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

What do you think will be the outcome of the CAS hearing?

  • Two-year ban upheld

    Votes: 197 13.1%

  • Ban reduced to one year

    Votes: 422 28.2%

  • Ban overturned and City exonerated

    Votes: 815 54.4%

  • Other

    Votes: 65 4.3%
  • Total voters
    1,499
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bluenova said:
Now that assumes that "Lawyers" are right. Very good lawyers will provide a strong argument that 1+1=3. Other very good lawyers will counter that 1+1=banana.

David Conn probably spoke to some very good lawyers before writing his article, rather than just providing his own insight.

City's lawyers may even agree with him, but have decided it's tactically best to argue the case at this stage. A shot across the bow, showing City are ready to go to CAS, while knowing there won't be a hearing at this stage? UEFA are then making a decision knowing it's less likely City are bluffing about challenging them.
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This.
I think City are doing exactly this 'shot across the bow' letting UEFA know we mean business.
If the appeal can't be brought at this stage, so what we can still incorporate it's subject matter ( flawed process) into our subsequent appeal which I assume will also challenge the substance of any sentence passed.
 
petrusha said:
He turned up to interview Franny for a north west business publication and said that the experience left him knowing that he'd been "talking to a businessman", as if it was the most pejorative label that could possibly be attached to an interviewee. What disgraceful temerity from Franny. Someone arrives to interview you for a business magazine and you talk about business. Conn's description of the episode sounds laughably juvenile.



He's knowledgeable but not to the degree a lot of people think. He has nothing like the level of insight that someone such as Stefan from the 93:20 pod does, but then Stefan is CEO of a public company and also their senior in-house lawyer, with a track record of having advised the boards of top football clubs in his past. Conn qualified as a solicitor but left the profession immediately after doing so. As someone who's supervised newly qualified solicitors and has been one, I can tell you that their ability to navigate complex legal issues such as this is really not all that. He's probably the most knowledgeable current British journalist about business issues in sport, but very much in an 'in the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is King' kind of way.

I gave my view of this latest piece by Conn in this thread last night, and at quite some length. It's possible he may be right, but if he is, it seems a senseless move from City's point of view. Yet if he's made any attempt to discern why City may be more confident of their case than he is, or what arguments we may put forward that distinguish the case from the precedent he refers to in his article, there's absolutely no sign of it. He may well have asked for a view from a sports law expert before writing, but the problem with that is that to get the right answers, you need to ask the right questions. I don't think I can be confident that he has.

More generally, Conn has shifted away from his usual subject matter when started out, which had a focus on exposing wrongdoing and sharp practices in the game. Then, he wrote for The Independent and produced two excellent books. In those days, I thought he was very good - and sometimes better than that. However, for reasons far beyond the tone, I loathe the specious, holier-than-thou role he's espoused over several years in The Guardian as a self-appointed conscience of modern football. Beyond some half-baked fan ownership nonsense, never does he put forward any constructive ideas for improvement amid his dreary whinges about the state of the modern game.

Moreover, there's no room for nuance. Almost every observation is refracted through the lens of Conn's own beliefs, often in a way that's simply sophomoric. Thus, we were treated to his eccentric observation in a Guardian column that, given the flaws in the PL's current model, "fan-owned Real Madrid" are an exemplar of moral rectitude in the modern game. We have his unabashed, uncritical adoration of a FC United, an outfit whose main asset - which translates into enormous media and political goodwill - is an identity they've leeched off one of the world's most famous clubs. And when he discusses why football was ethically superior in a bygone golden age (that never actually existed), he's egregious in the way he's blind (wilfully or otherwise) to the many drawbacks of the past and improvements in the modern age.

All these faults were fully evident in Richer Than God, which I'm glad I borrowed as opposed to shelling out my own cash on it. Like so many of his articles, the book merely served as an exercise in Conn trying to substantiate his simplistic philosophy by taking liberties with the facts and rational analysis. I find it all the more difficult to sympathise with that modus operandi given that I consider the philosophy in question to amount to little more than vapid, hand-wringing bullshit.

So sorry, Marvin. You admire Conn if you want to. But put me down in the 'not a fan' camp.
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A wonderful summary petrusha.Well done mate.
 
Conn is an absolute tool. He never writes anything good about us. Wouldn't piss on him if he was on fire, unless I pissed petrol!
 
bluenova said:
Now that assumes that "Lawyers" are right. Very good lawyers will provide a strong argument that 1+1=3. Other very good lawyers will counter that 1+1=banana.

David Conn probably spoke to some very good lawyers before writing his article, rather than just providing his own insight.

City's lawyers may even agree with him, but have decided it's tactically best to argue the case at this stage. A shot across the bow, showing City are ready to go to CAS, while knowing there won't be a hearing at this stage? UEFA are then making a decision knowing it's less likely City are bluffing about challenging them.
Click to expand...
Is a good explanation, interesting to see how it pans out.
 
Appealing to CAS now may be a way for City to pressurise UEFA’s upper discipline chamber to bounce whatever the lower chamber have decided in their deliberations.

If they know City will fight this all the way, I’m sure UEFA will not want their collective pants down pulled down without proper due process being carried out despite pressure from the cartel.
 
petrusha said:
He turned up to interview Franny for a north west business publication and said that the experience left him knowing that he'd been "talking to a businessman", as if it was the most pejorative label that could possibly be attached to an interviewee. What disgraceful temerity from Franny. Someone arrives to interview you for a business magazine and you talk about business. Conn's description of the episode sounds laughably juvenile.



He's knowledgeable but not to the degree a lot of people think. He has nothing like the level of insight that someone such as Stefan from the 93:20 pod does, but then Stefan is CEO of a public company and also their senior in-house lawyer, with a track record of having advised the boards of top football clubs in his past. Conn qualified as a solicitor but left the profession immediately after doing so. As someone who's supervised newly qualified solicitors and has been one, I can tell you that their ability to navigate complex legal issues such as this is really not all that. He's probably the most knowledgeable current British journalist about business issues in sport, but very much in an 'in the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is King' kind of way.

I gave my view of this latest piece by Conn in this thread last night, and at quite some length. It's possible he may be right, but if he is, it seems a senseless move from City's point of view. Yet if he's made any attempt to discern why City may be more confident of their case than he is, or what arguments we may put forward that distinguish the case from the precedent he refers to in his article, there's absolutely no sign of it. He may well have asked for a view from a sports law expert before writing, but the problem with that is that to get the right answers, you need to ask the right questions. I don't think I can be confident that he has.

More generally, Conn has shifted away from his usual subject matter when started out, which had a focus on exposing wrongdoing and sharp practices in the game. Then, he wrote for The Independent and produced two excellent books. In those days, I thought he was very good - and sometimes better than that. However, for reasons far beyond the tone, I loathe the specious, holier-than-thou role he's espoused over several years in The Guardian as a self-appointed conscience of modern football. Beyond some half-baked fan ownership nonsense, never does he put forward any constructive ideas for improvement amid his dreary whinges about the state of the modern game.

Moreover, there's no room for nuance. Almost every observation is refracted through the lens of Conn's own beliefs, often in a way that's simply sophomoric. Thus, we were treated to his eccentric observation in a Guardian column that, given the flaws in the PL's current model, "fan-owned Real Madrid" are an exemplar of moral rectitude in the modern game. We have his unabashed, uncritical adoration of a FC United, an outfit whose main asset - which translates into enormous media and political goodwill - is an identity they've leeched off one of the world's most famous clubs. And when he discusses why football was ethically superior in a bygone golden age (that never actually existed), he's egregious in the way he's blind (wilfully or otherwise) to the many drawbacks of the past and improvements in the modern age.

All these faults were fully evident in Richer Than God, which I'm glad I borrowed as opposed to shelling out my own cash on it. Like so many of his articles, the book merely served as an exercise in Conn trying to substantiate his simplistic philosophy by taking liberties with the facts and rational analysis. I find it all the more difficult to sympathise with that modus operandi given that I consider the philosophy in question to amount to little more than vapid, hand-wringing bullshit.

So sorry, Marvin. You admire Conn if you want to. But put me down in the 'not a fan' camp.
Click to expand...

Many thanks @petrusha your items are always very educational for us layman.
 
I give no credence whatsoever to arguments that City are "putting shots across UEFA's bows" or trying any other clever tactics to gain a short term objective. My opinion is that City are deadly serious and have been since the DS "revelations". The clubs position from the start has been that these revelations amount to a concerted campaign to damage the club's reputation. No explanation of who exactly is behind this campaign has been provided and we do not know if the club has hard evidence of this, but it seems clear to me that the club and its lawyers see UEFA's proceedings as playing an important role in adding to damage already done. Firstly the case (whatever it is) against City appears to rely heavily on evidence which a court of law may rule inadmissible. The "leaks" from the investigatory committee have given the distinct impression that City are guilty of withholding important information from UEFA about our accounts, that City were thus guilty of cheating and that they would be unable to compete in the CL for at least one season. This was all leaked when the club claim the investigatory committee was in possession of evidence from the club which it didn't even consider before sending the case to the adjudicatory chamber. The adjudicatory commission will consider what to do while City are to make decisions about contracts, transfers etc etc etc while everyone has been led to believe that we will not be playing in the CL next season.

This whole business is reputational damage by rumour, inuendo and suggestion and City MUST have the right of appeal to end a process so flawed (and so abused) that it is certainly damaging the interests of our club. As Petrusha pointed out last night, this is a massive difference from the AC Milan case.
 
bluenova said:
Now that assumes that "Lawyers" are right. Very good lawyers will provide a strong argument that 1+1=3. Other very good lawyers will counter that 1+1=banana.

David Conn probably spoke to some very good lawyers before writing his article, rather than just providing his own insight.

City's lawyers may even agree with him, but have decided it's tactically best to argue the case at this stage. A shot across the bow, showing City are ready to go to CAS, while knowing there won't be a hearing at this stage? UEFA are then making a decision knowing it's less likely City are bluffing about challenging them.
Click to expand...

Of course, given that no one at the moment knows exactly what City's arguments are, it's impossible to assess them. In view of that, Conn may be right. But if so, it's a strange move tactically from City. Any small benefit gained from delivering a so-called 'shot across the bows' is entirely lost when CAS throw out a no-hope case and publish a withering statement of their reasoning. It makes us look desperate and lacking in credibility. Imagine, in such an event, the crowing from UEFA 'sources' through the sycophantic media, trumpeting that it shows what they knew all along - that City are just all bluster.

No, far more likely is that our lawyers think we have a realistic prospect of winning (please note the wording). It doesn't necessarily mean that they're right, even though we've presumably employed the best. It doesn't mean that we'll definitely win - we quite possibly won't. But I'd be very surprised if we've done this without them thinking we stand some sort of genuine chance. I could be wrong, of course, but if I am then I think the club's strategy is seriously misguided.

Conn's piece makes no effort to assess what City's position might be, no effort to assess whether our case may have small but crucial differences from the AC Milan case that he cites as a precedent, and no effort to assess why, if what he says is true, City have taken the step they have. Yes, he'll have spoken to legal experts in compiling the piece, but if all he asked is whether an IC referral to the AC can be challenged before the CAS, he'll have got the answer he did. If he wanted a rounded picture, he'd have raised the issues I set out at the start of this paragraph. That they're conspicuous by their absence from the article suggests that either he raised them and omitted the answers, or that he didn't raise them at all.

My bet, frankly, is the latter. But it doesn't really matter - either way, the article is skewed. The lack of a discussion of MCFC's potential arguments or strategy makes it a deficient piece of journalism that's wholly unhelpful in the context of a proper discussion of the matter, and reinforces my view of David Conn set out in detail a few pages back in this thread.
 
petrusha said:
He turned up to interview Franny for a north west business publication and said that the experience left him knowing that he'd been "talking to a businessman", as if it was the most pejorative label that could possibly be attached to an interviewee. What disgraceful temerity from Franny. Someone arrives to interview you for a business magazine and you talk about business. Conn's description of the episode sounds laughably juvenile.



He's knowledgeable but not to the degree a lot of people think. He has nothing like the level of insight that someone such as Stefan from the 93:20 pod does, but then Stefan is CEO of a public company and also their senior in-house lawyer, with a track record of having advised the boards of top football clubs in his past. Conn qualified as a solicitor but left the profession immediately after doing so. As someone who's supervised newly qualified solicitors and has been one, I can tell you that their ability to navigate complex legal issues such as this is really not all that. He's probably the most knowledgeable current British journalist about business issues in sport, but very much in an 'in the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is King' kind of way.

I gave my view of this latest piece by Conn in this thread last night, and at quite some length. It's possible he may be right, but if he is, it seems a senseless move from City's point of view. Yet if he's made any attempt to discern why City may be more confident of their case than he is, or what arguments we may put forward that distinguish the case from the precedent he refers to in his article, there's absolutely no sign of it. He may well have asked for a view from a sports law expert before writing, but the problem with that is that to get the right answers, you need to ask the right questions. I don't think I can be confident that he has.

More generally, Conn has shifted away from his usual subject matter when started out, which had a focus on exposing wrongdoing and sharp practices in the game. Then, he wrote for The Independent and produced two excellent books. In those days, I thought he was very good - and sometimes better than that. However, for reasons far beyond the tone, I loathe the specious, holier-than-thou role he's espoused over several years in The Guardian as a self-appointed conscience of modern football. Beyond some half-baked fan ownership nonsense, never does he put forward any constructive ideas for improvement amid his dreary whinges about the state of the modern game.

Moreover, there's no room for nuance. Almost every observation is refracted through the lens of Conn's own beliefs, often in a way that's simply sophomoric. Thus, we were treated to his eccentric observation in a Guardian column that, given the flaws in the PL's current model, "fan-owned Real Madrid" are an exemplar of moral rectitude in the modern game. We have his unabashed, uncritical adoration of a FC United, an outfit whose main asset - which translates into enormous media and political goodwill - is an identity they've leeched off one of the world's most famous clubs. And when he discusses why football was ethically superior in a bygone golden age (that never actually existed), he's egregious in the way he's blind (wilfully or otherwise) to the many drawbacks of the past and improvements in the modern age.

All these faults were fully evident in Richer Than God, which I'm glad I borrowed as opposed to shelling out my own cash on it. Like so many of his articles, the book merely served as an exercise in Conn trying to substantiate his simplistic philosophy by taking liberties with the facts and rational analysis. I find it all the more difficult to sympathise with that modus operandi given that I consider the philosophy in question to amount to little more than vapid, hand-wringing bullshit.

So sorry, Marvin. You admire Conn if you want to. But put me down in the 'not a fan' camp.
Click to expand...

Great post pal. I'm really enjoyed your input.
 
BluessinceHydeRoad said:
I give no credence whatsoever to arguments that City are "putting shots across UEFA's bows" or trying any other clever tactics to gain a short term objective. My opinion is that City are deadly serious and have been since the DS "revelations". The clubs position from the start has been that these revelations amount to a concerted campaign to damage the club's reputation. No explanation of who exactly is behind this campaign has been provided and we do not know if the club has hard evidence of this, but it seems clear to me that the club and its lawyers see UEFA's proceedings as playing an important role in adding to damage already done. Firstly the case (whatever it is) against City appears to rely heavily on evidence which a court of law may rule inadmissible. The "leaks" from the investigatory committee have given the distinct impression that City are guilty of withholding important information from UEFA about our accounts, that City were thus guilty of cheating and that they would be unable to compete in the CL for at least one season. This was all leaked when the club claim the investigatory committee was in possession of evidence from the club which it didn't even consider before sending the case to the adjudicatory chamber. The adjudicatory commission will consider what to do while City are to make decisions about contracts, transfers etc etc etc while everyone has been led to believe that we will not be playing in the CL next season.

This whole business is reputational damage by rumour, inuendo and suggestion and City MUST have the right of appeal to end a process so flawed (and so abused) that it is certainly damaging the interests of our club. As Petrusha pointed out last night, this is a massive difference from the AC Milan case.
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Pretty much what I believe.
Doesn’t matter what we are actually charged with or whether we are guilty of anything. The propaganda damage continues and will continue.
And this does hamper our BAU day to day running of a business.
They don’t want us strengthening in the summer. This constant bombardment is a media aided and abetted tactic, that we are incapable of stopping.

UEFA have to be brought to task this time. Hopefully in exposing the flawed process, other corrupt protectionist practices get exposed also and the whole can of worms of the cartel influence gets placed in the public domain.

I do think our management are clever people and I’d like to trust that there is a very considered end game being pursued with their current strategy.
 
Hadn't noticed until this morning when watching a review of the Bundesliga. German Rags sleeve sponsor - Qatar Airways! Well I'll be.....
 
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