Football Leaks/Der Spiegel articles

[Marvin]

The simple reason why Conn is being bashed is that he hates our owners because they are Arabs.

I have never once detected racism in his writing.

 

[Rolee]

I have always stated that if the e-mails were obtained illegally, then UEFA are not allowed to use them, to bring a case against us. This is because whoever has obtained them and passed them on to Der Spiegel, has broken the law. Therefore city's lawyers should now be looking at getting law suit against Der Spiegel, forcing them to had over all the information that they have obtained illegally, or face a law suit for substantial damages. I would be looking at damages in the reason of £50m+.

The club could well be using a more subtle approach in taking Der Spiegel on. Interesting that one of their star writers was outed as a fraud just months after their smear campaign on City, could be just a coincidence but there again....

 

[Marvin]

I have always stated that if the e-mails were obtained illegally, then UEFA are not allowed to use them, to bring a case against us. This is because whoever has obtained them and passed them on to Der Spiegel, has broken the law. Therefore city's lawyers should now be looking at getting law suit against Der Spiegel, forcing them to had over all the information that they have obtained illegally, or face a law suit for substantial damages. I would be looking at damages in the reason of £50m+.

There is a claim that they were not hacked, however I struggle to understand how else they could be obtained.

The most important thing for me remains that the Etihad deal has not been compromised and that is 90% of the UAE finance. Whilst that remains intact, the case created by the email chain is weak - it just presents an organisation being threatened by the prospect of sanctions, which were in the end implemented anyway.

 

[Didsbury Dave]

The simple reason why Conn is being bashed is that he hates our owners because they are Arabs.

Spend years whingeing like a 12 year old about sports journalists supposedly letting their club allegiences colour their writing.

Then a City supporting journalist doesn't follow the Pavlovian City fan Groupthink pantomime "handbook" and he's a traitor.

Welcome to the warped world of the football fan.

 

[Tim of the Oak]

I'm not sure why people are bashing Conn over this.

Martyn Ziegler of The Times took the words "concrete case" uttered by Aleksandr Ceferin and turned them into a hysterical story with virtually no basis in fact. All other outlets took this as gospel and repeated the story with their own twist added. Conn was the only one who actually talked to people and came up with a completely different, less sensational version that appears to have been far more accurate. Ziegler was still trying to push his line a couple of weeks ago and, once again, Conn has pulled the rug from under his feet.

Yes Colin

It was the FCUM stuff I was agreeing with.

I think the Der Spiegel hacks / leaks have had a bigger impact on one or two other journos. Henry Winter has shifted from his usual pro City stance, for example, that appears to be linked to the inflated sponsorship deal allegations.

 

[George Hannah]

Spend years whingeing like a 12 year old about sports journalists supposedly letting their club allegiences colour their writing. Then a City supporting journalist doesn't follow the Pavlovian City fan Groupthink pantomime "handbook" and he's a traitor.
Welcome to the warped world of the football fan.

Two quick questions:

Is Mancini higher on your sociopathic hatelist than the other 17.4 million?
"Journalists supposedly letting their club allegiances colour their writing" - is that printed on a notice nailed outside your padded cell?

 

[asahartford1]

Is there any evidence that Conn does not like our owners, either because of their bank balance or ethnicity.?
The title of his "definitive" book isn't entirely positive, but I know of nothing else.

His article was nothing new was it really.

 

[Tim of the Oak]

Is there any evidence that Conn does not like our owners, either because of their bank balance or ethnicity.?
The title of his "definitive" book isn't entirely positive, but I know of nothing else.

His article was nothing new was it really.

No

Btw a copy of “Richer than God” is in my local Oxfam. I’ve alrwady got it though.

 

[aguero93:20]

What we don’t know about UEFA at the moment is what information they have received from Der Spiegel. Have they received copies of emails have they received or have they simply read the information in Der Spiegel?

If they have simply read the reports and are now reacting to them then there is very little new for them to act on it as there only allegations in articles. If they don’t have the emails themselves then it’s difficult for them to carry out an investigation without demanding City hand over a number of emails. I can’t see City handing over emails based on an allegation contained an article. Then where do UEFA GO?

It’s very hard for anyone to pursue a prosecution or investigation under FFP if they don’t have the evidence. City are likely to supply the evidence. So unless UEFA have the emails themselves they can do very little.

Furthermore even if they do have the emails the question is how they they were obtained is an issue. If the emails were illegally obtained then I don’t believe UEFA can use them to form the basis of investigation.

More than likely they've just read Der Spiegel, who were a secondary source in the first place. We don't know that Der Spiegel have possession of the emails.

If the emails were legit then we'd have the right to see them once they were turned over to UEFA and if they'd been leaked by somebody in the organisation it would be fairly easy to figure out who it was. I wouldn't want to be in their shoes in that scenario.
So if it's a legitimate source then DS will be obliged to protect that source and won't hand over anything without a court order.

 

[Henkeman]

Is there any evidence that Conn does not like our owners, either because of their bank balance or ethnicity.?
The title of his "definitive" book isn't entirely positive, but I know of nothing else.

His article was nothing new was it really.

I thought the book itself was fine. He used City as the most extreme example (obviously - because City are) but the thrust of it was about football generally. I certainly didn't see it as any kind of attack.