PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

[Elbow beards]

It was probably me but I'd ignored the Etihad/Etisalat sponsorships because there not a hope in hell of those being found in breach of the PL rules in my opinion. CAS made sure of that and the PL would have to have solid evidence that a load of people lied at CAS to overturn that.

Fordham was probably in the region of £12/13m a year for three years (2013/14 to 2015/16) and Mancini's contract was for £1.75m a year for the years 2009/10 to 2012/13.

So never more than £13m in any one year.

Or the equivalent to Luke Shaw's Greggs tap.

 

[bobbyowenquiff]

It was probably me but I'd ignored the Etihad/Etisalat sponsorships because there not a hope in hell of those being found in breach of the PL rules in my opinion. CAS made sure of that and the PL would have to have solid evidence that a load of people lied at CAS to overturn that.

Fordham was probably in the region of £12/13m a year for three years (2013/14 to 2015/16) and Mancini's contract was for £1.75m a year for the years 2009/10 to 2012/13.

So never more than £13m in any one year.

Thanks. Bloody hell relegated for breaching about £13m each year. Not much of a sporting advantage there. Masters and his pals have lost their minds. Imagine the legal costs to pursue all this.

 

[mancity2012_eamo]

It’ll never be over with, they’ll come up with something else once we’re cleared, that’s the only reason it all exists - bitterness. Part of me thinks the PL will punish us anyway so they can keep it going (through the courts) for another 5 or 10 years. Those “in charge” of the PL know they will be done and dusted by then either way, in fact they’ll stay in a paid position longer if they try to make the charges stick.

Just learn to live with it and enjoy the superb football that no-one else has.

Unfortunately, this is along the lines of what I believe also. I just don’t see the end of what I consider a ‘campaign’ against us that is really spoiling the enjoyment of football in general.
If the Americans do eventually get their way, football will go down the pan.
I’m nearly done with it as it is. It’s only City that are keeping me interested.

 

[inbetween]

I admire your commitment to a conspiracy theory that you completely disregard legal due process but fyi uefas panel was not independent but cas was and as i have continually and repeatedly said the red-top outrage which consists of the british press, sky sports etc doesnt have the global outreach that we think it does and we are not going to be disassembled etc etc i get it that it has become tiresome to listen to the constant stream of moronic outrage that its easier to just believe it than fight against it because whats the point right but what the press want to happen quite simply wont you quite simply expect any persons whos sole qualification is writing their opinion about football and talking crap on social media to remotely understand complex financial and legal machinations so their opinion counts the same as 99% of people everywhere in that it is irrelevant.

The media have to be extremely careful with how they report upon this because this goes beyond football.

They need to remember soon that they're not taking on Manchester City, they're taking on a country, a country with unlimited resources and fingers in pies beyond football. Our owners are not businessmen who need to submit to newspapers, they're more like rich kings who could quite honestly buy them out and close them down.

The Middle Eastern countries don't mess about with this sort of thing and the UK government will be watching this closely. Public embarassment of the UAE is not an option because the inevitable consequence is the loss of billions of future overseas investment in the UK and especially Manchester specifically.

 

[halfcenturyup]

Great point. Someone posted on here that we would not have breached FFP for most of the seasons even without the Etihad money. I can’t recall seeing any detailed figures.

We don't know what the details of the allegations are, so it's not easy to make calculations.

I think it is clear, though, that the PL must be alleging the Etihad sponsorship was severely overstated to have allegedly failed FFP. Iirc, the club's results were generally around break even in the years under review, so the other matters wouldn't have added anywhere near 100 million to losses.

What do we know about Etihad? Etihad 1 was supposedly a 400 million contract over 10 years, say 40 million a year. Etihad 2, we know from CAS was 220 million over years, say 55 million a year. Safe to assume Etihad 3 and 4 increased again to, say 60 million and 65 million a year.

UEFA's claim was that, as described in the emails, for one Etihad payment 8 million was paid "directly" and the remainder paid "indirectly" by ADUG. They applied this to each year even though, as CAS pointed out, the "direct" contribution changed each time. Anyway, let's assume the PL's case is also that 8 million was direct and the rest "indirect" each year. For Etihad 2 that would be a correction of 140 million (55-8*3) for each three year period, more than enough to put the club in FFP trouble, I imagine, even allowing for allowable costs.

Not that this is going to happen, imho. They don't have much chance of landing this one, I think, so it's all just a theoretical exercise really.

Anyway, these are just back of fag packet calculations, although I think think the basics are right. Happy to be corrected if wrong. It will be impossible to be accurate, though, until we see the reasons published by the IP.

 

[halfcenturyup]

Thanks. Bloody hell relegated for breaching about £13m each year. Not much of a sporting advantage there. Masters and his pals have lost their minds. Imagine the legal costs to pursue all this.

That wouldn't be a breach. The club's financial position was reasonably sound in the years covered by the allegations. So, even if they find in favour of the PL on everything except Etihad, including Etisalat, it's not a problem for FFP I don't think.

 

[Manchester_lalala]

It was probably me but I'd ignored the Etihad/Etisalat sponsorships because there not a hope in hell of those being found in breach of the PL rules in my opinion. CAS made sure of that and the PL would have to have solid evidence that a load of people lied at CAS to overturn that.

Fordham was probably in the region of £12/13m a year for three years (2013/14 to 2015/16) and Mancini's contract was for £1.75m a year for the years 2009/10 to 2012/13.

So never more than £13m in any one year.

So we potentially may get relegated to the Vanarama because of £13m worth of revenue? What a load of shite, ay.

 

[slbsn]

Fair enough. Can one of the parties present new evidence with leave of the appeals panel if some new evidence has "come to light"?

Only if they really couldn’t have found it before. Limited process for new evidence

 

[slbsn]

It probably isn't so simple one way or the other. The Open Skies document alleges that the AD government paid the sponsorship, which is where the ADEC thought comes from, I think.

But, at the end of the day, both can be true. 8 million could be paid out of the cash resources of Etihad and the remainder could have been forwarded from ADEC to Etihad specifically to fund the sponsorship. So Etihad would have paid all the sponsorship as Pearce said, but the vast majority would have had to be arranged from ADEC, as the emails said.

Context is everything.

Edit: And if the allegations are anything like UEFA, they aren't questioning that Etihad paid the full amount, anyway. The allegation is that the majority was funded into Etihad by ADUG/ Mansour for which, I expect, they will have no evidence at all.

The CAS witness evidence on this was broad and unequivocal:

Mr James Hogan, former President and CEO of Etihad: “The sponsorship obligations were paid out of Etihad’s own funds”

Mr Simon Pearce, Non-Executive Director of MCFC: "Neither ADUG nor [HHSM] funded any of Etihad’s sponsorship obligations”

Mr Ahmed Ali Al Sayegh, Board Member of Etihad Aviation Group and Chairman of the Board Finance and Investment Committee:

"[Etihad] did not receive any payments from ADUG or [HHSM] or any person or entity controlled or influenced by them, whether directly or indirectly in relation to any of the Sponsorship Agreements, whether by way of advance funding or subsequent reimbursement."



Mr Henning Zur Hausen, General Counsel and
Company Secretary of Etihad Aviation Group:

"All sponsorship fees payable by the Company under the Sponsorship Agreements have been and are being paid from the [Etihad’s] general funds and from sources available to the Company…[Etihad] did not receive any payments from [ADUG] or [HHSM] in relation to any of the Sponsorship Agreements.

Mr Tony Douglas, then Group Chief Executive Officer of Etihad, now CEO of Riyadh Air confirmed that Mr Zur Hausen's evidence was entirely correct and stated:

"For the avoidance of doubt, I also confirm that the sources available to the [Etihad] have never included (whether directly or indirectly) [ADUG], [HHSM], or any person or entity controlled or influenced by them.....I confirm, for the avoidance of doubt, that [Etihad] has never received any money whatsoever from [ADUG] or [HHSM] or any person or entity controlled or influenced by them, whether directly or indirectly."

Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan in writing confirmed:

“I can confirm that I have not authorised ADUG to make any payments to Etihad, Etisalat or any of their affiliates in relation to their sponsorship of [MCFC], nor have I authorised or arranged or anyone else to make any such payments to them. I can also confirm that I have not made any such payments myself."

 

[Saddleworth2]

It was probably me but I'd ignored the Etihad/Etisalat sponsorships because there not a hope in hell of those being found in breach of the PL rules in my opinion. CAS made sure of that and the PL would have to have solid evidence that a load of people lied at CAS to overturn that.

Fordham was probably in the region of £12/13m a year for three years (2013/14 to 2015/16) and Mancini's contract was for £1.75m a year for the years 2009/10 to 2012/13.

So never more than £13m in any one year.

That’s around what I thought - a relatively small amount. Makes this nonsense even more unbelievable. I wonder if this view is agreed by our other experts?