FFP - Why I believe we failed

[Anonymous]

Sorry peeps..im with bill and rammy on this...This is just the begining of the changing of the goal posts to fuck us up.
Quick question..If you were up in court and knew you'd done fuck all wrong,would you take the wrap whatever it was...I fucking wouldn't.
If it hurts city or not,I for one will be boycotting all cl games next season.

Its corrupt to the core...Why city have accepted this i will never understand,we have failed fuck all woth the rules they set out initially.

They win then

In my opinion yes Marvin..This is the one thing that will make me fuck football off pal,this is hoe strongly I feel.

I'm of the same opinion as you on this one SHB and was trying to explain as much the other night. We've done fuck all wrong, been punished for doing fuck all wrong but apparently it's a victory for us.

Gotta pick our battles you see and the ones where we are in the right (yet are been made a scapegoat over something we haven't done) are seemingly not the right battles to pick.

You couldn't fucking make it up.

And yes, I have been drinking again.

 

[TrueBlue1705]

They win then

In my opinion yes Marvin..This is the one thing that will make me fuck football off pal,this is hoe strongly I feel.

I'm of the same opinion as you on this one SHB and was trying to explain as much the other night. We've done fuck all wrong, been punished for doing fuck all wrong but apparently it's a victory for us.

Gotta pick our battles you see and the ones where we are in the right (yet are been made a scapegoat over something we haven't done) are seemingly not the right battles to pick.

You couldn't fucking make it up.

And yes, I have been drinking again.

My first thoughts are City are sitting tight and waiting for the Dupont vs FFP case - I'm told a decision should be around March 2015 - If FFP is found to be in contravention of EU law UEFA are in deep shit I would think. I dunno how City would then deal with UEFA, I'm not a lawyer but would think potentially any compensation to City would be about a lot more than the fine we will have paid, they've restricted us in the transfer market and limited our capability to compete in CL.

From what I've read most people with expertise seem to think UEFA are skating on very thin ice with FFP where EU law is concerned - I hope they are right!!

 

[Irwell]

Re: City & FFP (continued)

I've given the links on the other thread and I'd take you through it but am tired and have a migraine so excuse me if I don't. The figures you need are a loss of £98m in 2011/12 with an add-back of £15m and a loss of £52m last year with an add back of £20m. So our actual FFP break even deficits were £83m and £32m respectively. Our wages add-back for 2011/12 was £80m.

That means, on the basis of the 2013 version of the toolkit, we couldn't use the wages add-back as it was less than the break-even deficit.

I'm actually struggling to see it. Given these figures and the application of the 2011 rules I get the following:

BE12: -€121m
BE13: -€62m
Change: +€59m
(condition (i) passed)
---
Aggregate BE: -€183m
Aggregate BE - €5m: -€178m
Contributions: €40m
AG BE - Cont: -€138m
---
AG BE - Cont vs. BE12: -€138m < -€121m
(condition (ii) failed, 'aggregate BE deficit in excess of AD is only due to BE deficit of FY12')

 

[stony]

point still stands,

guidance notes issued by the regulatory authority shouldn't change during the period in question. Even hrmc know that and they are a bunch of gits :)

Trouble with guidance notes is just that. They are just a guide. Nothing more. Up until this week FFP has been a theory and no one could say with certainty how it would all pan out once FFP was put into practice.

But now we can. The accounts/revenue streams have been assessed and codified. We no longer have to rely on a 'guide' or informed guesswork. We now know what is acceptable and how to shape future investment because there is now precedent. Allowing something one year then trying to exclude it a year or two later is just begging for a legal challenge as no company can grow a business if you keep changing the rules (City's statement is a not very subtle warning to this effect). And they are rules now. Not just guidelines. And they are rules that both sides have accepted in terms of what is permissible and what is not.

City do not want a war with UEFA and judging by the settlement UEFA don't want one either. The headline 'fine' is just that. A juicy headline. The settlement itself is one that City can be confident of meeting because they negotiated and agreed to it. It brings certainty to the business model for the next two years so why wouldn't City agree to something they can do without breaking sweat? The alternative is arbitration, legal wrangling, bad PR and years of uncertainty. Accepting the deal is good business and City is a business.

As for PB being off the mark with his FFP projections. Well yeah he was. But then so were City and their accountants so I'd cut him some slack. What I guess everyone overlooked was that politically UEFA had to find some high profile name 'guilty' of failing FFP first time round to make it look good and that high profile name was always going to be us. So yeah it stinks but its just the cost of doing business.

Cheers for that Bob, I always like to read your posts and you've managed to cut through many tedious hours of hyperbolic bullshit and summarised it in one easy post.

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Re: City & FFP (continued)

I've given the links on the other thread and I'd take you through it but am tired and have a migraine so excuse me if I don't. The figures you need are a loss of £98m in 2011/12 with an add-back of £15m and a loss of £52m last year with an add back of £20m. So our actual FFP break even deficits were £83m and £32m respectively. Our wages add-back for 2011/12 was £80m.

That means, on the basis of the 2013 version of the toolkit, we couldn't use the wages add-back as it was less than the break-even deficit.

I'm actually struggling to see it. Given these figures and the application of the 2011 rules I get the following:

BE12: -€121m
BE13: -€62m
Change: +€59m
(condition (i) passed)
---
Aggregate BE: -€183m
Aggregate BE - €5m: -€178m
Contributions: €40m
AG BE - Cont: -€138m
---
AG BE - Cont vs. BE12: -€138m < -€121m
(condition (ii) failed, 'aggregate BE deficit in excess of AD is only due to BE deficit of FY12')

I can't sleep so have moved your post from the main thread into this thread so it's in one place.

You've not adjusted your figures for the infrastructure/youth development costs. Let's start from the top.

In FY12:
Loss -£98m/-€121m to which we can add back £15m/€21m
So BE12 is -£83m/-€100m

In FY13:
Loss -£52m/-€64m to which we can add back £20m/€28m
So BE13 is -£32m/-€36m

So aggregate BE is -£115m/-€136m

The acceptable deviation is -€45m as we assume maximum equity contribution of €40m, meaning the aggregate BE deficit that exceeds the AD is -£76m/-€91m

For the first test, BE12 is -€100m which is greater than the -€91m aggregate BE deficit. so that's OK.
For the second test, the aggregate BE deficit that exceeds the AD is €91m/£76m and the wages of players under contract prior to June 2010 is €98m/£80m. So the wages exceeds the €91m and the second test is OK.

So we can use the £80m wages as we've satified all the tests, as set out in the example table. That means aggregate BE of €136m less wages of €98m, giving an adjusted BE of €38m, which is within the €45m maximum allowable deficit.

So at that point using that guidance (which covers the accounts prepared for FY12 and FY13) we've passed according to my calculation. But according to the subsequent revision produced after we've done that calculation (and was produced for FY14) we fail.

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

point still stands,

guidance notes issued by the regulatory authority shouldn't change during the period in question. Even hrmc know that and they are a bunch of gits :)

Trouble with guidance notes is just that. They are just a guide. Nothing more. Up until this week FFP has been a theory and no one could say with certainty how it would all pan out once FFP was put into practice.

I don't think you've understood the nature of the guidance notes Bob. They're part of the pack sent out by UEFA & tell the clubs how to fill in the returns and what calculation basis to use. So it says things like "Add Figure A to Figure B to get Figure C. Then take away Figure D from Figure C to get Figure E. If Figure E is greater than Figure F then you've passed."

Following that guidance, we think we've passed and we prepare the accounts on the basis of that guidance. Then after we've done that, they issue new guidance and apply that to the accounts we've prepared using the original notes. The club and I both did calculations on the basis of that original guidance.

To use the speeding analogy, if the speed limit on the road is 40, you drive at 40 and think you're OK. Then you get a speeding ticket which you query but get told that they changed the limit to 30 that day but didn't put the signs up till later in the day, after you'd been clocked.

 

[George Hannah]

point still stands,

guidance notes issued by the regulatory authority shouldn't change during the period in question. Even hrmc know that and they are a bunch of gits :)

Trouble with guidance notes is just that. They are just a guide. Nothing more. Up until this week FFP has been a theory and no one could say with certainty how it would all pan out once FFP was put into practice.

I don't think you've understood the nature of the guidance notes Bob. They're part of the pack sent out by UEFA & tell the clubs how to fill in the returns and what calculation basis to use. So it says things like "Add Figure A to Figure B to get Figure C. Then take away Figure D from Figure C to get Figure E. If Figure E is greater than Figure F then you've passed."

Following that guidance, we think we've passed and we prepare the accounts on the basis of that guidance. Then after we've done that, they issue new guidance and apply that to the accounts we've prepared using the original notes. The club and I both did calculations on the basis of that original guidance.

To use the speeding analogy, if the speed limit on the road is 40, you drive at 40 and think you're OK. Then you get a speeding ticket which you query but get told that they changed the limit to 30 that day but didn't put the signs up till later in the day, after you'd been clocked.

so why did we wear it?

 

[yerwot?]

fundamentally then, City have fallen foul of a set of badly written rules, [ can be interpreted in different ways ], this despite seeking and getting assurance that we we were on the right path.
For me, the bitter disappointment is that the 'g 14' has escaped scot-free. I naively thought that once the cloak of respectability had been shown to be nothing more than a cover for naked self-interest , then there would be such a furore that change would be inevitable.
I accept that City were forced to be pragmatic, a long drawn out court case could affect potential deals with sponsors and signings of new players, with perhaps damage to the reputation of ADUG. Not worth the risk, given the vagaries of the 'justice' system.
This thread has benefited greatly from the expertise and insight,not to mention hard work of various posters, hats off to them.
There's just the small matter of world domination on the pitch now,

 

[tonea2003]

its all bollocks, we failed ffp because we are Manchester city. they have been after us from the off. lying cheating mard arse cunts. "fair play" ? protecting the cartel more like. they are fooling no one.

sometimes i wish you would just say what you meant :-)

 

[tonea2003]

point still stands,

guidance notes issued by the regulatory authority shouldn't change during the period in question. Even hrmc know that and they are a bunch of gits :)

Trouble with guidance notes is just that. They are just a guide. Nothing more. Up until this week FFP has been a theory and no one could say with certainty how it would all pan out once FFP was put into practice.

But now we can. The accounts/revenue streams have been assessed and codified. We no longer have to rely on a 'guide' or informed guesswork. We now know what is acceptable and how to shape future investment because there is now precedent. Allowing something one year then trying to exclude it a year or two later is just begging for a legal challenge as no company can grow a business if you keep changing the rules (City's statement is a not very subtle warning to this effect). And they are rules now. Not just guidelines. And they are rules that both sides have accepted in terms of what is permissible and what is not.

City do not want a war with UEFA and judging by the settlement UEFA don't want one either. The headline 'fine' is just that. A juicy headline. The settlement itself is one that City can be confident of meeting because they negotiated and agreed to it. It brings certainty to the business model for the next two years so why wouldn't City agree to something they can do without breaking sweat? The alternative is arbitration, legal wrangling, bad PR and years of uncertainty. Accepting the deal is good business and City is a business.

As for PB being off the mark with his FFP projections. Well yeah he was. But then so were City and their accountants so I'd cut him some slack. What I guess everyone overlooked was that politically UEFA had to find some high profile name 'guilty' of failing FFP first time round to make it look good and that high profile name was always going to be us. So yeah it stinks but its just the cost of doing business.

the bit in bold is significant to me in as much as the murky waters are crystal clear( to those that understand them it is) and now we all know where we stand

will we now see a whole host of clubs cutting their cloth accordingly or being hit with fines in the near future
how will liverpool react seeing as is reported they would have failed also, can they splash the cash?