Can I just check if my understanding of things is roughly correct?
Depending on your allegiances/agenda you can essentially cherry pick parts of the ruling to claim an overall victory in the court of public opinion. The PL "won" on some points and City on others.
PL claiming victory on the finding that the concept of FMV is lawful (though I'm not sure City disputed that?)
City claiming victory on the finding that their current implementation is unlawful.
People can argue about the spin of it on forums and twitter but what is the actual outcome and impact on clubs?
It seems that clubs who favour cash injections from related parties via sponsorship (e.g. City, Newcastle etc) will benefit as the rules around FMV are likely to be loosened and they will therefore see a boost to their p&l?
It seems clubs who favour cash injections from related parties via interest free loans are now going to have to see those rules applied evenly to them and they will therefore see a big hit to their P&L every year.
So regardless of who appears to be winning any argument online or in the press, the long and the short of it is that the ruling has a net benefit to clubs like City. We'll be making more and Arsenal will be making less?
This has always felt inevitable when rules were being made not in the name of fairness, but in the name of protecting those with a head start. Loopholes left in by design were always susceptible to challenges like this.