As a measure of how impenetrable this stuff is for laymen Col, I’ve been readping that post for about 20 minutes and I still don’t understand it!
Bottom line, does it mean we’ve acted illegally/dishonestly, are we fucked, and what would be an appropriate/likely punishment?
It's really wrong for people to keep calling these accusations illegal, especially on the part of the media who have been very careful to avoid drawing themselves into libelling city. City have done nothing illegal nor are accused of anything that is actually by definition illegal. The only thing that city have done allegedly wrong is in the context of the UEFA/PL rulebook which actually has no place in law.
Those rulebooks are drawn up by supposedly independent sports people who decide what the rules are based upon what they want to achieve. What they want to achieve by those rules is perhaps the most important question. This is why city have been charged by a sports body and the case will not be brought to a court but rather to a private hearing with the league's representatives. The good part of that is any outcome is possible as the league financially benefits massively from city/ADUG so they'll find balance difficult. We could well be charged with 100 things and found guilty but get no punishment at all.
In law terms, the league have already made massive mistakes in not communicating and even changing the charges brought against city which was seen in that statement. This in real life and real law would be a case breaker in itself as you can't serve multiple charges and change them as you see fit to achieve a look in the media.
City will likely take the end result to a real court to not only attack any decision on competitive grounds but they'll also challenge the rulebook on common law grounds which is how they appealed the UEFA charges at CAS. UEFA had to tone down their FFP rules in direct response to these legal challenges.
Anyone who really thinks that UEFA or the Premier League make these rules to ensure there is proper financial fair play are ridiculously mistaken. The rulebook was created as a form of control and to stifle the type of competition which threatens the established clubs because of the free market that clubs have to operate within. These big clubs have considerable influence and when their voice is added together they represent something bigger to protect than city.
It's ironic though because these clubs would destroy the free market in a heartbeat and most of the clubs bleating on about city wanted to create a European Super League to do just that. How many clubs were punished harshly for that? None, not a single one. They weren't punished because the league and UEFA would financially suffer because of the clubs involved so no action was taken, it's a complete joke.
The other clubs aren't rosy in comparison to us by any stretch either because just look at the ownership models of the likes of United and Liverpool. They have ultimate parent companies registered in places like Delaware and the Cayman Islands... How many grass roots clubs benefit from United being registered in the Cayman Islands to avoid tax? Financial fair play..... Really?
