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

[terraloon]

Given the seniority and eminence of this panel, (former Supreme Court etc) I’d say it’s findings would not be challenged/changed by a court of law.

I don’t disagree but the point I am trying to make the panel is just that an arbitration panel can be appealed by the PL (which is highly unlikely) but irrespective process has to be followed to remove rules that a panel has given a ruling on

 

[One Fan Clapping]

Interest free loans are effectively disguised equity funding. Of course they should all be charged retrospectively.

 

[The perfect fumble]

Can’t be.

As we all know, these rules were brought in to “prevent another Portsmouth”.

And that is the point.

The new rules that Masters was spluttering about last week, could well be painstakingly re-constructed over a sufficient period of time, and they could, though it's unlikely, produce a robust masterpiece of meticulous exactitude, compliant with UK commercial law in every aspect, or maybe not, but even if they pull off this masterpiece of in-house corporate legislation, it'd still be a crock of shit.

Because it's not the slap dash, make it up on the hoof, nature of these rules that's the real problem, though that was one of the reasons we scored such a significant victory, it's their purpose.

And their purpose cannot be addressed without stating what it is, as opposed to what is spun, and the biggest clue to what it is, is to ask who is best served by these rules? And to get there you follow the money, in this case "old" money, and when you do that you'll find where the real power lies in the Premier League, and what really motivates these powers behind the throne.

Everyone in here knows who the real power brokers in the Premier League are, what drives them and so on, and that Masters is simply their puppet. It is no coincidence that City were happy to take our UEFA case to CAS, happy to take this APT nonsense to arbitration and likewise the 115, because each time we do we're taking these trumped up charges away from the festering shit pits of self interest that spawned them, away from the power brokers and their puppets, and into the light of arbitration, governed by law and facts and reality.

That's why we're confident we'll smash the 115, because we know that nothing these self interested fuckers cook up can stand scrutiny when exposed to impartial legal professionals.

 

[terraloon]

Everton loans are probably for the new stadium, no?

Some were and some weren’t but the ruling around interest on infrastructure projects isn’t as straight forward as that indeed Everton found an anomaly with the rules in that they weren’t able to claim interest on commercial loans until the project was available to proceed in this instance it was the granting of planning permission.
The PL agreed that a concession could be granted but even then there were issues because Everton tried to flip the reasons loans be it a interest free owners loan or indeed one of the commercial loans were applied ironically Everton’s argument was that they just put all the money in one big pot and they didn’t have any governance around which loan was used for what.

 

[chesterguy]

Why is no one asking who drafted up the unlawful amendment? If it was the premier leagues lawyer Bird and Bird who coincidentally are Arsenal's lawyers then sure questions need to be asked as to their competence. Funnily enough i believe it was Bird and Bird who investigated City and raised the 115 allegations. Conspiracy theory or not questions have to be raised

 

[hammocity]

Independent regulation has failed in plenty of other sectors but something has to be done to change the current situation. The PL cant regulate the game because it is not impartial and has been corrupted by a small group of clubs. We have no choice at present. I fully understand your concerns about political interference though.

I'm fully onboard with the idea of an IR, just concerned about the influence that resonates from certain sections of the media and Politicians.

I'm blowing smoke up your arse but your understanding and that of certain posters on here represents a much better knowledge of the game than some MP's could ever have. It could be misconstrued as looking through blue tinted spectacles but the level of knowledge and understanding on here far outweigh's that of the Westminster mob, I don't have that much faith in them.

 

[StillBluessinceHydeRoad]

I think this case plus the emails that Tolmie mentioned may well be part of our case in that we may be able to show that the 115 are at least partially driven by bad faith.

The APT case was won by City in part because our legal team showed that the rules were nowhere near as comprehensive as they should have been and were therefore unlawful. In the Leicester case their counsel showed that Leicester were to be sanctioned for actions which were not prohibited by PL regulations. The regulations have increasingly been called into question and rulings have shown that the PL are to be held to the letter of their regulations. When the "charge sheet" for the 115 was first published City had to inform the PL that the regulations we had breached actually concerned the length of the grass and not entering in 2011 a competition we actually won in 2011!

We presume such blunders have been eliminated but PB has shown that the charges surrounding Mancini's contract deal with clear breaches perhaps in 2023 but with affairs which were clearly not breaches under the regulations obtaining at the time. It may be that there is a dawning realisation that, yet again, the PL doesn't understand its own regulations or that the regulations don't say what the PL thinks and intends. Then there is the matter of lawfulness - if the regulations had meant what the PL intended, would they be lawful?! These will be side issues, rather amusing as well, because City are certain we haven't breached any regulations and certainly haven't broken any laws.

PS Bit worried about the paragraphing. Satisfactory?

 

[StillBluessinceHydeRoad]

Why is no one asking who drafted up the unlawful amendment? If it was the premier leagues lawyer Bird and Bird who coincidentally are Arsenal's lawyers then sure questions need to be asked as to their competence. Funnily enough i believe it was Bird and Bird who investigated City and raised the 115 allegations. Conspiracy theory or not questions have to be raised

This is another issue with the 115. We know interest free loans were left out of the APT regs at the insistence of at least one PL chairman.

How many of the other regs were introduced as a result of pressure, have been broken by other clubs (but not us!) but were not intended to apply to them?

 

[lonestay]

Let's just nuke the prem and be done with it !!! Something's can't be fixed until they are totally broken.

 

[sir baconface]

It's all so unnecessarily complicated isn't it? The PL has worked itself into a right mess over PSR/APT.

The thing some people are missing about retrospective action is that any PSR calculations going forward aren't retrospective, of course, so the 24/25 three year monitoring period which also includes 22/23 and 23/24, at least, will, it seems to me, all have to be calculated with fmv loan interest on soft loans. This affects Liverpool, Brighton, Arsenal and the others and, if they are already close to PSR problems, it could push them into a breach.

I think.

Possibly. :)

Wouldn't that be a shame?

I share your crocodile tears.

Technically you may be correct. However, if I were them I would argue that they would have made different business decisions, therefore revised APT requires revised PSR.

Rather than get into a new wrangle, I’d imagine a compromise would be struck here in the interests of everyone moving forward.