PL charge City for alleged breaches of financial rules

[Chris in London]

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."

And the PLs case, based on the Der Spiegel emails and not much else that is in the public domain, is that they were all lying

 

[CC1]

Of course it goes beyond football. We are mostly owned by a member of the Abu Dhabi royal family. We have also come to be sponsored by companies supported by Abu Dhabi such as Etihad, Aldar, Etisalat etc. We aren't state owned no but we are certainly a related party. If we're found guilty of 'cheating' then how does that make Abu Dhabi look purely by association? These guys do not mess about with such accusations let alone actual findings.

I know the Middle Eastern airlines well and they operate exactly the same. They are world class and fantastic but one could easily argue against them on grounds of competition given not a single one of them has ever made a profit. How can an airline that must make a profit compete against one that doesn't care about profit and still puts out a better product? All they care about is having the best airline.

You'd be extremely naive to think that our owner is just willing to have his investments threatened by this and something that may potentially embarass him and Abu Dhabi. He will use every tool he can to ensure this goes his way whether that's through lawyers or political and even international pressure.

I'm not saying that we're guilty of anything by the way. You have to remember that this IS NOT a criminal process, there is no alleged criminality. All we've apparently done is broken rules that the Premer League dreamt up. This is what city will challenge and the guy with the most resources and friends always wins.

A second critical point for the league and any critics is that you'd also have to be EXTREMELY naive to think that the other clubs aren't exactly doing the same thing.

So, what do you think he can do if we’re found guilty? Do you believe our government would get involved??? No way

 

[slbsn]

Really? The Executive Council of Abu Dhabi?

I am trying to square the circle of the Open Skies document which suggests that ADEC paid City's sponsorship and the statements from the witnesses at CAS that Etihad paid for its sponsorship out of its own funds, by reasoning that that may be true but funds could have come originally from ADEC to Etihad specifically to pay City. So everybody was right.

I am not sure I see the problem with that.

It is hard to see how the ECAD putting Etihad in funds specifically for City would square with
"[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." ECAD would seem to be at least indirectly influenced by SM.

The point is that any funding from any other entity must have gone into general and unspecified funds not to counter the witness evidence given how broad the witness evidence was. Anyway all a bit irrelevant

 

[Stoned Rose]

Of course it goes beyond football. We are mostly owned by a member of the Abu Dhabi royal family. We have also come to be sponsored by companies supported by Abu Dhabi such as Etihad, Aldar, Etisalat etc. We aren't state owned no but we are certainly a related party. If we're found guilty of 'cheating' then how does that make Abu Dhabi look purely by association? These guys do not mess about with such accusations let alone actual findings.

I know the Middle Eastern airlines well and they operate exactly the same. They are world class and fantastic but one could easily argue against them on grounds of competition given not a single one of them has ever made a profit. How can an airline that must make a profit compete against one that doesn't care about profit and still puts out a better product? All they care about is having the best airline.

You'd be extremely naive to think that our owner is just willing to have his investments threatened by this and something that may potentially embarass him and Abu Dhabi. He will use every tool he can to ensure this goes his way whether that's through lawyers or political and even international pressure.

I'm not saying that we're guilty of anything by the way. You have to remember that this IS NOT a criminal process, there is no alleged criminality. All we've apparently done is broken rules that the Premer League dreamt up. This is what city will challenge and the guy with the most resources and friends always wins.

A second critical point for the league and any critics is that you'd also have to be EXTREMELY naive to think that the other clubs aren't exactly doing the same thing.

Mental post.

If SM was able to crack skulls to this extent he’d have done so at the beginning before even a whiff of these alleged breaches got out.

He wouldn’t have allowed the club to be dragged through the mire like we have.

 

[slbsn]

And the PLs case, based on the Der Spiegel emails and not much else that is in the public domain, is that they were all lying

I assume they have much more in disclosed docs but I agree, I do not see how the PL win on the sponsor agreements without showing these people were lying. Simply too senior to be naively mistaken or unaware.

 

[Maly]

I know the Middle Eastern airlines well and they operate exactly the same. They are world class and fantastic but one could easily argue against them on grounds of competition given not a single one of them has ever made a profit. How can an airline that must make a profit compete against one that doesn't care about profit and still puts out a better product? All they care about is having the best airline.

I don’t think you know them as well as you think as the part highlighted isn’t true

 

[inbetween]

So, what do you think he can do if we’re found guilty? Don’t believe our government would get involved??? No way

It depends upon what you mean by guilty. Guilty of what? You can only be guilty of a crime but there are no crimes and there won't even be a jury. It's no different to me saying that you are guilty of a rule I just made up.

If you're Etihad and the Premier League says can you disclose how you fund your sponsorship of Manchester City, what would you expect them to say? They'd say get stuffed. So what happens next?

The Premier League has no power to force Etihad to do anything and no power to force city to do anything so do they just then kick us out of the Premier League like criminals? This is where litigation comes in and city have unlimited resources and power that goes beyond football.

 

[inbetween]

I don’t think you know them as well as you think as the part highlighted isn’t true

Yeah it's not true anymore but it was for a very long time when they first started up, all of their losses were absorbed by the state, others would have gone bankrupt.

 

[Grassland Blue]

Meanwhile, on the field of play, (yes, there's still a competition ongoing!) City are champions and top of the embryonic league.
I hope we continue to win it for many years to come.

We are City
We are City
Super City
from Maine Road....

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Not really. You suggest that between the evidence was a gap for remainder to have been forwarded from ADEC (I’ve no idea who ADEC are) to Etihad specifically to fund the sponsorship. Hogan said “The sponsorship obligations were paid out of Etihad’s own funds” and lots of people said no SM or ADUG entity directly or indirectly paid for the sponsorship. So maybe ADEC funded Etihad in some way but it would be irrelevant and the evidence is it was unconnected to the sponsorship.

I seem to recall that the issue was that separate payments had been recorded for Etihad's direct £8m contribution and the other £52m, leading to the charge that the latter amount came from ADUG (although there was no actual evidence to support that).

The CAS hearing revealed that that it had come from what was described as a 'central marketing budget', which was presumably an Abu Dhabi-controlled one, rather than Etihad. That supported the Booz Allen presentation that claimed the Etihad sponsorship was covered by the Executive Council (ADEC).