PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

[StillBluessinceHydeRoad]

Clearly football clubs are businesses - but my argument is that you can't run them as a traditional business, where the aim is to make as much money as possible, and gain a market share that allows you to dominate.

In traditional markets, we would try and avoid monopoly situations, but would accept half a dozen big players competing with each other (e.g. like the big supermarkets in the UK).

But that situation shouldn't be allowed to happen in sport. We've always had the big city clubs doing well, but we've never seen the kind of gaps we have now - and it's been allowed to reach a point (partly because of FFP), where bridging the gap is only possible for the very richest people in the World.

It was David Conn who said in one of his earlier works that football needed to be more businesslike but should never become just another business. The unfortunate thing is that no-one has ever been able to work out how you manage this and the gap was filled by UEFA, which saw opportunities to exploit the commercial potential of its tournaments and a group of successful clubs which wanted what they saw as a fairer share of the extra revenue they played a considerable role in generating. As a result of much greater public interest in football (and loss of life at matches) clubs were compelled to generate revenue to pay for better facilities for those wishing to attend matches. This led to the adoption of much more businesslike methods in the running of clubs: Manchester United floated on the stock exchange Khaldoon was horrified to find that City did not have an HR department at the time of the takeover to quote just two examples. The Plc at OT certainly ran the club more efficiently than before and City soon underwent a recolution which has made them the best run club in world football. No problem there. And other clubs have undergone change as well: Southampton, Brighton and others have emerged with new grounds and better teams. The problem has been the capture of the governing bodies by a group of clubs with a jealous, protectionist outlook which sees competition as an evil to be avoided at all costs rather than as a pathway to progress for the game. And I would point out that it is FFP and P&S which compels clubs to operate at a profitand punishes clubs for "overspending" on players. Clubs are in need of regulation but, I'm afraid experience leads to the conclusion that the law is rather better at it than football's governing bodies.

 

[Chi-town blues]

David Gill termed it "Only spend what you earn". It wasn't UEFA who abandoned debt, it was the G14, with the threat of the ESL if UEFA didn't comply.

Who in their right mind would be against reckless owners putting their clubs" existence at risk?

However, just imagine if FFP/PSR was applied to every UK business sector? The country would be more fucked than it already is.

Spot on. Regardless of ffs or whatever term they use , clubs with small match day revenue, small infrastructure ,small fan base etc etc will alway remain on the bottom.

 

[blue b4 the moon]

Why on earth would anyone be concerned about what the fans of (Fill in the team) say about anything City related, let alone a complex legal matter?!

The absolute desperation of those two teams in particular is especially gratifying!

I’m going to go out on a limb and say the IC will find us guilty of not rolling out the red carpet and nothing else. They’ll give us a fine for non-cooperation and that’ll be that.

All the know nowts will declare “City found guilty, but only fined! The fix is in! Abu Dhabi has either bribed or threatened the Govt…or both!” and yet the sun will continue to rise in the east.

Heads will explode and much piss will be boiled.

Don't think you'll be too far out with that synopsis.

 

[wolviedinho]

"Once and for all", that was our statement.

We won't be taking any pinch.

To be clear, personal reputations are on the line as well as the Club.

I have been assured the top brass would take it all the way to the highest law court.

That last sentence should be good enough for most blues. Hopefully it doesn't come to that but reassuring all the same. The club want and deserve vindication.

 

[xgorton]

David Gill termed it "Only spend what you earn". It wasn't UEFA who abandoned debt, it was the G14, with the threat of the ESL if UEFA didn't comply.

Who in their right mind would be against reckless owners putting their clubs" existence at risk?

However, just imagine if FFP/PSR was applied to every UK business sector? The country would be more fucked than it already is.

Or clear your 500 m debt off before you can spend.

 

[Dribble]

Spot on. Regardless of ffs or whatever term they use , clubs with small match day revenue, small infrastructure ,small fan base etc etc will alway remain on the bottom.

That was their plan all along...

 

[Dribble]

Or clear your 500 m debt off before you can spend.

Or as I suggested your total amortised debt can be no more than 25% of your annual turnover. If it surpasses this level, a transfer ban & wage reduction is put in place until you match the 25% level or drop below.

This wouldn't limit owner equity investment, but the Cartel Clubs wouldn't have it because ManUre & Spuds would be fucked immediately.

 

[StillBluessinceHydeRoad]

I don't think that's possible though.

The fact is they're not going to outright accuse anyone of fraud, they're going to accuse of breaking their rules and the club signed up to resolving it's issues with those rules via tribunal and not in court.

So I think they have to break their own rules during the process for us to get relief in a higher court.

I don't think this is the case at all. If the ruling of the IC goes against City the club would go straight to court. The grounds of the appeal would almost certainly be (amongst others) that City had been found, in fact, to have broken the criminal law and that the IC has no jurisdiction in such matters since it is not a duly constituted court, and that those presiding are not appointed by the proper authorities and it is thus not a body with the competence to deal with such matters. Then there is the basis on which such a ruling was based: balance of probability or beyond reasonable doubt? Either way the IC cannot rule in a criminal matter. I think this is what Stefan and others are getting at when they say it is a case the PL cannot win - especially when you consider the number and reputation of those who would have to have been deceived by, or taken part in, the deception? Is an IC really competent to judge so many?

 

[Iassel]

Not if found guilty of fraud. We would take it to High Court, forget tribunals and Premier League rules at that stage.

To confirm, this is your opinion and is not supported by any sort of facts.

The PL would not be finding City guilty of fraud albeit they could/would strongly infer it. Any ruling by the tribunal cannot be appealed outside of the PL environment, unless it is founded upon such completely egregious reasoning as to convince a commercial court to take it on, and even then, a commercial court has already ruled the PL have jurisdiction to hear the case, not them.

TLDR version, unless City put forth such evidence as to show completely incontrovertibly that everything was above board, the IC acknowledges it and openly ignores it, the case will end within the PL environment.

 

[Lord Blue]

Or as I suggested your total amortised debt can be no more than 25% of your annual turnover. If it surpasses this level, a transfer ban & wage reduction is put in place until you match the 25% level or drop below.

This wouldn't limit owner equity investment, but the Cartel Clubs wouldn't have it because ManUre & Spuds would be fucked immediately.

not sure it would be a good idea to discourage stadium investment. who would build a new stadium if it restricted spending so badly. a mortgage on a stadium should be fine imo.