PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

[Gundoggin]

There is no she’s significant evidence we were offered a settlement. It’s come from one poster saying he’d heard we had.

I’m not aware of any corroborating evidence.

Who is she ?

 

[Stoned Rose]

It’s rare for any litigation to not feature an offer to settle by one of the parties at sone pint, even if it’s derisory and not capable of acceptance. No reason to think there couldn’t have been case here.

8th, 9th or 10th pint?

 

[Norman kneejerk]

You're right about the initial Etihad deal as far as I'm aware but At CAS the claim was that Etihad had only paid £8m from its own funds and £52m from somewhere else. UEFA assumed that 'somewhere else' was ADUG whereas we showed it wasn't. But that was for the financial years 2013/14, 2015/16 and 2016/17 iirc.

Nick Harris made great play of the fact that the amounts involved over those 3 years meant that the Etihad deal was closer to £80m a year but hadn't taken into account that we got (I think) only £5m in the missing year, meaning it was around the £60m mark.

Find your explanations great value as many others do but you just lost me with Harris turning the £52m into £80m and the reference to only £5m in one particular year. Did you mean he was adding multi years together to overstate it ?

 

[SilverFox2]

It's an interesting question which is, as you suggest, difficult to answer absent sight of the evidence. However, my thinking is that the decision-making progress in bringing the charges may form part of the case because the question of "good faith" in the allegations is subjective.

That is to say someone at the PL has looked at the evidence and formed the opinion that City's actions constutute dishonesty. Whilst, obviously, it is ultimately for the Commission to decide, as it's implicit in the most serious charges, it would seem to be legitimate to cross examine whoever made that decision to bring out whether that opinion was arrived at properly.

Unlike, for example, the Secretary of State who, because (s)he can't see everything, is accepted as being able to delegate that power to their civil servants, I don't think Masters can shift that responsibility. Given the seriousness of the case and all its implications, he absolutely must have signed off on it and, therefore, should be able to justify it.

City, may, of course, believe that the decision-making process was impeccable or that there is nothing to be gained by challenging it but I suspect not and that Masters will end up being cross examined. I certainly hope so.

What a good point you make. Smoke out the decision maker or perhaps the fall guy.

 

[Alan Harper's Tash]

 

[Cobwebcat]

I can't see how we will lose if we are innocent, certainly not on the substantial charges. Personally if we are innocent I'm happy the club declined the offer if made. And if the PL turns into a kangaroo court and finds us guilty despite the evidence then fuck them, you should always stand up for what's right and your principals. It's them that won't sleep at night not those at City.

Well let’s take two cases we know about: Leicester were found guilty by the first panel and appealed again to be found innocent.

City at CAS: despite all the evidence, the verdict was not unanimous meaning 33% of the panel found against us.

There are many people on BM that believe this panel is biased as the PL picked them. Yet apparently, it’s impossible for this panel to get it wrong. I don’t believe the panel is biased but I do believe they could get it wrong.

Now I believe we are innocent but if the PL offered a settlement of 6 points I don’t think it ridiculous, given what has already happened, to consider it. I can see an argument for accepting and an argument for rejecting it.

 

[mexico1970]

As this is all playing out in public I would be staggered if the PL had offered a 6pt deduction. Everton were given 10pts initially, reduced to 6 on appeal. So immediately the public perception will be that City have "gotten away with it". I would have thought any offer would be around the 10pt mark so it's at least parallel to Everton's initial penalty, with no opportunity to appeal.

That's before you consider the public fallout from there being a settlement, which would have gone down like a lead balloon. The public would have seen that as incredibly dodgy and also believed that we bribed our way to get to that point.

But if it is true that some settlement approach was made, which I don't dispute and it's logical to reduce ongoing legal costs and speed this up, you can only conclude that City will win this. There's no way a Barrister of Pannick's stature turns down a settlement unless he's very confident the panel will clear us. You don't get to his level by making the wrong judgement call on a matter like that, and City wouldn't be so blind as to ignore his counsel on it.

People are just making stuff up because this tribunal is like a secret court, nothing is reported about what exactly is happening. With the absence of cold hard facts social media is doing what it does best, making stuff up with nothing but shit to go on.

 

[Salford_Blue]

It's an interesting question which is, as you suggest, difficult to answer absent sight of the evidence. However, my thinking is that the decision-making progress in bringing the charges may form part of the case because the question of "good faith" in the allegations is subjective.

That is to say someone at the PL has looked at the evidence and formed the opinion that City's actions constitute dishonesty. Whilst, obviously, it is ultimately for the Commission to decide, as it's implicit in the most serious charges, it would seem to be legitimate to cross examine whoever made that decision to bring out whether that opinion was arrived at properly.

Unlike, for example, the Secretary of State who, because (s)he can't see everything, is accepted as being able to delegate that power to their civil servants, I don't think Masters can shift that responsibility. Given the seriousness of the case and all its implications, he absolutely must have signed off on it and, therefore, should be able to justify it.

City, may, of course, believe that the decision-making process was impeccable or that there is nothing to be gained by challenging it but I suspect not and that Masters will end up being cross examined. I certainly hope so.

That shows to me why an independent regulator is needed.

Otherwise, they continue to act as judge, jury and executioner.

 

[Goatmeal]

I’m guessing they have wrapped up for the week now.
Is there not a pub close by where KC Pannick and the boys will retire for an afternoon tipple.
Maybe some blues could pop in for stella zero and see if they can eavesdrop

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Find your explanations great value as many others do but you just lost me with Harris turning the £52m into £80m and the reference to only £5m in one particular year. Did you mean he was adding multi years together to overstate it ?

Essentially the contract was for £60m a year but we arranged cash payments from Etihad for more than that in three years. Harris added those payments up and let's say they came to £230m. He took that as evidence that the Etihad contract was therefore nearer £80m a year and that we'd underreported it as £60m in the accounts.

What he didn't understand was that if the contract was for £60m a year, then that's what we need to show in the accounts. The cash actually received is irrelevant.

He also didn't understand (or conveniently chose to ignore) that if the contract was for £60m a year over 10 years, we'd get an average of £60m a year but that could be paid in any way, with a lump sum upfront and a lower annual payment for example. So in the 'missing' 2014/15 year, we only received a small sum in cash, as we'd received higher payments in the other 3 years. In other words, it all balanced out over those years.