PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

[cheekybids]

Fair enough, I just get the impression the club hasn't provided third party evidence to the investigation. Yes, thousands of pages of the club's financial information so they can say they cooperated fully (as far as they think they had to), but nothing external (which is where the real counter-evidence is). Plenty of reasons for that, but the new rule for clubs to make best efforts to provide third party evidence isn't a coincidence, of course. Nor was the club challenging that new rules couldn't be applied to prior years.

Just a theory, but it answers questions people are asking like i) why did the PL charge the club if they have no evidence? (the better question for me is what else could the PL do if no convincing evidence was presented against the allegations?) ii) why did the PL charge the club with non-cooperation and acting in bad faith when we say we have fully cooperated? (because we didn't recognise the requirement to provide third party information and we have deliberately withheld it until the panel). iii) Why did the PL recently introduce a new rule that clubs "must" obtain third party information? and iv) What was it about the news that the club was seeking confirmation that new rules couldn't be applied retroactively?

Anyway, as I said, just a theory and don't want to derail the thread again, so will shut up. :)

You shouldn’t have to defend yourself against “no evidence” of wrong doing.

 

[cheekybids]

Carrying on from previous posts ……..
Billionaire Joe Lewis (Spurs) is due in court in the UK later this month ………

How many charges? I’ve realised now that his guilt is based on how many charges & not the strength of the evidence……

 

[Gundoggin]

How many charges? I’ve realised now that his guilt is based on how many charges & not the strength of the evidence……

You can only find out about this story on USA media channels, the UK media are running with erm ……… Nothing !
Tell us everything ;-)

 

[cheekybids]

Just to be clear, the emails were the grounds, rather than the evidence, on which UEFA justified undertaking its investigation, which CAS felt was justified. There were other stories, including the Mancini contract, the Fordham image rights payments (which UEFA already knew about) and a few other things. Generally speaking, it requires a reasonable suspicion that rules or laws have been broken for an investigation and requesting evidence to take place, and the Der Spiegel articles provided that.

What they then did was ask us for the full email chains and any other pertinent documents. This is where the disputes over cooperation started, as our legal advisers resisted some of these requests, on the grounds that they weren't pertinent or relevant. In effect, it was a 'fishing expedition'. CAS actually questioned why UEFA didn't hold out for some emails they thought they were entitled to, and brought the charges before they had those.

We didn't provide some documents that we later supplied to CAS however. You'd have to wonder why we chose that course of actio and whether UEFA would have not gone ahead with the referral of the case to the Adjudicatory Chamber if we had provided those. We don't know the legal details though so it is pure speculation.

What we do know is that the AC found against us, and issued the 2-season ban, which was overturned by CAS, who did have all the evidence.

The PL likewise can only act based on a reasonable suspicion that we've broken rules and the emails gave them that. But unless we've given the PL's lawyers something that we didn't give to UEFA or CAS, then they're unlikely to be any more succesful than UEFA were.

Is it reasonable suspicion? I keep saying this all they had was a fabricated story. Even in the days of the News of the World ‘fake sheik’ exposes it always ended with a dossier has been sent to the police. Without the dossier no investigation occurs. Was a dossier provided from Der Spiegel? In my opinion that’s where the investigation occurs? Was the journalist reliable, was the evidence?

 

[cheekybids]

I seem to remember it being rumoured City’s legal team weren’t particularly happy after the first day of CAS but much more upbeat after the second

That was purely down to the catering…

 

[foggy1974]

Please stop worrying about rival fans who think we've paid them off, whoever that might be.
I'd stop watching the game if I thought there was a shred of truth in it.
Most are just bitter knobheads behind a key board.

I'm not worrying about them, just saying how the premier league have got exactly what they wanted

 

[bluemanchester]

I doubt that it was 15 minutes but didn’t the CAS hearing finish earlier than expected? I seem to recall reading about it at the time.

Your right. How long does it take to say "is that it, really";-)

 

[The Future’s Blue!]

Innocent, prove us guilty.

 

[remember arthur mann]

 

[nmc]

Is it reasonable suspicion? I keep saying this all they had was a fabricated story. Even in the days of the News of the World ‘fake sheik’ exposes it always ended with a dossier has been sent to the police. Without the dossier no investigation occurs. Was a dossier provided from Der Spiegel? In my opinion that’s where the investigation occurs? Was the journalist reliable, was the evidence?

I think the CAS case proved the allegations alleged by Der Spiegel were untrue and their interpretation of the emails was inaccurate. The PL are obviously taking a different view to CAS ! although I think they are naively hanging their hat on the time barred elements from CAS… more in hope than anticipation.