PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

[MillionMilesAway]

It's been pointed out to the Tories that previous Telegraph owner Conrad Black was a convicted fraudster, & the son of a former KGB agent, Evgeny Lebedev, was allowed to own the Independent and the Evening Standard.

I think the issue with the sale of the Torygraph to an Abu Dhabi backed consortium, are the Tories don't want to see the erosion of their right wing media powerbase.

If Sheikh Mansour was Trump, Orban or Bolsonaro, they'd probably give them a grant to help with the purchase. ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠⊙⁠_⁠ʖ⁠⊙⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

Much my opinion on the matter too.

 

[jimmygrimblesboots]

The delay in the hearing is only making the Premier league look like fools , it appears the charges were made well before they had the evidence to proceed with the charges , they were forced into their announcement due to the impending white paper for a government football regulator.

Master's wanted to give the impression that the Premier league can rule with an iron fist hence the Everton, Forest charges but all they are doing is damaging their "brand" world wide at the behest of a couple of football clubs who are trying to run roughshod over the other eighteen Premier league clubs.

After our verdict i can see massive changes , Masters falling on his sword and the inroduction of a government regulator who hopefully will consider all twenty clubs , not just two of them

 

[SilverFox2]

Thanks pal. Not sure what the other guy is on tbh. Odd.

I've been reading a guy on Twitter, Russell Scott and that's what's piqued my interest. The way he puts it, it's cut and dried and involves high level conspiracy and cover ups. Sounds crazy tbh. If it was all true, surely City would already have been brought to book and punished accordingly? A lot of Liverpool fans I know are already counting titles they're going to be given "when justice is served". They almost sound desperate.

Selfish people are a bit like that don't you think?

Unwelcome events cannot be their fault so they do a cocktail of taking things out of context and inventing speculation as fact.

Unfortunately our media have been informed where their biggest audience is likely to be so they feed their targets with the same toxic mixture their biased minds believe.

 

[domalino]

We made it to Radio 4's news quiz. "What's going to take longer, The Premier League's investigation into Manchester City, or the SNP's investigation into Nicola Sturgeon".

I have noticed that the Everton points deduction and then the Everton and Forest charges seem to have kicked our case into the mainstream public opinion.

 

[Tb1981]

Day one of the hearing
Man City who is your first witness….
Man City - uniteds new CEO
Let him say we didn’t do anything wrong on day one
Then see what they do!

 

[cheekybids]

The Minister talked to several other clubs & football stakeholders from across the spectrum & all the leagues.

Granted, Scott made it sound like City held a grubby backdoor meeting, where no one else did, which is blatantly untrue, as the Minister quoted when interviewed.

I think Westminster are getting a feeling of what City have had to endure, & I doubt this Red Top & Spuds protectionism is playing well with them, ESPECIALLY as it previously threatened a £10bn investment in the UK from Abu Dhabi.

I thought that until I heard the goons ask ‘what about City’ at the last meeting.

 

[M18CTID]

Ha, no I’ve not heard anything from within the club. I’m just increasingly confident that we’ll be cleared of the most serious charges. Hopefully that confidence isn’t misguided!

Ok, cheers mate. It does seem that we might be heading towards a situation where the charges might start to fall away. I wouldn't like to bet on it though!

 

[BlueMoonz1977]

The delay in the hearing is only making the Premier league look like fools , it appears the charges were made well before they had the evidence to proceed with the charges , they were forced into their announcement due to the impending white paper for a government football regulator.

Master's wanted to give the impression that the Premier league can rule with an iron fist hence the Everton, Forest charges but all they are doing is damaging their "brand" world wide at the behest of a couple of football clubs who are trying to run roughshod over the other eighteen Premier league clubs.

After our verdict i can see massive changes , Masters falling on his sword and the inroduction of a government regulator who hopefully will consider all twenty clubs , not just two of them

My sentiments exactly...white paper inbound, Redtops went into overdrive and forced the hand of masters and the league probably under the illusion that this would somehow show they could govern it themselves. Hence them showing face towards Everton and forest.

And what they have effectively done is basically accuse the powers that be of our club of multi-national widespread accountancy fraud - let that sink in a minute.

So masters and the PL better have total clarity and substantial proof to prove these accusations, because in the end (if proven) would be subject to class action lawsuits from external MCFC investors to our boardroom

And once these jumped up charges are proven incorrect, the fallout will be huge and we all know how it will play out in the short term....the red cartel will turn on masters and blame him and shout from the rooftops through their mouthpieces that he is incompetent

 

[M18CTID]

I imagine all of the criticism about how long the process is taking, from fans, pundits and journalists alike, must be stinging the PL. As mentioned previously, it’s causing considerable reputational damage to them now. Are they really going to try and ride it out for the next 18 months?

I guess the only way they could plausibly expedite the process would be to drop some of the harder to prove charges or try and strike a deal, but that seems highly improbable. Not even sure if that’s possible now that it’s been referred to an independent commission?! What a mess they’ve got themselves into.

Maybe not striking a deal as such but somebody else made the point that the independent panel are probably busy working on the case now and assessing everything ahead of the hearing date. Surely they don't just pitch up on the day of the hearing and start looking at things then - perhaps somebody better qualified than me can clarify? So if they are working on it now then it is possible that some of the charges fall away before the date of the hearing IF there's little in the way of cogent evidence?

 

[TheMagicDragon]

Pay no attention mate. We've a problem on this forum with ManUre fans joining & posing as City fans, so there's a unhinged level of paranoia with some around here. I take people as I find until they give me a reason to believe otherwise.

It's not cut & dried pal. In 2018/19, we faced the same charges with UEFA as we do now, were found guilty, fined £30m & given a 2 year Champions League ban, which was suspended, pending our appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).

On appeal, CAS found us not guilty on all charges, aside from non-cooperation for which we were fined £10m.

Because of our 2014 experience with UEFA/G14, City decided it was pointless showing our hand to them during their investigation stage again, as they would use our evidence to amend their accusations & rules to nail us, exactly as they did in 2014. Yup! That's exactly what they did, hence the zero trust between City & UEFA/G14.

UEFA made their accusations against us based on 6 emails, from over 5 million stolen from us by the notorious Portuguese hacker Rui Pinto.

Of the six emails revealed by the German rag Der Spiegel, two were spliced together from various emails sent a couple of years apart, which gave an out of context view of a sponsorship deal we had with Etisalat.

Once the original emails were viewed with an explanation from City, CAS quickly realised UEFA/G14 had zero actual evidence to backup their claims that our owner injected equity funding into City, disguised as sponsorship.

Essentially what happened was the telecommunications giant Etisalat had a sponsorship agreement with City worth £15m per season over its duration. In 2012/13, we needed to show that money in our account to comply with FFP, so asked Etisalat if they could pay it ahead of schedule.

They couldn’t, but agreed if it could be paid by a bridging loan, they'd be fine with that as they could settle that loan when the original payment schedule ended.

One of the internal City emails between two executives discussed this & it was stated if HRH could source the bridging loan on Etisalat's behalf. Enter UAE financier Jaber Mohammed, who struck a bridging loan deal with Etisalat.

Mohammed paid £15m in 2012 & £15m in 2013 to City which helped us meet FFP. In 2015 when Etisalat's deal ended, they paid Jaber Mohammed back & satisfied the terms of the bridging loan agreement.

Hopefully you're still following me up to this point? :-)

HOWEVER, when this stolen email came to the attention of UEFA/G14, they accused City of getting our owner Sheikh Mansour to pay Jaber Mohammed, who paid City which they claim essentially meant Sheikh Mansour injected money into Manchester City, but disguised it as sponsorship funds from Etisalat.

When asked for evidence of this by CAS, UEFA/G14 didn't have any. They merely connected the dots & made the accusation on their balance of probabilities, based on zero physical evidence, hence why CAS threw their claim out & totally exonerated City.

There was also a claim that City paid part of Roberto Mancini's wages off the books again to circumnavigate FFP. Mancini had an consultancy agreement with ADUG (the company who own City Football Group) to act as a consultant to the Abu Dhabi Football Club - Al Jazira Club worth £1.7m per season.

This was all above board, but UEFA/G14 opined this was done to keep the £1.7m off the books to help City meet FFP requirements. Mancini was on £2m per season basic at City, plus generous bonuses, which pushed his wages closer to £5m per season, but UEFA/G14 still stuck by their claim & added this to City's list of breaches, but again offered zero actual evidence.

Essentially, UEFA/G14 were accusing the Abu Dhabi Royal Family, Roberto Mancini, Etisalat, Etihad Airways & several other high profile multinational companies & huge conglomerates of organised fraud on an industrial scale, BUT without using the word fraud, which would turn their FFP rule "breaches" into a criminal matter, therefore taking it out of their hands & into the hands of the law.

They've inferred all sorts, but never once dared use the word fraud, realising the ramifications if they did. They offered zero actual evidence either, which perfectly highlights the difference between their FFP "Rules" & UK Law.

Their FFP rules are essentially no different to the rules of a private members club. It's like them wanting to sanction a private club member for not washing up their teacup after use. That maybe their club rule, but not washing up your teacup isn't against UK Law.

This is why City are in favour of IREF, the Independent Regulator for English Football, & the Premiere League are dead set against it. Once FFP is looked at through the eyes of UK Law, it doesn't stand a chance. In what other sphere of business isn't a wealthy owner not allowed to invest what he likes into his business?

There's a lot more to our situation, but I've tried to give you the most concise answer I can without explaining chapter & verse, going back to the beginning of our charges in 2009.

We just want to play football, but our fans have been forced to become lay-accountants merely to understand our situation. Hopefully this helps. )(

Thanks for that pal. Weird how anyone asking any kind of question apart from "Why are City being persecuted for nothing?!" is instantly a wind up. What I will say is that if City are found innocent, the Premier League need suing. 115 charges is insane if not proven. On the other hand, with Everton being docked 10 points for a lesser charge, surely a guilty punishment would be huge? What are your thoughts on Everton and Forest btw? I'm wondering if the PL have made them patsies so they can slip these charges on City and then say "See, its not just you!".

Do you think stripping titles to appease the "bigger clubs" is the agenda?