Not only that. These rules expose the difference in the way business is handled in the US (where the motivators for the rule come from) and in the Arab world. Arab business is built largely on trust. You do business with people you trust and you believe what they say they will achieve so you benefit together. So Mansour would have said to Etihad, we are going to build the world's premier football club, be there at the beginning with us and we will share the benefit together in future years. On that basis, they would be happy to invest more at the beginning in return for more return later.
At the risk of sounding brusque, American business is about how much you can get out of any else in the short term.
These rules make no allowance for business practice anywhere other than the US, or more generously, I suppose, the west as a whole. I can see why Mansour thinks they are targeted at businesses built on personal relationships, trust and the long term.