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

[hello]

UEFA are really questioning where a sponsor is getting their funds from to pay for sponsorship of a football club. Only, it isn't really any of their business and if they think it is, why are all other sponsors within the game not subjected to the same scrutiny?

Without descending the Harris levels of "whataboutery" Do UEFA care about the fact that one of its main line sponsors received billions of state funding to prop itself up and that the state that did so has clubs competing in UEFA competitions? No of course that's absolutely fine and there's no potential conflict of interest there. Er but actually weren't the FPP regulations changed to facilitate AC Milan's change of ownership and allow investment shortly after UEFA renewed its sponsorship agreement with Milan based Unicredit which had been propped up to the tune of 8.1bn euros by the Italian state. That's just pure coincidence I am sure.

Lots of sources are behind paywalls but a couple of open ones:

https://fr.uefa.com/insideuefa/about-uefa/administration/marketing/news/newsid=2253825.html

https://www.irishtimes.com/business...es-on-to-unicredit-s-13bn-cash-call-1.2934743

 

[BlueMoonz1977]

This is an interesting comment from the head of commercial activities of OctagonUK, one of the partner of UEFA and trusted audit firm used for fair value market assessment.

He wonders why Puma made this statement. If they weren't sure, it would have been best for them not to comment. So City must have given them solid proof of being cleared in an appeal.

This is 2014 Octagon valuation of City sponsorship :



Worth noting that the minimum value given to Etihad deal is 40 and maximum is 50. Even though it is lower than the actual deal, it is nowhere near close to the 8 M figure. This alone should tell the attacks on City aren't legit.

Just read his twitter thread on that - so UEFA are ultimately trying to suggest that the sponsorship deals were inflated and paid by our owner...an example being that Etihad were only paying £8m per year and the rest was from Mansour ?

I have just come out a meeting at work in which I nearly fell asleep in so reading his twitter feed I may be missing the point

 

[gordondaviesmoustache]

I think Wenger’s first side would have failed ffp. He benefited from Fiszmann bankrolling him. He got the initial heavy investment he is now trying to deny anyone else, such a hypocrite.

And he never gets pulled up for it.

 

[Gordyola]

Sorry probably used the wrong chose of words. It will be based on an assessment of the merits of City's appeal.

CAS dont just automatically suspend a ban at the request of an individual or organisation. From my understanding (im not a lawyer or anything and like everyone on here we have just read a lot about it from previous cases etc) you have to have put forward a case that shows you have a chance of success at appeal. IF CAS do suspend the ban then it does indeed mean the case we put forward to them has a chance of success. Weather that means a reduction of ban/fine or acquittal remains to be seen

Sorry I disagree about it having a level of success CAS will not make any assumption of success

 

[Rolee]

I think the trail indicates the money originated from the EC but MAY have been routed through ADUG.
My point is that if this is the case then the routing through ADUG is not just a trivial post box issue.
The result being that we could be in breach of FFP.

Doesn't some of the Etihad sponsorship money go to New York and Melbourne? In which case putting the money into the holding company before being distributed to the 3 clubs would make sense?

 

[domalino]

1. Being deceitful isn't always 'a worse offence than the offence itself': it's in most jurisdictions (according to sentencing guidelines) far less serious than the original offence itself and results in much fewer prosecutions. Even in the UK, if I turned up at the Guardian's offices and slapped David Conn's bald head but then denied it, the only prosecution I'd face is one for the (common) assault.

2. More importantly, nowhere in the 'UEFA Club Licensing and Financial Fair Play Regulations' or 'the Procedural rules governing the UEFA Club Financial Control Body' does it say that:

• 'Breach of trust' is an offence
• 'Breach of trust' or a similar offence is more serious than any other offence

Once again, it looks like Conn's arrived at an opinion not just without facts but in the opposition of facts.

He really is a disgrace to journalism.

Actually, it’s not true at all.

Conn states that “clearly Sheikh Mansour is the source of the £57m”

What is he basing that on? The hacked emails.

First rule of financial litigation - follow the money. That’s what PB did and it turns out the £57m came from the Abu Dhabi Executive Council. Absolutely nothing to do with Sheikh Mansour.

Perhaps Conn should have given his old pal PB a call before he jumped in and made himself look silly again.

Conn has showed a very poor grasp of specifics and the correct terms when he's featured on the radio and podcasts about this. Like you said, inserting phrases like "breach of trust" like it's an actual charge when it has never been used by any party is not something you would do if you had a solid grounding of knowledge.

He's wafty, like a schoolboy who didn't do his homework and research his presentation, but has very strong opinions anyway.

 

[Len Rum]

We could not be in breach of FFP if the money originated from the EC, regardless of how it was routed. Even if wording in FFP suggested that was some sort of breach, any competent court or arbitration body would look at the substance of the transaction and find in City's favour.

Can't agree mate.
If it's routed through J.Bloggs clearing house for financial transactions Ltd. you might have a case.
But it wasn't it came through ADUG and that is our owner and that makes all the difference.
Anyhow hope I'm wrong.

 

[dario2739]

Can't agree mate.
If it's routed through J.Bloggs clearing house for financial transactions Ltd. you might have a case.
But it wasn't it came through ADUG and that is our owner and that makes all the difference.
Anyhow hope I'm wrong.

From what I read it wasn't through ADUG though

 

[tolmie's hairdoo]

Conn is so far down the rabbit hole that to come out and admit his main piece of evidence against us, the e-mail saying HH was a reference to shiekh mansour and not shiekh kalifa will make him look like a fool.

He has no turning back stratergy as he has staked his last 4-5 articles on this premise.

Now that the etihad funding is being clearly shown not to be from our shiekh he is twisting the narrative as otherwise he is shown to be a poorly reseached journalist.

It is both pathetic and moronic.

A poorly researched journalist?

Some are being far too kind. He has chosen to lift Prestwich Blue's information and present it as his own, ignoring the relevancy and facts to maintain his ongoing narrative.

He's not a journalist. He's a chiseler.

An absolute disgrace to the profession.

 

[domalino]

This is an interesting comment from the head of commercial activities of OctagonUK, one of the partner of UEFA and trusted audit firm used for fair value market assessment.

He wonders why Puma made this statement. If they weren't sure, it would have been best for them not to comment. So City must have given them solid proof of being cleared in an appeal.

This is 2014 Octagon valuation of City sponsorship :



Worth noting that the minimum value given to Etihad deal is 40 and maximum is 50. Even though it is lower than the actual deal, it is nowhere near close to the 8 M figure. This alone should tell the attacks on City aren't legit.

Also worth noting, this is a study done by the same company, Octagon, which valued PSG's QSA sponsorship as 7m/year, which Yves Leterme then disregarded and accepted it was worth 100m, PSG's value.

If UEFA's IC decided the related party sponsorships of Aabar and Etisalat were overvalued because they were paying 11 instead of 4 (2.75x) and 15 instead of 5 (3.00x) then why the fuck did they allow a sponsorship which was 14x larger as assessed by the same company.