UEFA FFP investigation - CAS decision to be announced Monday, 13th July 9.30am BST

[bluemanchester]

Didn’t @projectriver post an extract from an article by David Conn earlier that despite City disagreeing, UEFA decided Etihad were a related party? If that is indeed true, then maybe there’s a different angle to this that we’re not considering. Instead of us all trying to show that our owner didn’t fund the shortfall, surely it makes no difference if he did because UEFA declared Etihad a related party? Maybe that’s the irrefutable evidence that City have. Picture the conversation:

UEFA: “We’re hitting you with a 2 year ban and a big fuck-off fine for using disguised owner investment to make up the shortfall in the Etihad deal”
City: “We’ve done nothing wrong and have irrefutable evidence to back it up”
UEFA: “Like what?”
City: “Well remember back in 2014 when we were in disagreement that Etihad were a related party or not? We said they weren’t and you said they were. We tried telling you but you wouldn’t listen. We’ve got it all here in writing from you so it’s irrelevant if our owner bailed Etihad out as you yourselves deemed them to be a related party and had signed off the sponsorship deal as being fair value. There’s our irrefutable evidence of no wrongdoing so fuck off and stop wasting our time!”

"We’ve got it all here in writing from you so it’s irrelevant if our owner bailed Etihad out as you yourselves deemed them to be a related party"
But maybe you presume they cant move the goal posts, again

 

[bluemanchester]

That's exactly what I would be saying to them and I've said this before. They (or PWC) claimed Etihad is a related party, along with the other Abu Dhabi sponsors. They apparently reduced the sponsorships of those other ones, according to Conn, or at least that was their suggestion/recommendation. Whether UEFA actually applied that reduction for the other sponsorships, they seem to have accepted Etihad was in the right sort of ball park. So Sheikh Mansour could have funded every penny of that as that's allowed under FFP.

If they are trying to prove now that they aren't related parties and that we've knowingly received owner investment, that would appeear to be a complete U-turn from their original position. It therefore makes me wonder what the hell they're trying to prove.

To prove they can move the goal posts whenever they want. A bit like the premier league can interpret VAR to suit certain teams, whenever they want.

 

[M18CTID]

Are we sure that UEFA insisted on classifying Etihad and other Abu Dhabi sponsors as related parties? Yes, PwC disagreed with MCFC's auditors and maintained they were, but my assumption has always been that UEFA didn't push the point, primarily because the settlement agreement dealt with the alleged overvaluations of the Etisalat and Aabar deals by way of contractual undertakings not to increase the fees under the relevant agreements for a set period. Surely they'd have just revalued them if they 'd decided to treat these entities as related parties of MCFC. With Etihad, the sponsorship was stated by PwC to be at more or less a fair value anyway, so it seems quite plausible to me that UEFA decided the related party point was irrelevant in the circumstances.

Yes, it would certainly suit us at this stage for Etihad to be classed as a related party, as it would render the fact of ADUG paying some of the cash irrelevant in he light of the PwC valuation. Though, of course, in this case MCFC could still be accused of acting in bad faith by trying to pain Etihad as a non-related party but not disclosing any channelling of cash from ADUG through the company.

Peter, we can’t be sure but I think this angle has only come about as a result of Conn’s article which states UEFA deemed Etihad to be a related party. Of course, the Conn article could be complete bollocks. If it’s true though then your point about UEFA perhaps not pushing it due to it being deemed more or less fair value could be spun the other way too. Maybe City agreed to disagree with UEFA on the related party issue but didn’t push it and allowed UEFA to class it as a related party deal because they’d signed it off as fair value anyway so it wasn’t worth really arguing over? I don’t think any of us know for sure though - the 2014 settlement agreement made reference to a couple of secondary sponsors and that we’d agreed to not raise the value of them (for a couple of seasons at least I think), but there was nothing about the Etihad deal.

 

[cjn]

It is worth a quick look at the documents themselves to illustrate a couple of points. https://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussba...ostrecke-a293d1c1-0001-0002-0000-000000167278 First, whichever funding structure was used it looks likely that Etihad cash was put into the club via the correct entity (see page 4). Both options put forward by the CFO had money coming from Etihad to City. Likewise on page 3, the club were very aware that the actual payment flow had to come from the relevant contractual entity.

On context, page 1 is a perfect example. The email is obviously true and is largely unredacted. But it is pre-contractual, how many other emails exist, what did the final deal look like, what did the rest of the thread say, when was the actual contract signed (if ever) etc etc. I do not believe you can conclude anything from one email in a thread like that. We shall see.

Question on this. Isn't this whole issue as straightforward as saying, "yes of course Etihad is a related party" and therefore the funding of said transaction, while perhaps improper from a Etihad governance perspective, is not relevant as long it was done at a commercially reasonable level? Which of course has already been investigated and determined as such.

 

[M18CTID]

"We’ve got it all here in writing from you so it’s irrelevant if our owner bailed Etihad out as you yourselves deemed them to be a related party"
But maybe you presume they cant move the goal posts, again

Oh, we know they’ve got form for moving the goalposts but I don’t think they’d get away with retrospectively moving them

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

Where's Pannick? Is he there.

Gone to Bayern I believe.

 

[maurizio]

Question on this. Isn't this whole issue as straightforward as saying, "yes of course Etihad is a related party" and therefore the funding of said transaction, while perhaps improper from a Etihad governance perspective, is not relevant as long it was done at a commercially reasonable level? Which of course has already been investigated and determined as such.

What if they say: you told us in writing that Etihad was not a related party. So any money coming from the owner is now relevant (despite us previously claiming it was a related party).

 

[slbsn]

It's a bit impenetrable that mate ;-)

So going off what I can glean from that, are you basically saying even if the activities in the emails turns out to be true, we shouldn't face additional sanctions anyway?

Essentially, UEFA knew what was going on, they told us to reign it in with the AD sponsorships, we agreed and have complied ever since?

So City's argument is going to be based on the fact the settlement agreement from the 2014 breach means we can't be tried for the same thing twice?

Sorry if I've got it wrong or over-simplified your fantastically detailed article.

That is one strand of the argument we know City have made in CAS 1 and I assume have made in CAS 2.

 

[BLUEMATT23]

Noticeable how the poll thinking we will get exonerated has been creeping down last 2 days.

 

[CC1]

Wasn't aware of his previous involvement with other UAE countries. That sounds a lot more plausible to me as to why he didn't take ours then.

This was the recent case that he “lost” I believe


https://www.theguardian.com/law/201...not-casino-judge-tells-lawyers-over-huge-fees

Pannick was criticised for his costs - & he lost the case


https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8081237/The-1m-prizefighter-QC-fought-Dubai-ruler.html