Manchester City’s Financial Doping

[Batman]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1798455392697303470

Of course. People like Todd Boehly are the poster children for thumbing their nose up at rules.

 

[Synical]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1798320145766453298

 

[freeglennhelder2]

Oh Guardian, we love you so:

‘See for example the deeply cynical Trumpian framing, the idea that this is a battle being fought against “the elites”. Here we have a richer-than-god inherited monarchy, owners of the most powerful football club in the world, somehow presenting themselves as outsiders. When will the boundlessly rich kings and princes of the overclass finally be allowed to take a seat at the top table?’


Article summary: The EPL allowed a nation state to own a football club, twice. Yes they made a lot of money but nobody knows where this will end and they may well have destroyed themselves.

‘Governments are not benevolent enterprises. The UK government sells arms and kills people to protect its own interests. The US government is an imperialist machine. What did we expect Abu Dhabi to do here exactly? Play nice?’

Manchester City’s Trumpian tactics spotlight autocratic creep in football | Barney Ronay

As club’s powerful owners rail against ‘the elites’ in legal battle with Premier League, there is a looming danger to the game

www.theguardian.com

 

[HattoriHanzo]

Article from The Times:

Hypocritical Man City’s only goal was sportswashing but league let them in anyway


Panicking powerbrokers now realise the scale of their error – unless these cuckoo owners are expelled from the nest, English football’s whole ecosystem faces collapse

June 05 2024, 4.00pm BST
Did they suppose the document would never leak? Did they not count on the brilliant investigative reporters at Times Sport, the best in the business? Did they hope that their perversion of the words of John Stuart Mill, in his wonderful tome On Liberty, would never see the light of day? Or do they no longer care about how they look, knowing that a proportion of Manchester City fans will take to social media to defend the indefensible, turning tribal allegiance into an advanced form of cognitive dissonance?

“The tyranny of the majority” is the breathtaking claim of City. They argue that their freedom to make money has been limited by the Premier League’s rules on sponsorship deals, which forbid related companies (such as Etihad Airways sponsoring a team backed by Abu Dhabi) from offering cash above the commercial rate determined by an independent assessor. They say they are being persecuted, held back by a cartel of legacy clubs that want to monopolise success at their expense.

I am guessing that all fans will see through this comedy gold. City have won the past four Premier League titles and more than 57 per cent of the available domestic trophies over the past seven years. According to my former colleague Tony Evans, this makes them the most dominant side in top-flight history: more dominant than Liverpool in the Seventies and Eighties (41 per cent), more dominant than Manchester United in the Nineties (33 per cent).

Indeed, they are almost as dominant as the emirate of Abu Dhabi, which understands the concept of tyranny quite well having engaged in human rights abuses of a kind that led Amnesty International to question its treatment of immigrant workers and to condemn the arbitrary detention of 26 prisoners of conscience.

But dominance is, as Einstein might have said, a relative term. City want more money than they have at present, more dominance than they enjoy now, more freedom to spend on players (their bench is worth more than the first teams of most of their rivals) so that they can win, what, 40 league titles in a row? That would indeed turn the Premier League from what many regard as a fairly enjoyable competition into a tyranny of the minority.

And this is why the story revealed by my colleague Matt Lawton will cause the scales to fall from the eyes of all but the most biased of observers. The motive of City’s owners is not principally about football, the Premier League or, indeed, Manchester. As many warned from the outset, this was always a scheme of sportswashing, a strategy of furthering the interests of a microstate in the Middle East. It is in effect leveraging the soft power of football, its cultural cachet, to launder its reputation. This is why it is furious about quaint rules on spending limits thwarting the kind of power that, back home, is untrammelled.

And let us be clear about what all this means. An emirate, whose government is autocratic and therefore not subject to the full rule of law, is paying for a squad of eye-wateringly expensive lawyers to pursue a case in British courts that directly violates British interests. For whatever one thinks about what the Premier League has become, there is no doubt that its success has benefited the UK, not just in terms of the estimated contribution to the economy of £8billion in 2021-22, but also through a tax contribution of £4.2billion and thousands of jobs.

There was no turning back once Abramovich was welcomed with open arms to the English game

Yet what would happen if the spending taps were allowed to be turned full tilt by removing restraints related to “associated partners”? That’s right: what remains of competitive balance would be destroyed, decimating the league’s prestige and appeal.

Remember a few years ago when leaked emails showed that Khaldoon al-Mubarak, the City chairman, “would rather spend 30 million on the 50 best lawyers in the world to sue them for the next ten years”. Isn’t it funny that such people love the rule of law abroad — seeing it as a vehicle for outspending counterparties on expensive litigation — almost as much as they fear it at home? It’s as though City have ditched any pretence to care about anything except the geopolitical interests of their owners. What’s certain is that the Premier League can no longer cope with multiple City lawsuits and has had to hire outside help. In this case, as in so many others, the rule of law is morphing into something quite different: the rule of lawyers.

In some ways you almost feel like saying to football’s now panicking powerbrokers: it serves you right. These people welcomed Roman Abramovich, then stood wide-eyed while state actors entered the game too. They surely cannot be too surprised that the logical endpoint for this greed and connivance is that the blue-ribband event of English football is now fighting for its survival. When you sup with Mephistopheles, you can’t complain when the old fella returns to claim his side of the bargain.

But the dominant sense today is the shameless hypocrisy of the owners of City. They said that they were investing in City because they cared about regenerating the area. They now say that unless they get their own way, they are likely to stop community funding. They said that the commercial deals were within the rules; they now say that the rules are illegal. They said that competitive balance was important for English football; they now want to destroy it. They said they were happy with the democratic ethos of Premier League decision-making; now they hilariously say it’s oppressive.

I suspect at least some City fans are uncomfortable with this brazenness and may even be belatedly reassessing the true motives of the club’s owners. What’s now clear is that cuckoos have been let into the Premier League nest. Unless they are properly confronted or ejected, they could now threaten the whole ecosystem of English football.

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I saw in some articles that some clubs already think about expelling this cancet from the league.
Maybe this will be the only solution.

 

[<<reed>>]

Man city would have punished if they were playing in serie a like the moment they charged with 115

Because Serie A is a proper grand ol' competition run by classy old-fashioned Italian gangsters

 

[Blood on the Tracks]

Honestly I don't care about us being given some pity trophy. It won't mean anything to me. Just void the titles they've won I don't care.

What's so galling is their behaviour has been know about for a decade and they've just been allowed to carry on because of the wealth and political power they have.

There are rules for everyone, you don't have to like the rules or agree with them but you have to abide by them to compete in the competition. They've made a mockery of it.

 

[MartiSaka]

Just to note the 115 charges are separate to the associated party transactions that city are taking the PL to court over. The 115 charges are predominatley about deliberate cooking of the books and not cooperating with PL investigations. The associated party rule was brought in by the PL after Newcastle ownership changed. A vast majority of clubs voted for the rule change including City, who are now taking the PL to court over it.

 

[HattoriHanzo]

Because Serie A is a proper grand ol' competition run by classy old-fashioned Italian gangsters

And which type of gangsters are running Premier League?
These from City are not classy at all.

 

[Kuroske]

Is it a possibility that the government steps in at some point to prevent foreign countries destroy their own football league? I can imaging that football fans will revolt if the judges rule in favor of City and that the PL will stop existing.

 

[HattoriHanzo]

Just to note the 115 charges are separate to the associated party transactions that city are taking the PL to court over. The 115 charges are predominatley about deliberate cooking of the books, and then lying and not cooperating with PL investigations. The associated party rule was brought in by the PL after Newcastle ownership changed. A vast majority of clubs voted for the rule change including City whi are now taking the PL to court over it.

I know that.
So City voted for these changes introduced after Newcastle takeover, and are now claiming that they are discriminated because of them?
Really?

 

[HattoriHanzo]

Is it a possibility that the government steps in at some point to prevent foreign countries destroy their own football league? I can imaging that football fans will revolt if the judges rule in favor of City and that the PL will stop existing.

Depends how many clubs are with City.

 

[MartiSaka]

Wow i thought Newcastle would.have been the club to support City in this case. But I guess if you want to sportswash properly, there is no point looking like hypocritical, arrogant ****s like the UAE are looking like currently. City are currently just branding themselves as the bad guys who have no interest in the "good of the game" apart from their lofty ambitions. It seems the Saudis, so far, dont want to be painted that way.

 

[MartiSaka]

I know that.
So City voted for these changes introduced after Newcastle takeover, and are now claiming that they are discriminated because of them?
Really?

I think this is correct, at least 14 of the 20 clubs would have voted yes. I think i heard they voted in support of it, but not entirely sure.

 

[Sniper Mik]

Depends how many clubs are with City.

Some clubs will definitely fold. Doubt a great deal of unity exists at multi-club ownership level. Can see United-Liverpool-Arsenal banding together for obvious reasons. Not sure about the strength of resolve of the rest

 

[MartiSaka]

Just expel City from football, its not like they reallly add anything or have much support. They can join a super league competition, which i am sure they will enjoy, given the purpose of that competiton is to equalise the spending of all the clubs in it.

Its not worth the effort.

 

[HattoriHanzo]

I think this is correct, at least 14 of the 20 clubs would have voted yes. I think i heard they voted in support of it, but not entirely sure.

I have found it.
From ESPN article:
That said, the league could point to the fact that these rules were approved in 2021 by a significant majority (19, with one abstaining) of Premier League clubs (rule changes require at least 14 of the 20 to vote in favor), that being part of the league is voluntary and that if you're going to be a part of it you have to abide by the rules set by its members.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I suppose the club abstaining was Newcastle.
So no one was against these changes in 2021, not even City.

It is obvious that this is only tactics to force Premier League to spend money on lawyers in useless trials.
Their logic is that they can spend more on lawyers and useless litigation than the league.
And they can spend more.

 

[HattoriHanzo]

Just expel City from football, its not like they reallly add anything or have much support. They can join a super league competition, which i am sure they will enjoy, given the purpose of that competiton is to equalise the spending of all the clubs in it.

Its not worth the effort.

 

[MartiSaka]

I have found it.
From ESPN article:
That said, the league could point to the fact that these rules were approved in 2021 by a significant majority (19, with one abstaining) of Premier League clubs (rule changes require at least 14 of the 20 to vote in favor), that being part of the league is voluntary and that if you're going to be a part of it you have to abide by the rules set by its members.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I suppose the club abstaining was Newcastle.
So no one was against these changes in 2021, not even City.

It is obvious that this is only tactics to force Premier League to spend money on lawyers in useless trials.
Their logic is that they can spend more on lawyers and useless litigation than the league.
And they can spend more.

As far as in understand, City are using the same legal team on both cases. So they have to fight on two fronts now. Imo the premier league has no issue with the additional legal costs, im sure their legal team is as accomplished as City. And remember all of the PL clubs including city are the ones funding the PL case.

 

[HattoriHanzo]

This article explains a lot.

Man City APT

From the article:

Well, if you want to play in UEFA competitions, you still have to abide by their rules. And they have "fair market value" principles to evaluate sponsorship deals. So even if City were to win, I doubt we'd suddenly get a billion-dollar Etihad sponsorship. (While this might mean they could be sponsored for $500m and sign Kylian Mbappé to play in the Premier League if such rules are removed, those same books would still be evaluated by UEFA as part of playing in those competitions. As such, they could still rule that these deals are inflated under their rules.)

More likely, this is aimed at the upcoming case in November, the one with the 115 charges. Many of them relate to sponsorship deals that were allegedly inflated beyond fair market value. And if that is no longer against the rules, it's hard to throw the book at them even if the rules were in place at the time. That's in essence what City are arguing here.

Either way, the implications are going to be far-reaching.
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So, UEFA has the same sponsorship rules Premier league.
Will they sue UEFA?
I guess not.

Bolded part is the essence, I think.

 

[HattoriHanzo]

Some clubs will definitely fold. Doubt a great deal of unity exists at multi-club ownership level. Can see United-Liverpool-Arsenal banding together for obvious reasons. Not sure about the strength of resolve of the rest

Useful idiots (average City fans) are crying about so-called "Red Cartel" running Premier League (United -Liverpool - Arsenal).
They just echo what their club PR is spouting.