City launch legal action against the Premier League | City win APT case (pg901)

[SalfordCityBlue]

Fully agree. If he goes on all happy clapper. His personal and professional credibility goes out the window.
Then we are back to same one sided narrative.

This is definitely true... But there is a concern (for us, not so much him as I presume they make it worth his while) that they are using him to say 'look even a City "insider" agrees with us!' to strengthen their attempts to do harm to Man City. That's where the frustration comes from. They have people lining up to eviscerate us, and the only person attempting to be 'fair and reasonable' is the one person they allow on from our side.

When Simon Jordan is doing a better job representing City fans' feelings, something has gone awry. City grabbed the upper hand yesterday, there's no need for us to be magnanimous, because they wouldn't have been magnanimous if they'd been more successful. But I get that means they might not have him on at all.

It's like the Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. When the Republicans are in power they say fuck the Democrats, when the Democrats are in power they say we 'need to reach across the aisle'. It's why one side gets things done and the other side gets bogged down in diplomacy.

 

[Phil1]

No I retweeted it as an important counter balance to the other briefing.

I am not backing down from my position because....

get this

I ACTUALLY BELIEVE IT HAVING READ THE DECISION.

I’ve never heard you raise your voice before.

I like it.

 

[IcriedwhenTueartleft]

Has Stefan read The Times headline this morning - "Legal Victory for City" apparently - anybody got a link?

Man City victory as Premier League’s sponsorship rules declared unlawful

Premier League calls emergency meeting with all 20 clubs after two deals with Etihad and First Abu Dhabi Bank were deemed to have been ‘unfairly blocked’ in landmark decision

www.thetimes.com

Perhaps not as he has been very busy reading the whole 176 pages of the report and commented in detail on a lot of it. It's not his job to put forward a pro-City stance, that is the club's responsibility. People should lay off Stefan, he's been staunch in defending us (based on facts) and they should be more critical of the silence from City for much of the last 8 months.

 

[hello]

**** can’t even spell judgment correctly.

I'ld usually defend the odd misspelt word and it really ticks me off when folks use that in an argument. However in this case isn't the command of basic English a fucking prerequisite of the job? if not then surely it should be for a sports editor at a publicly funded organisation and the fat useless **** will be getting his p45 this week?

 

[MCFC1993]

Who won? I have been asked at least 6 times today. Purely because the Premier League played it down as a small matter of incorrect rules that can easily be rectified.
My answer was make your own mind up. City can claim compensation for millions. The Premier League have to change their rules as they have been declared illegal. Clubs have to pay interest on loans designed to give them a competitive advantage aka cheating. I KNOW who won!

And my personal opinion is that I'd agree. The key points we wanted I think we got, at least most of them anyway.

However, I think there is a couple of things that didn't go for us that we would have liked as well but can't have it all.

A nice warm up for the big one next year where everyone will be trying to claim victory. Where once again, the victory line will be different for everybody.

 

[SkyBlueFlux]

The compulsive need for media outlets (and some fans) to categorise a 175-page judgment into a binary "Win" or "Lose" statement which completely guts it of all context and nuance is a big part of the problem here. In fact, it's symptomatic of the way society has evolved. Nobody has time for detail, they just want a sound bite that explains everything in 10 seconds. Legal proceedings don't allow for that level of oversimplification. I can see that part of the reason Stefan is getting criticised (unfairly, in my view), is because he refuses to give into these false dichotomies. It's never as simple, never as black and white, as most layman want it to be. He has gone for the term 'score draw' to appease this crowd because he knows neither of the extreme scenarios (win/lose) are accurate descriptions.

Who "won" is simply a PR exercise that carries absolutely no substance. What does carry substance is the actions that the respective parties will now have to take. And we know the Premier League now have work to do for their rules to comply with law. That work will be even more difficult given the impact it will have on a number of clubs in the league. No, the rules aren't completely buried forever, but if they come back it will have to be in a different form. This will have also impacted them reputationally in the eyes of some, but whether that will come to matter or not remains to be seen.

City, on the other hand, may now have recourse to seek damages. And perhaps their objective was to trash APT forever (I'm not sure it was) in which case they haven't achieved that. Or perhaps prove in a court some level of discrimination in a way that can support their charges in the other case. The extent of how pleased they will be will depend upon whatever objective they had in mind, and all we can do is speculate.

 

[Nickyweaves]

As I understand it, City went to the tribunal because they objected to the amendments to APT passed in February 2024. Prior to that they had accepted the rules for over two years. And had not gone to a tribunal.

According to the reports, the tribunal agreed that the amendments were unlawful. They will now have to be cancelled or changed.
On that basis alone then surely we won.

In addition, we have had APT declared unlawful due to the shareholder loan issue. That is a bonus win.

We have also had the way that the PL dealt with two of our APTs declared procedurally unfair and unreasonably delayed. That is a bonus win.

There were things we lost on, but I imagine there was some opportunism on City’s part. We are in front of a tribunal, let’s see if we can push other points.

 

[HelloCity]

No I retweeted it as an important counter balance to the other briefing.

I am not backing down from my position because....

get this

I ACTUALLY BELIEVE IT HAVING READ THE DECISION.

Do you consider City’s reading to be incorrect? It seems to be at odds with your own.

He added: "While it is true that MCFC did not succeed with every point that it ran in its legal challenge, the club did not need to prove that the APT rules are unlawful for lots of different reasons. It is enough that they are unlawful for one reason."

Cliff added that it was “not correct that the tribunal’s decision identifies 'certain discrete elements' of the APT rules that need to be amended in order to comply with competition and public law requirements.

"On the contrary: the APT Rules... have been found to be unlawful, as a matter of competition law and public law.

 

[Gundoggin]

This is definitely true... But there is a concern (for us, not so much him as I presume they make it worth his while) that they are using him to say 'look even a City "insider" agrees with us!' to strengthen their attempts to do harm to Man City. That's where the frustration comes from. They have people lining up to eviscerate us, and the only person attempting to be 'fair and reasonable' is the one person they allow on from our side.

When Simon Jordan is doing a better job representing City fans' feelings, something has gone awry. City grabbed the upper hand yesterday, there's no need for us to be magnanimous, because they wouldn't have been magnanimous if they'd been more successful. But I get that means they might not have him on at all.

It's like the Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. When the Republicans are in power they say fuck the Democrats, when the Democrats are in power they say we 'need to reach across the aisle'. It's why one side gets things done and the other side gets bogged down in diplomacy.

Great post !

 

[SebastianBlue]

I see the thread has taken the customary BM ‘second day of controversy’ turn.