about 1% of our turnover, plus we lost nearly £200m.

Even in the event that the commission find that was a dodge, so what? It's completely insignificant. But why would we even try to hide £1.75m in the context of that scale of losses? It's hardly on the Enron scale of fraud.

I presume the PL rule they're citing however is the one where we have to give full details of the manager's remuneration, hence the charge. But they'd need to show that Mancini (and City) had no intention of him fulfilling that contract.

They would have to show that contract was a sham, which in itself is an allegation of dishonesty