- As we predicted, the war with Man C has gone legal
- How to be a football journalist in one easy lesson
By Tony Attwood
In the Premier League now what we effectively have is a battle between Manchester City, (seemingly backed by Newcastle United and Chelsea) and the rest. If Manchester City win, they will get a lot of money from the rest of the clubs in the league, and the rules will be changed in Manchester City’s favour.
To change the rules from within Man C need 14 of the 20 PL clubs to vote with them. At the moment they only have four votes it seems so they are trying a different approach and this story is of course everywhere from the Sun to the Independent.
The Standardised Rules of the Premier League appear on the FA Website and say, “In the event of a Club, not being placed in a relegation position at the end of the season, wishing to resign from the Competition at the end of the season, or having been removed
from membership under the Articles, the number of Clubs to be relegated shall be reduced accordingly.”
Thus Man C, Newcastle and Chelsea can leave and set up their own league with PSG, Real Madrid and Barcelona, and the PL can vote in three more clubs to replace them. It would be interesting to see if Uefa would recognise such a breakaway league.
Certainly, it is clear that around Europe there is no appetite for clubs such as Manchester City and it would seem unlikely that there will be much support for the new model Premier League and Man C and others might form.
Meanwhile, the suggestion that Untold has been making for several weeks that players could leave Manchester City has now been taken up elsewhere as the Mancheseter Evening News says, “The worry is also that players will lose the appetite to stay at the Etihad Stadium too, including Kevin De Bruyne and Haaland, who has been frequently linked with Real Madrid. Securing Haaland’s future is said to be a priority for City in the coming months.”
Haaland’s buyout clause decreases year on year in a way that quickly makes him affordable. Meanwhile, it remains unclear what Guardiola’s view is of Manchester City’s current approach to the rest of the league.
And this brings us to the key point. Manchester City can of course sue the Premier League over what it claims are “unlawful” financial regulations. Meanwhile, the current case involving the 115 allegations of financial wrongdoing is quite separate and carries on.
And there is another point here. We have often noted the power of the media in football in England particularly in relation to its unified decision not to criticise or question the validity of PGMO. The media has maintained that stance for years, showing that it can act in a unified and powerful manner if it wants to.
And by and large the media has been in favour of the approach of the Premier League which the Manchester City document calls “tyranny of the majority.” Manchester C might take their supporters with them; I can’t see them taking the media along too.
Indeed it is that “tyranny” phrase that tells us exactly the mindset of Manchester City’s owners, for while some of us find the situation of Sheikh Mansour repugnant (vice president and deputy prime minister of the United Arab Emirates, brother of the president of the UAE, married to the of the ruler of Dubai, and chairman of the two UAE sovereign wealth funds), anything from ludicrous to repugnant, undoubtedly to him and his family, it is the natural order of things.
Thankfully for once the British media does not see this as anything like a natural order. As the Telegraph says, “Without serious controls on the value of commercial deals earned by clubs from entities in the same state from which that club’s owner originates … there can be no financial fair play. It is extraordinary that this still requires saying, and yet here we are, with one club trying to collapse the whole structure.”
If Manchester C were to win a legal case, or indeed even start one, the rest of the league could simply resign and set up a new league. With whom would the Championship and other leagues align themselves? It would seem unlikely that it would be Manchester City and Newcastle United. For Man C it is a lose-lose situation.
That the owners of Manchester C don’t understand this is a reflection of how isolated, unimaginably wealthy people endlessly used to getting their own way can become. They can go and play PSG and the clubs in the City group, but their departure will only make the Premier League more exciting, and stronger.
It is a situation I have felt the League would have to fight for. I never imagined Man C would seek to deliver it to the rest of the league on a plate.
An admittance of guilt. Man City are trying to destroy the Premier League. Only Chelsea and Newcastle, the moneyed ones, are supporting this. Good riddance to Manchester City, and their obnoxious attempt to destroy the English Premier League. Shameful.
Everyone was complaining in Media that it’s Arsenal who is trying to take advantage of this case in order to win EPL but slowly the case is getting shape. Now let EPL hear and see what is trying to happen behind bar which will affect almost every club. So those who were pointing fingers on Arsenal, you will be among the ones affected.
The owners of Man115 are clearly used to getting it their way. Which is no surprise if you are the almighty rulers in your country. Democracy, majority…. all non existing words in their country I can imagine. Things go the way I want them to go is more appropriate in their country. Well they can move Man115 to their country if they wish.
We have seen Everton and Notts Forest hung out to dry by the officials for quite minor breaches of the rules. All this time Man City and Chelsea have constantly purchased (for the want of of a better word) league titles, Cups etc. Both clubs for near 100 years have been loved but average to poor quality teams. Along comes the Oil money and they are aloud to break every known fairness rule because of their power. They have to answer 115 breaks of the same rules that Everton and Forest bent. Both those clubs were punished bu points deductions (far to harsh in my opinion) but City and Chelsea carried on using lawyers to avoid punishment. Now IF they are found guilty of ANY rule break and avoiding answering for it, they must both be relegated two divisions and hand back all UK trophies gained during that period. Anything less would be also criminal.
Stephen Sinclair
“An admittance of guilt”
My thoughts exactly.
To me at least, this seems a very risky strategy on Man City’s behalf.
Prior to this it was surely incumbent upon the Premier League to ‘prove’ Man City had broken the 115 rules they claim they have?
Surely that is no longer the case as Man City have effectively admitted they have broken the rules, they just don’t like them.
But, more than that, they claim the rules have been set up specifically to discriminate against them, and them alone?
Which surely means it is now incumbent upon Man City to ‘prove’ that?
If they really believe that, then surely the time to of made such a claim was when they first read the rules? BEFORE they agreed to them?
A desperate move from Man City, one that will surely put all those City fans that keep claiming they have done nothing wrong back in their box.
Absolutely no chance.
Well the chickens have finally come home to roost.They are fast making an enemy of just about anyone who matters outside of their cabal .
Stamping their feet & throwing their toys out of the pram make it obvious to anyone their intentions.
Outside of Newcastle & the Nouveau riche Chavs,both cut from the same cloth,they have no support.
It’s looking more & more desperate for them.Hence their last roll of the dice in threatening the prem.
The prem,FA,etc should throw the book at them.let them leave if that’s their aim.
There will be turmoil in other leagues round the world should others remotely consider joining their circus.
The above , has cheered me up no end. However, a word of caution : All those years ago when a certain Russian rocked up he was regarded as a ‘fit and proper person’ and was allowed to start the destruction of football. Who gave him that permission ?
My guess would be that Man C have seen the draft of the findings which shows them guilty on most counts and so are setting out their retaliation in advance of the official report.
We are now seeing the consequences of allowing an Arab state to bring their business ethics (or lack of them) into the English Premier League. The stable door was opened when the FA & the government allowed a certain Russian oligarch (now residing with many other Russian oligarchs in Isreal) to bring Russian gangster capitalism into the Premier League to destabilise it. And how long did it take the British government to bar him from the UK? Too long as the damage he caused is all too apparent for fans to see in todays Arab dominated Premier League.
And the English legacy media have never investigated either & have gone along with their take overs of the Premier league without an iota of dissent.
Ask yourselves why is a British winter sport attracting talent from across Europe to play for the Arabs in the sun drenched undemocratic desert? And why have the Arab rulers taken up a winter sport in the desert when they have been more interested in camel & horse racing?
Les Martin
“All those years ago when a certain Russian rocked up he was regarded as a ‘fit and proper person’ and was allowed to start the destruction of football”.
I am, and have always been of the opinion, that part of what was behind the willingness, nay, over willingness, to embrace such financial investment was to break the ‘perceived’ stranglehold Man Utd and Arsenal had over the Premier League at that time.
It was always going to give Arsenal a bloodier nose than Man Utd, as they had the jump on everyone else, and as we all know, their World Wide brand had exploded, where as we were still restricted to playing in front of 38,000 at Highbury, and they just made it all the more fun.
The rest of football loved seeing Arsenal take a hit. As I have said on here many a time, criticising and laughing at Arsenal became a National pastime.
The ‘Daily Arse’ on Takshite anyone?
But even if it was a stranglehold, which it wasn’t, it was a stranglehold that was earned by good stewardship by the respective boards, followed by rewards on the pitch. All earned and paid for via sound business models. (alright I know Man Utd have sort of fu**ed that model up, but hey) Something all other clubs could achieve, and as has been pointed out by others, was achieved by a much broader spectrum of clubs, prior to the arrival of the oil money.
Of course major City Clubs with historically high followings will have a financial edge. But before the ‘doping’ arrived, that was no guarantee of success, or even protection against failure, as we witnessed with relegations for Man Utd, Spurs, Man City, Chelsea, Newcastle, Birmingham, Aston Villa and Leeds United, to name but a few.
Although not relegated for many seasons both Arsenal and Liverpool have suffered trophy droughts.
For all the claims of ‘jealousy’ we hear from the City fans, the truth is it was actually jealousy of Arsenal and Man Utd that was partly behind allowing the influx of the oil money in the first place.
As I kept saying, if you wanted to win the league, perhaps you shouldn’t of ran your club like a second hand junk store.
You are accused of murder . How do you plead ?
Not guilty !
However I will plead guilty to manslaughter.
Mitigation.
fascinating to read comment by the boss of City complaining – seriously..- that City fans worldwide, city employees, players are sad that they are always confronted with 115… I really feel for them…. poor things…. the whole world against them…
Apart from the fact that most of them are fans for the trophies….and will just buy some short from another club, why should anyone care ? This attempt by theboss at portraying City as poor victims is so damn pathetic.
And when you consider that they sue to spend as they want, they do now recognise there is a rule now…. which they want to change.
The lid has come right off Pandora’s box. And we’ve not seen anything yet.
A century and a half ago we formed leagues to organise football games for fun, so that workers could enjoy playing in their spare time. Football teams gained supporters and started charging supporters to attend, growing those clubs into businesses.
Less than 100 years later, when I was a child, those businesses became rich and the players started to be paid more than you or me. Then much more. And even then the millions gambled on the outcomes, in the bookies or on the football pools, were greater still.
Now that amount of money is incomprehensibly large. Many many billions not millions. And so the crooks and the spivs and the thieves and the gangsters take notice. And take over.
Right now I still want Arsenal to win. But when we win it, I hope it’s worth winning.
Nitram,
Thanks for the detailed comments in your reply , theres a great deal there for me to assimilate, so if it goes quiet in this quarter for a while its because this Cockney Gunner (62 years now) only figures things out at walking speed.
North London Forever.
As long as the current Chairman of the ECA remains in place, Europe will continue to have an appetite for clubs such as Manchester City, whether they want to, or not.
UEFA’s CFCB have bottled it and cleared both City and Girona to play in next season’s UCL competition. This would seem to indicate that Europe does have an appetite for clubs such as Man. City.
First we had the Fit and Proper Person’s test (FPP).
Then we had Financial Fair Play (FFP).
Both of these have been shown not to be fit for purpose (ffp) by teams wearing blue.
FPP has now been rebranded as ODT (Owners’ and Directors’ test)
FFP has now been rebranded as PSR (Profit and Sustainability Rules)
The ODT seems to be a toothless mechanism, as is well documented recently by the words of Richard Masters in connection with the Everton/777 ongoing fiasco.
It seems to me that the Premier League is in the last chance saloon with PSR. If they can’t get this right, the Premier League is finished.
Many people seem to be of the opinion that a government-led regulator would be an improvement on the current status quo.
Having seen the antics that many governments have overseen and participated in during the last 5 years, I am not convinced.
Everton have had total deductions of 8 points this season for two breaches of PSR.
Forest have had a deduction of 4 points this season for one breach of PSR.
Do you see where I’m going with this one?
All the clubs (excluding Manchester City, Chelsea and Newcastle United) should investigate their main option. Resign from the PL and join the EFL. They should contact the EFL to see if this possible and press the button.
A slightly different view. They beat us fair and square to the Premiership and this case has nothing to do with that. Secondly they are questioning the legality of an action taken. Should not they be allowed to do that and if the action taken was illegal shouldn’t we be informed and take remedial action as we all want and need to act within the law and be judged accordingly if we break the law. Thirdly they have been accused of financial irregularities and will be judged in due course on the facts ofthe case Until then they are not guilty and we should stop acting like a lynching party and like rebel rousers who have no faith in the due process that is being followed …..admittedly very slowly.