I apologise for the length of this but it was the only way I could reasonably cover what I wanted to discuss or relay to you lot.
Having read several articles now regarding the alleged case against us I am still unable to establish if the ICB have only used information taken from web pages of Der Spiegel to form the basis of charges against us or have they sought the alleged actual emails from the stolen cache of data or is that currently residing in Portugal awaiting its disposal from a Portuguese court following Pintos likely public castration.
Mark Goddards iterations are interesting (see page 167 of this thread) in respect of the likely investigative process employed by Uefa investigators and I think it doesn't take a great leap for normal folk to read the Der Spiegel allegations and formulate the necessary questions to put to City.
https://www.spiegel.de/internationa...-rules-to-the-tune-of-millions-a-1236346.html
Unsurprisingly i've read through the report several times looking beyond the laughable rhetoric and faux outrage (using Hoeness as some form of paragon of financial proberty being a particular favourite) and there are several references to emails (none dated surprisingly). I wanted to have a clear look at what was allegedly in the emails to try to understand and substantiate any potential charges.
The following alleged email must be post May 2013 when RM was sacked.
"We will have a shortfall of 9.9m pounds in order to comply with UEFA FFP this season," Man City's Chief Financial Officer Jorge Chumillas wrote in an internal email. "The deficit is due to RM (eds: a reference to Roberto Mancini) termination. I think that the only solution left would be an additional amount of AD (eds: Abu Dhabi) sponsorship revenues that covers this gap."
Subsequently
....sponsoring contracts would be adjusted -- for the just finished season! Etihad was to suddenly pay 1.5 million pounds more, Aabar 0.5 million extra and the tourism authority a surplus of fully 5.5 million pounds.
Looking at this as a result DS makes certain assumptions that MCFC compelled such payments however would it not be perfectly feasible that we approached our certainly friendly sponsors and asked them to make additional payments to help us out at a sticky point for certain future discounts or privileges or future contractual subsidies as long as said payments were made prior to year end?
Another infamous email is the one below
As early as April 2010, when Pearce negotiated the sponsorship deal with Aabar, he wrote a telltale email to the firm's leadership. According to the contract, the investment company was to pay the club 15 million pounds annually. But that apparently isn't the full story. "As we discussed, the annual direct obligation for Aabar is GBP 3 million," Pearce wrote. "The remaining 12 million GBP requirement will come from alternative sources provided by His Highness."
however this refers to details prior to our settlement on 16.05.2014 for seasons 13/14 - 14/15 & 15/16
https://www.uefa.com/MultimediaFile...ncialControl/02/10/69/00/2106900_DOWNLOAD.pdf
so I believe has no bearing on anything as the investigators would already have looked in depth at values of sponsorship contracts and been happy with them. In any event I think we may have established HH is likely not to be our owner as DS obviously thinks.
Next in line was....
Apparently, companies like Etihad in Abu Dhabi wait for the Abu Dhabi United Group (ADUG), the holding company that belongs to Sheikh Mansour and which also owns Manchester City, to wire them money. That money is then "routed through the partners and they then forward onto us," wrote Finance Director Andrew Widdowson in an email. That, at least, is how things were done in 2015: At the time, the deal with Etihad was bringing in 67.5 million pounds annually. But Chief Financial Officer Chumillas emphasized in an email to Pearce: "Please note that out of those 67.5m pounds, 8m pounds should be funded directly by Etihad and 59.5 by ADUG."
I think we have accepted that this was potentially what happened however unfortunately for DS and the rabid dogs this is not a contravention of FFP. In addition we had a statement from Etihad which said the financial obligations associated with the partnership with the club have always been and remain the airline's "sole liability and responsibility." Although the likelihood of such a sponsorship being a related party might be somewhat in question the value of the contract was never an issue therefore it certainly wasn't "Inflated" as a sponsorship amount.
The following is a load of bluster about compromises by Infantino.
https://www.spiegel.de/internationa...-and-psg-pact-with-the-sheikhs-a-1236414.html
Clearly the settlements reached were necessary and are strictly a part of the FFP process as applied and if DS wanted to do their research properly (not their narrative though) they should have looked up the whole concept rules of FFP and particularly the clear and transparent requirement for settlements and sanctions of which FFP currently doesn't have and which would most certainly leave a legal loophole to be challenged. These matters are discussed in this following legal piece - although unedited makes clear ref to the position of Uefa
https://www.lawinsport.com/topics/f...airness-in-financial-fair-play#sdfootnote3sym
The DS No 2 is a litany of stuff about Project Longbow which is all about the creation of Fordham to manage player image rights which would then be purchased by CFG which outsources part of the player wages in effect with the intention of lowering costs. Again its already all been dealt with following the settlement in May 2014. It was subsequently dealt with and the agreement with City saw its demise as a vehicle to manage losses. All entirely legal im afraid and good business practice to keep initial operating costs down.
Part 3 of the DS episodes is a Bayern Munich sob storey that Pep signed for City before his contract was up at Bayern - Boo Hoo - nothing to do with anything apart from quoting Peps remuneration package and stating it was world leading. Thats what happens when you hire the best coach in the world you muppets.
DS Part 4 is another Boo Hoo piece regarding KDB purchase from Wolfsburg and the description of the CFG business model being global. It also makes reference to RM salary being paid in 2 parts the 2nd being by Al Jazira in relation to "football advisory" activities. No illegal as far as im aware and not against FFP. It doesn't in itself allege any other wrongdoing apart from a reference to the Part 1 elements regarding "hidden payments etc" (i note they were very careful not to indicate any illegal activity). Suffice to say the articles final line was
"In football, it's not just survival of the fittest, it's also survival of the richest" - I would say no shit sherlock.
Thats it - am I the only one thinking if thats all they've got they better have some good lawyers.
