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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M18CTID said:
Well put Marvin and squares with my thinking. We have to trust the club when they say they’ve done nothing wrong (until such a time as UEFA can categorically prove otherwise), and I find it difficult to see why so many prominent figures at the club would be risking their reputations in being so bullish about our innocence if we were guilty of wrongdoing. That said, as much as I’m trusting the club on this, like you I can see exactly why UEFA would want to ask City questions about the content of the e-mails.
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The club was quite clearly pulling out all the stops to try to qualify to use the pre-2010 wages exemption which, even though we'd still have technically failed FFP, would have allowed us to avoid punishment for that failure. The reporting in the media has been universally hysterical and has almost never, as far as I can see, allowed for the possibility that an organisation can legitimately seek to find a way to circumvent rules according to which it has to operate. To my knowledge, only Keiran Maguire, the football finance guy from Liverpool University, has noted that several measures City employed are quite commonplace in the commercial world.

That said, in one or two aspects City did rather go beyond what was reasonable. Based on the Der Spiegel materials, PwC alleged that the values of the sponsorships with Etihad and Aabar were overvalued and, while I don't have the figures to hand, I do recall that the amounts involved made this conclusion seem perfectly reasonable. Now, I think it's reasonable to infer that City were able to persuade these sponsors to enter into contracts at inflated amounts only owing to the owner's connections in Abu Dhabi; an arm's length contract for a similar sponsorship wouldn't have contained those valuations. In the light of that, City were really taking the piss in asserting that the amounts couldn't be adjusted to a fair value because these sponsors weren't related parties.

So I can fully understand why UEFA were dubious about City and why they felt they had to investigate the Der Spiegel revelations. But reportedly the sanctions against City relate to the Etihad contract, which leaves me a bit nonplussed. After all, we know that City have performed obligations under the agreement (e.g. Etihad's logo has appeared on City's shirts through the period), even PwC accepted the valuation, and City's accounts show the money coming from Etihad. So I really have no idea on what grounds the IC and AC process concluded that the settlement agreement should be reopened. I keep thinking that there must be more information we're so far unaware of, because something just doesn't seem right somehow.
 
grunge said:
Are we expecting a result at the end of the day or will this be something that goes into review by them for a few months?
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I actually want to kill Ya.
If it’s not the puntastic knobs derailing, it’s the thread jcls.
You don’t even have to trawl the whole thread, just go back a couple of days.
Result by Xmas
 
Shaelumstash said:
With that being the case, why did City argue against PwC’s suggestion that Etihad is a related party?

What did we stand to gain?
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I'm not sure. We hadn't classed Etihad or any of the other sponsors as related parties prior to 2014 so maybe that was part of it. It could also have been that if we had, we would've had to write down the smaller ones, which might have impacted our ability to pass FFP in subsequent years. From what I can see though, we'd probably have been OK even if we did that.

In that case I'd have simply said "OK. For the purposes of FFP, and FFP only, we will class these companies, and any other Abu Dhabi ones, as related parties. Therefore if you agree that Etihad is fair value then that's OK but we'll look at the others and get our own view on valuation, rather than simply accept yours. Then we'll come to an agreement."
 
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antspider said:
The fact there is no “UEFA “ leak is because it isn’t going at all well for them :)
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Im not buying that for one second. They aren't in charge of this procedure so unlike the previously where they have held all the cards, they start to leak info now, especially with what city raised on the original process, they would effectively be screwing their own chances.
 
projectriver said:
Well beggars can't be choosers. We need to win by any means. An "exoneration" is very unlikely.
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Hi mate, thanks for all your input on this thread it's been very informative.

What do you see being the most realistic outcome, CAS knocking it back to the AC to sort out a more suitable punishment in line with the breach or exoneration, which you state is very unlikely?
 
Citizen Green said:
Hi mate, thanks for all your input on this thread it's been very informative.

What do you see being the most realistic outcome, CAS knocking it back to the AC to sort out a more suitable punishment in line with the breach or exoneration, which you state is very unlikely?
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Ill leave you to listen to the 9320pod out shortly where I am put on the spot on...I'll link it when its out.
 
willipp said:
Im not buying that for one second. They aren't in charge of this procedure so unlike the previously where they have held all the cards, they start to leak info now, especially with what city raised on the original process, they would effectively be screwing their own chances.
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One of the complaints from City which CAS actually took onboard first time around was the leaks to the NYT from UEFA, CAS called them "concerning" and advised the offender be removed from the process, so UEFA won't be leaking a thing as it could jeopardize them whether it be positive or negative from their stand point.
 
Citizen Green said:
One of the complaints from City which CAS actually took onboard first time around was the leaks to the NYT from UEFA, CAS called them "concerning" and advised the offender be removed from the process, so UEFA won't be leaking a thing as it could jeopardize them whether it be positive or negative from their stand point.
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Yes exactly my thought.
 
projectriver said:
City argued PwC were wrong on everything...but settled anyway https://www.spiegel.de/internationa...-and-psg-pact-with-the-sheikhs-a-1236414.html

"The PwC Report is seriously flawed in that it contains numerous erroneous interpretations of the Regulations, false assumptions of fact, errors of law and erroneous conclusions," read the reply. The lawyers demanded that the PwC auditors revise or delete large sections of their report. PwC refused, which further enraged the Manchester City attorneys.
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that makes interesting reading everything we do is aggressive is anyone not aggressive when they are being told what they can do in there own business and face loosing millions and there lawyers are saying the other side is completely wrong ? Do we know in what way our side disagreed with PWC I think I am right in saying our auditors did not consider any of our deals related party PWC considered 3 of 4 related guessing Etisalate Aabar Visit Abu Dhabi and Etihad did we not have a sponsorship deal with Mubala excuse the spelling mistakes then we agreed to have 2 treated as related party or at least not increased guessing Etisalte and Aabar but not ETihad or visit Abu Dhabi I would like to know how our auditors reach a very different conclusions PWC the term related party has been explained on here before and it’s very factual feels like one set of auditors or perhaps both are being swayed by there clients money wonder what CAS make of this but perhaps it is for a different court to look at
 
whipper said:
Waiting till August will mess up player recruitment for next season I would imagine.
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Don't think there will be much of a window before August. Though migh impact on UEFA planning next seasons c/l so they might have to suspend the punishment anyway if thats the case.
 
petrusha said:
The club was quite clearly pulling out all the stops to try to qualify to use the pre-2010 wages exemption which, even though we'd still have technically failed FFP, would have allowed us to avoid punishment for that failure. The reporting in the media has been universally hysterical and has almost never, as far as I can see, allowed for the possibility that an organisation can legitimately seek to find a way to circumvent rules according to which it has to operate. To my knowledge, only Keiran Maguire, the football finance guy from Liverpool University, has noted that several measures City employed are quite commonplace in the commercial world.

That said, in one or two aspects City did rather go beyond what was reasonable. Based on the Der Spiegel materials, PwC alleged that the values of the sponsorships with Etihad and Aabar were overvalued and, while I don't have the figures to hand, I do recall that the amounts involved made this conclusion seem perfectly reasonable. Now, I think it's reasonable to infer that City were able to persuade these sponsors to enter into contracts at inflated amounts only owing to the owner's connections in Abu Dhabi; an arm's length contract for a similar sponsorship wouldn't have contained those valuations. In the light of that, City were really taking the piss in asserting that the amounts couldn't be adjusted to a fair value because these sponsors weren't related parties.

So I can fully understand why UEFA were dubious about City and why they felt they had to investigate the Der Spiegel revelations. But reportedly the sanctions against City relate to the Etihad contract, which leaves me a bit nonplussed. After all, we know that City have performed obligations under the agreement (e.g. Etihad's logo has appeared on City's shirts through the period), even PwC accepted the valuation, and City's accounts show the money coming from Etihad. So I really have no idea on what grounds the IC and AC process concluded that the settlement agreement should be reopened. I keep thinking that there must be more information we're so far unaware of, because something just doesn't seem right somehow.
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It wasn't Etihad's sponsorship that was deemed excessive; that appears to have been broadly acceptable. It was Etisalat I think. But compare that to PSG, where Leterme's external experts Octagon, significantly down-valued the Qatar contract but he allowed PSG to bring in their own experts, who significantly up-valued it. Which he accepted without seemingly a murmur.

I can't remember the figures for the second tier sponsorships but think they talked about £15m each (or Euros) and the total value should have been £7 or 8m. Now suppose we'd got Nielsen in to value them (and they were quite visible sponsorships) and they'd said they were worth £10m each, so £20m in total. We might have settled at £15m in total, meaning a £15m write-down (if they were realted parties). That wouldn't have been significant in the overall scheme of things.

You've just jogged my memory on something else actually. You cast doubt on some of Conn's article, referring to the related party issue, and he also said there was an argument over the amount we thought we could claim for wages, as we'd also included amortisation. That struck me as highly unlikely, as I know from Swiss Ramble, who had sources inside UEFA, that they & City had mutually agreed a figure of £80m for those wages. This surprised both of us, as we both had it somewhat lower but he explained that UEFA had allowed renegotiated contracts to be included as long as those were only at the same level as the original contract. So if you were paying someone £70k a week under a pre-2010 contract then upped it to £90k a week in 2011, you could still claim the £70k as the 2012 figure, whereas we'd both thought renegotiated contracts couldn't be included. So I'm not convinced Conn had that right either.
 
WRicko said:
that makes interesting reading everything we do is aggressive is anyone not aggressive when they are being told what they can do in there own business and face loosing millions and there lawyers are saying the other side is completely wrong ? Do we know in what way our side disagreed with PWC I think I am right in saying our auditors did not consider any of our deals related party PWC considered 3 of 4 related guessing Etisalate Aabar Visit Abu Dhabi and Etihad did we not have a sponsorship deal with Mubala excuse the spelling mistakes then we agreed to have 2 treated as related party or at least not increased guessing Etisalte and Aabar but not ETihad or visit Abu Dhabi I would like to know how our auditors reach a very different conclusions PWC the term related party has been explained on here before and it’s very factual feels like one set of auditors or perhaps both are being swayed by there clients money wonder what CAS make of this but perhaps it is for a different court to look at
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Mate - you need some punctuation in there to indicate where one sentence ends and the next one starts - it's really difficult to read and respond to otherwise.
 
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