PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

Prestwich_Blue said:
There are lots of HH's in Abu Dhabi but even if it was Mansour, the email said "HH will arrange funding", not "HH will provide the funding" or "It will be funded by HH via ADUG".

So Sheikh Mansour or one of his staff could pick up the phone, ring another HH and arrange for the Executive Council to provide the funding to Etihad. But even in the most extreme case, where SM clearly provided the additional funding from ADUG, as long as Etihad were getting full value for the money, and the sponsorship was seen as fair value (which CAS said it was) then even that might not be a problem, as owners are allowed to sponsor clubs under FFP rules. So in that last scenario, which Stefan and me disagreed slightly on, I'd say he was more likely to be right. I always said that if we agreed Etihad was a related party, then there's nothing UEFA could have done.
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What he said.
 
Prestwich_Blue said:
There are lots of HH's in Abu Dhabi but even if it was Mansour, the email said "HH will arrange funding", not "HH will provide the funding" or "It will be funded by HH via ADUG".

So Sheikh Mansour or one of his staff could pick up the phone, ring another HH and arrange for the Executive Council to provide the funding to Etihad. But even in the most extreme case, where SM clearly provided the additional funding from ADUG, as long as Etihad were getting full value for the money, and the sponsorship was seen as fair value (which CAS said it was) then even that might not be a problem, as owners are allowed to sponsor clubs under FFP rules. So in that last scenario, which Stefan and me disagreed slightly on, I'd say he was more likely to be right. I always said that if we agreed Etihad was a related party, then there's nothing UEFA could have done.
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On the first paragraph, that's a very good point. And if SM was arranging the funding in the way you suggest by getting in touch with the relevant people then that's perfectly understandable. After all, he is the owner and is best placed out of everyone within the club to make that phone call.
 
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KS55 said:
You are rearing the ugly prospect of PL rules clashing with UEFA rules. We agreed with UEFA to follow a certain course of action but if it is part of the PL case that that action was incorrect, we have a right to do on our hands.
The newPL rules on owner funding differ from UEFA rules.
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It’s a right mess as you say.

I think Premier league are in a right mess here.

If they take issue with the Etihad deal based on the emails.

If it happened that the Sheik funded some of the sponsorship they would probably be right in saying that this should be declared that not sure how though.

From conversations by people more expert than me on here related party is a precise legal term that has been copied by UEFA and the Premier League that has nothing to do with this sort of thing but is about ownership and control the Sheik does not own or control Etihad.

However if it happened it would seem like in affect it was related party a non related party would not bump up sponsorship via an owner

But regardless of what we did and what we should have said about what we did the sponsorship was fair / market value. I don’t see how the Premier League can know something else happened. They would have to getting info out of Etihad who they have no jurisdiction over and would have to call the Sheik other executives at CFG and Etihad liars at CAS and perhaps even auditors

I have probably repeated what I said before and what’s been said by others but I wanted to respond to your post it’s all very interesting
 
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I see that fat slug Tebas is spouting his shite about us again
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He comes across as very sad and embittered. Spouting out the same old dross that has already been dealt with via CAS. However, he does make one relevant point. Why have the PL taken so long on this? So, at least briefly, he has shown some sanity.
 
Prestwich_Blue said:
There are lots of HH's in Abu Dhabi but even if it was Mansour, the email said "HH will arrange funding", not "HH will provide the funding" or "It will be funded by HH via ADUG".

So Sheikh Mansour or one of his staff could pick up the phone, ring another HH and arrange for the Executive Council to provide the funding to Etihad. But even in the most extreme case, where SM clearly provided the additional funding from ADUG, as long as Etihad were getting full value for the money, and the sponsorship was seen as fair value (which CAS said it was) then even that might not be a problem, as owners are allowed to sponsor clubs under FFP rules. So in that last scenario, which Stefan and me disagreed slightly on, I'd say he was more likely to be right. I always said that if we agreed Etihad was a related party, then there's nothing UEFA could have done.
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Thinking about it, you're probably right that, if we'd asserted that Etihad was a related party, it wouldn't have mattered if Mansour was funding

UEFA maintained that Mansour had funded most of the Etihad sponsorship, and, despite Etihad having clearly received the sponsorship services under the agreement with City and the sponsorship fee being accepted by their specialist advisers as being of a fair value, saw fit to impose a 2-year ban on us and fine us EUR 30 million. For them, Mansour being involved at all in paying the Etihad sponsorship on its own was sufficient to prove our guilt and justify that swingeing sanction.

It seems ridiculous that a contract under which services are actually being performed at a fair fee can effectively be claimed, as UEFA did, to be fraudulent. I maintain that if City had wanted to devise a dishonest scheme for Mansour to funnel money into the club, they'd have done it much better than was alleged. It wouldn't be hard for the Abu Dhabi state to provide the finance and for Mansour to square it with them through ostensibly unrelated lawful means if that were the objective here.

The truth, as you've regularly pointed out, is that the Open Skies case in the States showed that it was the Abu Dhabi state that was financing the sponsorship. The powers that be over there no doubt think it reflects well on them if City do well, and want Etihad to benefit from the exposure created by a sponsorship of a prominent team in the domestic sporting competition that enjoys the greatest global popularity.

Finally, one more thing to note. Our detractors constantly parrot that we can afford the best lawyers so can get off when we go to arbitration to challenge sanctions against us. Don't these idiots ever take time to reflect that maybe if we can afford top lawyers, we employ some to ensure that we act within the letter of the rules and thus have strong chances of prevailing when we come before impartial authorities as opposed to those that are out to nail us unjustly come what may.
 
WRicko said:
A soft loan wouldn’t count as revenue revenue helps with FFP
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I think I see what you're saying but:
a) The soft loan would be to Etihad and they are already contracted to pay an annual amount.

b) Even if they classed it as related party, since it's a temporary one for Etihad only, don't their rules say only that which is not within FMV(which is only for related party to begin with) is deducted from break even calculations?

The biggest problem would be not disclosing it. UEFA's term for it was "disguised equity funding". The PL have termed it as not giving financial information in good faith.
 
M18CTID said:
On the first paragraph, that's a very good point. And if SM was arranging the funding in the way you suggest by getting in touch with the relevant people then that's perfectly understandable. After all, he is the owner and is best placed out of everyone within the club to make that phone call.
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There is no way that the PL are going after us in this way, based on possible semantics ........... surely!
Especially when you consider the considerable strength and subsequently very (very!) costly legal team!
Is their a smoking gun somewhere?
 
I agree with others, that there was no reason to do any of what's being claimed.

No reason for Abu Dhabi to hide their ownership of City when the takeover happened. Which has been subtly and not so subtly implied since the start of the ownership

No reason for Sheikh Mansour to need to dip into his own pocket to pay Etihad's (a wealthy state's own airline) remaining balance.

No reason to hide payments to Mancini what would have made very little difference to FFP break even requirements, other than risking being sanctioned by UEFA and the PL. I haven't even seen much about the player image rights issue, I take it that must mean it's either a similar story or we just don't have much info on that.

The looser fit and proper owner tests and non-existent FFP constraints in 2008 would have made it much easier than Newcastle's bid, which still got through. As far as I'm aware, there were no failed bids from Abu Dhabi or a related consortium, which would mean they didn't even test the waters. If you really think about it, even if Sheikh Mansour's private ownership was a front. He could and probably would have sold the club to them at any time afterwards. Perhaps in 2011, when Qatar bought the remaining shares of PSG. At that time, City had likely got their valuation on their FMV and would have worked out the roadmap already.

If it was a disguised ownership, where they foresaw all the things that the people with tinfoil hats are giving them credit for. Bearing in mind, they would have had time to prepare for FFP since 2009(where FFP was agreed on) and if I remember right, City employed someone who helped write those rules also. If all of that were true, then it stands to reason that there would be no need for people to chase up remaining balances from Etihad on City's side because that's one of the first things they would have ironed out. How can anyone believe they planned in advance for so much, to hide their tracks but tried to wing it on one of the biggest aspects of FFP?

"Build-in some back-up contingencies for our dodgy sponsorships, for the club we secretly own? Nahhh, we'll just deal with that when we get there and have lots of back and forth, leaving paper/email trails everywhere. It will be fine."

Maybe "no reason" is a bit too strongly put but on the balance of risk vs reward, all I find myself asking is : "In that scenario, would they have thought that was a necessary risk or not?". When all is said and done, everything that has been claimed to have been done, could have been done without breaking any of the FFP rules, to my mind.
 
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The more I think about it the more I am sure it is all complete bullshit.

Etihad airways is a public company. I admit that I know nothing about corporate law in UAE and I am not an accountant. I am fairly sure of one thing though, in the UK or US if someone made large payments to a public company the anti-bribery and anti-corruption police would be all over it.
 
Keith Moon said:
Mancinis payment had nothing to do with ffp, it was a way for RM to avoid tax in Italy.
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Fair enough, so disclosing manager remunerations was there before FFP? But wasn't all of this while he was living in the UK?

Either way, there was still a way for Sheikh Mansour to pay Mancini for consultancy work for his other club, without breaking any PL or UEFA rules.
 
Metalartin said:
I think I see what you're saying but:
a) The soft loan would be to Etihad and they are already contracted to pay an annual amount.

b) Even if they classed it as related party, since it's a temporary one for Etihad only, don't their rules say only that which is not within FMV(which is only for related party to begin with) is deducted from break even calculations?

The biggest problem would be not disclosing it. UEFA's term for it was "disguised equity funding". The PL have termed it as not giving financial information in good faith.
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Etihad don’t need soft loans they are backed by the UAE government as opposed to a very wealthy member of it in the Sheik
 
WRicko said:
Etihad don’t need soft loans they are backed by the UAE government as opposed to a very wealthy member of it in the Sheik
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Yep, I've said as much numerous times. I was just entertaining the theory, to pick holes in it. As I did with, if Manchester City were secretly owned by Abu Dhabi(which there is no legal reason to do either) along with Etihad... Abu Dhabi wouldn't have Sheikh Mansour anywhere near the Etihad finances either. Disguise an ownership, then let your frontman do the very thing the disguised ownership theory says you're trying to avoid(the legal owner, funding the sponsorships)?

From every angle you look at it, since it was all within fair market value, there would have been a safer/legal way to go about it, without changing much for City at all. Every cheat theory, seems an unnecessary risk.

Abu Dhabi wants to own a club? They could have done that.
Etihad is related party? Tell the PL and UEFA it is, no need to jump through any hoops.
Want to overpay Mancini for consultancy work for an Abu Dhabi football club? Nothing to do with City, the PL or UEFA(though it may be a Mancini and Sheikh Mansour/whoever arranged it problem). It doesn't need to be paid by City and it doesn't need to be included in their accounts.

And so on.
 
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