And nobody asks how Real Madrid came by their money? Barcelona too. Everybody knows these two are essentially insolvent but they continue to splurge on big money signings. Where is that money coming from?
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Barcelona have spent 375 MILLION on Coutinho, Dembele and Griezmann alone.
City spent less to buy Ederson, Laporte, Walker, Mendy, Mahrez, Jesus, Sane and Bernardo Silva.
From Twitter.
Please, fair play? This is a game for rich clubs than spend millions.
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If those actions those are deemed fair and above board no problem. There does appear to be something in my nose and guts that tells me there could be some cheating but the severity of the crime should define punishment. I would suggest a 2 season ban to be the max penalty with any criminal transgressions being permanent ban.
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Liverpool supporters will now argue that City should have to forfeit the Prem title- to Liverpool Football Club.
Meanwhile- Come On You Spurs!
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Reminds me of the excellent book "AngloArabia: Why Gulf Wealth Matters To Britain."
2
The level of lying, cheating and manipulation by Man City that was documented in the leaks is unprecedented, even in Euro club football. A one year ban from Champions League does not seem commensurate with the crime. They should be stripped of their titles, relegated and forced to sell players to fairly balance their books.
And how does their coach Pep, who is supposed to stand for all things good in football and life, sleep at night knowing his "beautiful" team was assembled by nefarious means. He wears a yellow ribbon while coaching to support Catalonian political prisoners, yet he stand proud of his work at Man City?
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@Pete sorry Pete did this one hurt your feelings? The accusations are that we over inflated a sponsorship deal not attacked children for Christ sake. Go defend something meaningful not some crazed ridiculous attempt at distracting a club that has had to fight to fit in with Europe's elite. Do some research into the history of other PL teams and you'll see that they all have sugar daddies you numpty.
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This forms part of a bigger issue where certain owners would like to see domestic league football in Italy, Spain and France in particular collapse so the a so-called European super league could form.
Man City's Gulf based owner, along with the owners of Paris St. German, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Juventus (which is spearheading this), Bayern Munich and several others, like Inter Milan, want the top four or five English Premier League sides to come into this super league.
It's because the Premiership makes the most television money and the team's on the continent are slipping behind.
The Man City owner is never going to adhere to any UEFA spending rules.
By contrast, Liverpool operates at a profit at the club based on no outside cash. It balances its transfer books on players out and in.
Man City have gone into the red on player signings for almost a billion and a half dollars. They won the league by a single point and are not in the Champions League final.
The crazy spending by a few clubs, like Juventus, Real Madrid, Barcelona and PSG have wrecked the competitive balance of Serie A, La Liga, League 1 in France and the German league with Bayern Munich.
Man City are trying to do that to the Premiership and thank God for Liverpool trying to reel them in.
Greed is poised to wreck world football if it isn't stopped.
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@John Harrington The push for the Super League is not backed by City and it has not gone into the red for $1.5bn. City operates at a profit despite heavy early investment to catch up with the existing super-rich clubs who often had huge debts eg LFC and MUFC built up whilst winning the UCL and EPL. Maybe their titles should also be stripped away given they went into debt to do so,
Much of the money spent by Mansour has gone into the superb Academy (£50m alone was needed to remediate 40 acres of deeply contaminated ex-industrial wasteland) and other initiatives to make the club robust. Its revenues are now close to MUFC's.
BTW Liverpool increased its debtload on 2017/2018 due to heavy expenditure on players.
Get your facts straight.
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@SupremeEditor
Please don't make stuff up.
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2019/feb/08/liverpool-world-record-profit-2017-18
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@John Harrington crying because Liverpool bottled it again hahahahaha.
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In the time honored manner of everyone caught by information they would like to keep hidden, ManCity condemns the leaks and offers no exculpatory evidence.
And while UEFA looks at PSG and others, the owner of Juventus is attempting to change the Champions League format to ensure the big clubs have a near perpetual automatic entry. The Agnelli family is not alone.
As in all team sport, it really is all about money.
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Is it true that Liverpool FC's second largest shareholder is NY Times?
If that is true, then they should be disgusted that they are reporting on undecided issues that are just subject to investigation.
Liverpool have a reputation for being cheats but this is terrible. Obviously just trying to gain an unfair competitive edge in the transfer market.
Behavior like this should lead to an exclusion from champions league and the most sever penalty possible.
I would be very interested if this ownership is true or false news?
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@Mark I
According to the Telegraph and from what I have heard, The NY Times is the second largest shareholder of Liverpool. There is no problem with them reporting on financial fair play issues, especially since there are others doing the same. If you think this gives Liverpool an unfair advantage, you may be correct but that just means that cheating is not beneficial in the long run. I am not sure why Liverpool would be punished for something like this. Care to explain?
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@Mark I
False. The New York Times Company had a 17.75% stake in Fenway Sports Group (parent company of Liverpool FC) but they sold it in 2012.
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@Mark
Nope. It's not true.
Stake was sold years ago.
Nice try, though.
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If you cheat in sport, any trophies won whilst cheating should be taken away. Surely?
That would discourage cheating more than a financial penalty (irrelevant to Man City or PSG) or a prospective ban from the Champions League
And it would make players and managers pay attention rather than turn a blind eye to financial cheating, as they do too easily at the moment
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@Paul So should Utd have their titles taken from them as they built up huge debts in the Noughties?
Should Liverpool lose its Champions League as it used losses to fund player purchases? It was £300m in debt when Fenway/NY Times purchased it?
How is it that going into debt only became against the rules when 'new' entrants like City and PSG tried to break the G14 cartel?
Should all G14 members lose all their titles? Now that would be justice as well as very interesting.
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They should be kicked out of the Premier League as well.
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This article doesn't fully represent the facts of this case.
1. FFP may have been packaged as an attempt to stop clubs running up huge debt but the reality is its anti competitive attempt by the elite clubs to creat e a glass ceiling.
2. Some of the biggest European clubs are carrying massive debt.
Manchester United ( elite clubs behind FFP) euro 459m.
Inter Milan (elite club) euro 435m
Atletico Madrid euro 431m
Juventus (elite club ) euro 289 m
AC Milan (elite club) euro 272m
and so it goes on but Manchester City have no deb
2. When was it ever a problem in business for owners to invest in their businesses? Speculate to accumulate being a phrase most people would recognise.
3. The massive investment City man on the Etihad training complex is an allowable expense even by UEFA;s shoddy standards.
4. The Portugese authorities are attempting to extradite the Portugese hacker from Hungary for multiple hacking.
Its FFP which is attempting to cheat up and coming clubs and maintain the status quo. City were wrong in compromising with UEFA before. I cant see them walking away this time.
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The unfortunate truth is, that nothing will happen - once again. The UEFA, as well as the FIFA, is way too corrupt and too entangled with the super-rich club owners.
For example: Nasser Al-Khelaifi, the owner of Paris Saint-Germain, is a delegate at the UEFA executive committee since this year.
The system is poisoned. From top to bottom.
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The intent of FFP, regardless of personal interpretation, is to keep a club's books balanced. City fans would have kittens should Bolton or Oldham be bought by some quiet investment group, have it turn out to be the Saudi royal family, they pump billions into the club, they buy all the best players, win all the titles, and scoff every time FFP comes up...because "they invested sooo much in the community". Not the point. When the owners get tired, sell the club, and you are left with your original 60,000 fans (half of which cannot afford ticket costs)(and the plastic fans who jump on the bandwagon of whomever wins the title leave) you have an unsustainable situation. FFP is not about blaming bitter Germans, or proclaiming it is there to strictly benefit the "big" clubs. It is about ensuring you HAVE a club, even after they are used and discarded by so-called "sugar-daddy" owners. ALL CLUBS need to be held accountable to their legitimate financial sustainability...not lies on paper, but real sustainability. I am not a City fan, but I would hate for City to go into Insolvency in the future...then my United wouldn't be able to beat them anymore. (and YES...United needs to be held accountable as much as everybody else!) As a fan, I would be FURIOUS if someone was playing with the books of my club I support!!!
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@RedAbroad No we won't. The only way a small team can compete against the riches of the big teams is with outside investment. FFP was created to prevent this.
Later (2015), when both AC Milan and Inter got nice big cash injections from outside, suddenly the rules were changed to accommodate this. Only, previously guilty clubs may still not "receive gifts". So now the Milan clubs can spend money they "did not earn", but City can't? It just so happens that both of them (with Utd, Pool, Arsenal, Chelsea, and others) were behind FFP to begin with.
Man City is fully sustainable, with a turnover of more than 500 mil Pound Sterling, and they have no debts. If UEFA and the FA really cared about the financial well-being of clubs, they should ban clubs like Utd until they have paid up all their debts.
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@Sam...no debts, eh? And how, exactly, did that happen? Yeah, that's right - a boatload of money put in by a sovereign fund, that's how...thanks for making the point.
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It's little ironic that financial irregularities seem to attract bigger penalties than racism by fans at football stadiums. I would personally hope that the opposite were the case (not that financial irregularities should be let off easy).
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On the face of these leaked accusations - without any other details - the City should indeed be punished.
To me, the whole EPL has become a playground for the rich to use it as a "trophy wife" or a "big chest thumping exercise."
I have been to the City stadium - just a couple of years back. It's a stadium that mimics our American stadiums for comfort - a rarity in England.
As a matter of fact, I paid a little over $1,000 for what they call a "tunnel club.". Its a 5 star restaurant that gives you real up close experience in soccer. Absolutely worth it.
Having said that EPL is becoming kind of boring with the same 4 teams constantly jockeying for a top place. Leicester City was that rare exception which proves the rule.
They may need some more American "equalizing" the field with our system of bidding on a large pool of players. With first draft going to the lowest ranked team etc.
This may add more vitality to competition in EPL - and I dare say - more honesty in financial engineering.
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@Neil
As you said, EPL has become a playground for the rich. Not just that, but the whole industry has attracted the richest to buy clubs without history and turn them into a top class team. It has happened with Man City, just like with Chelsea, PSG, Anzhi, and others.
Unlike the American way, football always worked by divisions, with the weakest teams getting relegated, and the strongest getting promoted. Thats the way It always have worked and the way It should work. Football it's for the fans, and getting year after year the very same teams in the top flight is like forgetting about all the fans there is. There are thousands of teams in Europe, and all of them should have the ability to pursue success, not just 20 or so that move around all the time between cities.
The proper way to compete should include getting these kind of ownership clubs banned and giving players a salary cap.
This way, of course there would always be teams richer than others, but the gap would come close for sure.
Please don't "Americanize" football.
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@Neil Actually, the EPL now has a Top 6. If you think that is boring, look at the European leagues.
La Liga a Top Two and a bit.
Serie A a Top One.
Bundes a Top One and occassional bit.
Ligue Un a Top One.
This year, we have had two teams going toe-to-toe down to the last few minutes of the last games and a battle royale for the remain Champions League spots.
We now have all four spots in the European finals.
Compare this to previous eras. The late 70s/80s were all One Team. The Nineties was all One Team. The Noughties was a Top Three. Now we have a six-way fight.
The EPL is now like it was in the 60s and 70s before any one team dominated for long periods. It is way more exciting thanks to the 'new' rich kids like Chelsea and City and latterly Spurs.
We live in an age of riches on and off the pitch. Long may it continue.
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UEFA's modus operandi is clear for all to see when supporters of the clubs in their premier competition get given less than 50% of the final tickets between them.
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FFP was brought in to stop reckless owners spending money clubs don't have and balancing their books, to protect fans from losing their clubs to bankruptcy.
By default it protects elite clubs with strong balance sheets which have evolved over many years.
Whether FFP is "fair" can be debated but the rules are the rules and just like doping Man C have been caught and now need to be banned or will the stench of "Oil money" wash around UEFA and pour oil on troubled waters of FFP
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@Jack it's not by default at all. It's because FFP was never concerned with stopping the business model of clubs like City, it was concerned with preventing situations like the one one at Leeds United arising, where gambling on the club's future success led to the club itself being saddled enormous amounts of debt. In that instance it almost cost the supporters the club they love.
So the FFP rules in their original format would not only have had no effect on City, they would also have disbarred several of Europe's so called elite from entering European competition due to amount of debt loaded onto the clubs by their respective owners...couldn't have that though could we. How dare this upstart club think they've got the right to benefit from massive outside investment when the so called elite all did it decades ago?...Liverpool who went from second division mediocrity to serial winners courtesy of fund from a tatty bingo company... United the original sugar daddy club, ground given to them for zip, ground rebuilt with taxpayer funds and then FA funds.
The current batch of accusations can be traced all the way back to a certain Uli 'bitterness personified' Hoeness, after Guardiola rejected a contract extension on offer in Bavaria to go and manage elsewhere for a lower salary. Maybe the exceptionally corrupt Mr Hoeness could do with another 3.5 years in jail as the last stretch doesn't appear to have cured him. He certainly shouldn't be allowed anywhere near professional sport.
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I understand that FFP helps to protect the bigger clubs who have massive fan bases and are among the top 10 richest clubs. But I think that is the point...Those clubs have built their global following for years and years and benefit from millions in shirt sales, sponsorships etc So when they spend money on Player X who costs £80m they have already made that (unless they sold to raise the money)
So why should Man City jump the queue and blow a billion when they haven’t earned the right to?In terms of global following (prior to Sheikh Mansour and to a lesser extent now) they don’t compare to the traditional top 4 let alone Barca/Madrid. Yet they spend the most.
If UEFA don’t secure a hefty punishment they will lose what remains of their tattered credibility.
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@Jersey 22 why were Liverpool allowed to jump the queue when Sir John Moores bankrolled Shankley when they were just a mid table second division side?
The Yorkshire and Lancashire Railway Company Football Club Newton Heath was bankrupt and the bailiffs on the verge of closing down the Bank Street ground before Harry Stafford sold his dog, the new owner bailed them out, built them old trafford and paid the wages, when he left, they were again in financial distress until being bailed out again, and even between the Busby and Ferguson era's they were benefiting from "unearned income".
FFP is only concerned with protecting the revenue streams of clubs that had previously seen investment in them similar to that City have received more recently.
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@Jersey 22 All the top clubs have had rich backers.
Man Utd were first nicknamed 'MoneyBags Utd' in 1908, a full century before Sheikh Mansour. Liverpool's rise was on the back of the very rich Moores family switching allegiance from Everton and using their gambling profits to spend heavily on players.
Blackburn won when it had rich backers. Arsenal has always been extremely rich even before the super-rich Yanks and Russians took a stake. Abramovich ditto.
Even Leicester City's owners pumped £250m into it before it won the Prem (not often reported on).
Success in football has always been built on money. We delude ourselves if we think otherwise. It is only the sources and scale of the wealth that has changed.
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Are Lance Armstrong FC about to be finally brought to task?
Well pep do an interview with oprah?
I thought that was the whole point of world soccer...the richest club wins the title.
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While they’re fixing things, how about those VIPs in Qatar once again providing beIN Sports on DISH or DiRECT tv, so that a small segment of the US population, who truly appreciate world class soccer, might enjoy some real futbol?
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@Aromas Get FuboTV.
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@Aromas
Let’s have competition for the rights instead of a kickbacks monopoly cemented with dirty money.
There are hundreds of TV broadcasters who would love to have a shot at the American market.
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Hours after they win the title you write this for the 10th time this season? Wow.
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The Times doing a far better job, than the English press in detailing out the gross financial malfeasance of City's owners. Never happen in the states.
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Let them play next year so Spurs can beat them again. #coys
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And about time. MC's victories and previous championships are all tainted and MC can never be England's best - not as long as MC continue to be used by the riches of an oil sheikhdom to launder or sportwash its sins. Not as long as the fact remains (an inconvenient fact for the devoted, but a fact nevertheless) that MC cheated its way to the top, its roster stacked with top-notch players, via a brazen violation of the FFP regulations. You can of course buy championships, but you can never buy class. I will never recognize MC (or Chelsea and its robber-baron loot for that matter) as the rightful holder of a trophy once hoisted by real champions - MU, Arsenal, Leicester City . . .
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@PS tell me again about how Arsenal moved from South of the Thames to Highbury and how they financed this, or how Chapman was lured from Huddersfield to London and given free reign on signings to make Arsenal challenge?
Newton Heath were bankrupt before they got the brewers money, and again in the 30's would have went out of business without the draper bailing them out.
The Leicester chairman pumped millions into the Foxes and was rewarded with a title.
Liverpool were a mid table second division side before they won the pools.
ALL the currently "big" clubs are there because at some stage in their history wealthy benefactors gave them the money to buy the best players.
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@Jock McD
Wow! Salty Spurs fans from the 1920’s still making the rounds of the comment section.
That issue with Woolwich had been settled. After 100 years of being never relegated from the top flight and being the only team since Preston North End in the 1880’s winning the league with an undefeated record. The holders of a record number of FA Cups ( the oldest club competition in the world ) have already bought many times over their right to be in North London. Arsenal started to be a successful team only in the 30’s and Chapman only won 2 championships with that team. If it hadn’t been for the war, they would have been far ahead of any team in England.
Protesting about this now is like complaining about why Bertha Benz took Karl’s car without his permission.
This is like the San Francisco Giants complaining about the New York Yankees ( formerly Baltimore Orioles ) moving into town.
Get over it.
@Jock McD completely irrelevant. The accusations are not about whether sponsorship is allowed or legal they’re about . Breaking the rules 2. Covering it up 3. Getting found out then concocting further lies to evade the rules and punishment.
It’s nothing to do with whether you agree with the rules or not or investments made into football many decades ago.
1
You leave out a very important perspective. The Financial Fair Play rules were created to protect an elite group of clubs that seek to maintain their status and prevent outside investment from interlopers. UEFA will be challenged if they seek to ban City, and they should lose in court as the whole premise is no more than a ruse to protect and enrich this elite group of clubs.
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This is untrue. This is not the reason why Financial Fair Play was created. The real reason is to stop pumping endless amounts of money into this sport without even looking at your checks and balances. And a club's dominance can be broken up even without that.
Buying championships is as time honored as sports itself. Exhibit A (New York Yankees)
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@Basic Also, Manchester United, Real Madrid, FC Barcelona, Golden State Warriors, New England Patriots... et al.
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@josestate
The Warriors are paying a huge luxury tax bill for their players that will eventually bring them back to earth. Every NBA team can attract the best players and then exceed the cap to keep them. NE Pats? They are below the cap and Tom Brady has never been the highest paid quarterback. They follow those rules.
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@josestate...don't forget Liverpool. Aside from decades of a playing field tilted in their favour by pools money last century, they would have failed FFP rules when they were originally brought in and barred from European competition ... only their team was so rubbish they didn't even qualify!
1
Um... no. A swish does not come after a clang.
That’s about as basic as it gets.
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The Financial Fair Play regulations are primarily intended to protect the interests of the traditional soccer powerhouses such as Bayern Munich and Manchester United. If you have a large global fan base with lucrative commercial and TV contracts why would you want an upstart club muscling in on your turf. The best way to prevent this is to outlaw early investments to build a successful team that will eventually become self sustaining. Hence the need for Manchester City and PSG to disguise their investment as inflated commercial deals from their own airlines etc. The bottom line is the Financial regulations are ignored if not the soccer authorities run the risk of being challenged in the EU courts on anti competitive grounds leading to unforeseen onsequences.
There are no good guys here. Bayern Munich are run by convicted tax criminals, Arsenal owned by a Walmart heir, Real Madrid were given support by the Franco regime, Manchester United were previously owned by a wholesale butcher who made a fortune selling suspect meat to local schools and several Russian oligarchs are involved with different clubs.
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@Blue Deacon I agree 100%. FFP was implemented to keep the top dogs at the table. City are debt free and don't use loans to fund the club. CTID
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Even the Superteams like Man City and PSG need to get sanctioned to keep them honest now and then, provided that the organization doing the sanctioning has"clean hands". When UEFA proposes to grandfather the Top 24 of 32 qualifiers for the Champions League for the following season, it suggests that they are strongly aligned with the oligarchs and Gulf royalty more than the home town fans paying to sit high up in the grandstand in the winter cold. I'd be OK with the semi-finalists getting a pass through for the next season's ECL, but carrying the same core teams year over year is an abomination that really makes financial "fair-play" a joke.
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@Len J The sham of FFP and the plans to keep the same clubs in the Champions League year on year are absolutely related. This is a powerplay by 12-14 top European clubs to keep the pie all to themselves.
5
Banning them from this premier competition should only be a start. Clubs like Man City that skirt the rules should also be docked points in their domestic leagues. Only then would they sit up and take notice. What good is a monetary fine if the club's owner's are more than willing to pay it as long as they lift trophies.
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@David Knutson City's owners are using their own money to fund the club. There is ZERO debt at the club. No bank loans nothing. FFP is to prevent the likes of City and PSG sharing a piece of the buy from the ilks of Bayern, Madrid, United etc. CTID
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@Bluemoon. RIGHT ON ! Man City is fortunate to have owners willing to invest in the community as well. We visited Manchester last month and were impressed by the long term investment being made in improved housing, commercial development and infrastructure.
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@Bluemoon There should be either a salary cap or revenue sharing.....or the Prem League will turn into the other leagues where the champion is a forgone conclusion most years. Juventus, Bayern, Barca, PSG. There is a direct correlation between spending and titles. Man City spent 200 million more than Liverpool this year. The big money is rui
ning the sport. That's why everyone was happy with Ajax's run this year.
7