Manchester City’s 115 charges and legal action - Premier League statement p9

My understanding is that if the Premier League relegate City, the EFL have to accept them into the Championship, but if they're expelled the EFL can choose to place them lower or even to refuse to take them at all. The FA do have a right to insist on clubs being placed at a specific level rather than lower, which they use sometimes if a large club goes bust and their fans set up a replacement which has to start in non-league and work its way back up. The FA can place a club that's going to bring 1000 fans to all its away games at a level where clubs will have grounds big enough to cope. 

So if the Premier expel them, they're not going to end up playing on a council rec against the team from the Dog and Duck. But they could end up in League 2, or the National League, or even a division or two lower.

Personally I fully expect the league to try to duck the issue, which will then create a problem next time they want to punish someone for breaking the rules in a lesser way.

Man City 114(1 charge found not guilty) against Chelsea's 74.

Different charges but rules broken by both clubs on an industrial scale over several years.

Chelsea self reported as the offences occured under a previous owner and received a 10 million fine. 

Man City just keep denying any wrong doing and will no doubt get Lawyers to say they exploited loop holes in the system and no cheating occurred!

What a humongous mess and I can imagine any football agent who has been banned by the Premier league telling tales on other clubs.

The Premier League could implode.

thickandthin63 said:

Chris_from_Sidcup said:

thickandthin63 said:

Chris_from_Sidcup said:

thickandthin63 said:

ForeverAddickted said:

soapboxsam said:

Obviously other than the freak year that Leicester won the Premier it's going to be a team with loads of money that wins titles; that is a Shay Given !

So Chelsea and Man can cheat on an industrial scale and that is ok and fans of other clubs shouldn't be bothered !

Blimey O'Riley ( Irish International 🤔) Chelsea won 21 trophies in 19 years under the Russian agent Oligarch Abramovich and if you don't have rules you have anarchy.

Man City have won 26 trophies since 2008 under the vast wealth of Abu Dhabi united group.

47 trophies that could have gone to other clubs iF the cheating started early in the tenure of either Clubs by the present owners of Man city and the past owner of Chelsea.

So what about the trophies won by Arsenal / Man Utd / Liverpool in the decades before?

Ferguson won around 30 trophies in a 20-year spell... Man City have won 26-trophies in an 18-year spell...

Why was that okay? - Because the rules setup to protect those same clubs weren't in place? - Disguised as a means to protect the small clubs from themselves, so that the likes of Bury (when it eventually happened) would be a limited case, but hasn't stopped Sheff Wed / Reading from very almost going the same way.

How can you compare fergusons record with citys.Ferguson was at united nearly 4 years before he won a trophy.City came and just put unlimited cash towards instant success.Ferguson built his great team around wonderful home grown talent and very astute buying,not just hoovering up every top player that became available.Arsen Venger built his team from scratch and today Arsenal are still probably the best run club in the Premier league.I really hope that this does lasting damage to City,also Chelsea,as they are now slowly slipping from the top table.

Sorry what?

Ferguson broke the transfer record countless times and had a free run at most of the leagues top players (Rooney, Rio, Keane, Berbatov, Carrick, Cantona, Cole, Yorke, Ince, Van Persie, Sheringham etc) because United were the biggest club and had the most money.

If there was a player doing well at a lesser club, Ferguson tried to sign him. I think the only major ones he failed with domestically in 20+ years were Gazza and Shearer.

Ferguson took 7 years to win his first title,he built that team around bruce and Pallister who were hardly stellar signings,H e bought Schmichael for around £500,000 .He then brought in the class of 92,plus of course the likes of Keen,Cantona.But there was no sugar daddy chucking billions around.Transfers were paid for out of the money generated by continual success and of course regular sell out crowds .That is the difference,the Arabs just came in chucked in limitless amounts of money and demanded instant success,which they achieved,now we know by fiddling the books.Fergusons continued success put him in the position whereby he could sign the best players,that was his job,and didnt he do it well.

I'm not questioning the job Ferguson did, his longevity will probably never be matched and he is the best Premier league manager of all time. But let's not pretend he did things on a shoestring budget. For most of his tenure United were the biggest, richest club and could take their pick of players from other English clubs.

Of the players you mentioned:

Bruce - Norwich captain, won the league cup, Norwich player of the year.
Pallister - England international and at the time it was the highest ever transfer fee between two British clubs.
Keane - named in the PFA team of the year at Forest and at the time it was a British transfer record.
Cantona - signed from Leeds who had just beaten United to the league title.

I take your point,what I am trying to say is,United did it in a legitimate way,by winning things,and thereby investing their honestly earned wealth in the team.They were the richest club,mainly because over a period of time, they were the most successful,that changed when our Russian and Arab friends threw unlimited funds at their respective clubs.I do confess that I welcomed the challenge to the united supremacy,at the time it was deemed to be above board,but now we know it was a sham.

ElfsborgAddick said:

I suppose that with the Premier League and EFL being different entities it would mean that City could not be demoted to League 2, I would imagine the biggest punishment they can get is a points deduction. 

You're never happy 

As bullish and defiant as they are being publicly with their statements, i wonder what it's like behind the scenes?

Stoke City are the one I would look at........ that Bet365 Stadium 'sponsorship'.......... no way they have the revenue organically to support their spend this summer.

fenaddick said:

Chris_from_Sidcup said:

As bullish and defiant as they are being publicly with their statements, i wonder what it's like behind the scenes?

I know it's been rumoured before but i also wonder at what point the UAE government will get involved. You've got the City owner (Mansour) who is Vice President of the UAE, and the City CEO (al Mubarak) who is a key advisor to the UAE President and sits next to him in meetings with Trump.

Surely a diplomatic issue somewhere if you effectively say these guys are cheats and kill their reputations?

They've already got involved haven't they? I'm sure there was something about them threatening diplomatic relationships would suffer if a guilty verdict was delivered

There were some stories but not sure anything was actually confirmed, but now shit has got real for them.

Had a look on the Blue Moon forum and their thread on the charges puts our takeover thread to shame, it's almost 8,500 pages.

The amount of City fans on there who still have faith in their owners and think this has all been one huge stitch up by the premier league is pretty mind blowing.

They've always been a supporter base who loved being the victims of circumstance, so they reverting to type at the moment, adding to an ownership, who have never had to be accountable at home

Football lives in a bubble - as evidenced by all the comments on here. As far as I can see there is a simple solution. 

Above all else, the business of Man City is a UK registered company.  It therefore comes under the auspices of the UK Government.  What they can do trumps anything the PL or FA can come up with.

From what we have been told it is difficult to imagine that Man City have not committed fraud by misrepresentaion.
As it is a UK registered company, it is a straightforward matter for any member of the public to report the issue to the Dept for Business and Trade. https://www.gov.uk/guidance/report-fraud-to-the-department-for-business-and-trade-dbt

They should hand it straight to the Companies Investigations Branch of The Insolvency Service. It seems implausible that they could come to any conclusion but to use the CDDA 86 to ban any individuals involved from being company directors of a UK company for 10 years (thereby making the football fit and proper test otiose).

At the same time they can immediate petition the High Court to have the football club wound up - as it should be. Thus also making any fine, points deduction or relegation otiose.

It would have the added benefit of making all other 91 clubs think very, very carefully about how they conducted their businesses in the future.

So, who wants to spend a few minutes amusing themselves on the Gov web site?

you make the points deduction 75 points, and even a record-breaking season would see them down, despite Spurs and Coventry's best effort 

Question (put yourself in a City fans shoes). What option are you taking here?

OPTION 1
Taken over by Mansour, enjoy 16 years of success, travel everywhere across Europe, win everything there is to win, continually beat your main rivals Man U who you'd been in the shadow of for decades, no one can take your memories away, but you're now known throughout world football as cheats.

OPTION 2
No takeover, win nothing, forever in United's shadow, yo-yo between the Championship and the bottom half of the Premier league, but your club is not tarnished.

jose said:

Bury is not far from Manchester and circumstances have obliged Bury FC to re start from a humble level, which they have done with very little money but a great deal of fortitude. Their last home league game was a 4-0 victory against Emley in the seventh tier of English football (the same level as Welling, Dartford and Dulwich Hamlet) in front of a crowd of some three and a half thousand after several seasons trying to climb to that seventh tier level.
The situation at Manchester City is different clearly, but the road to restoration could be the same nonetheless.
Imagine where Bury, Dartford, Welling, Dulwich Hamlet and others could be if they had £900 million to strut around with.
There are examples of national life where in a competitive environment spending is limited by the agreed rules (I’m talking of an area that dare not speak its name on Charlton Life) and overspend leads to punishment.
Bury started its climb back in the eleventh tier of English football, the North West Counties League Premier Division. If such a decent league offered refuge to noble Bury FC I think they will also put their arms around a punished Manchester City too.

I've seen Emley play on several occasions. They come from a small village in Yorkshire, attract crowds of about 400 and have won two promotions in the last couple of seasons. That means they are now mixing it with some (relative) big beasts. I understand Bury have sold over 3,000 season tickets.         

Blucher said:

Chris_from_Sidcup said:

thickandthin63 said:

ForeverAddickted said:

soapboxsam said:

Obviously other than the freak year that Leicester won the Premier it's going to be a team with loads of money that wins titles; that is a Shay Given !

So Chelsea and Man can cheat on an industrial scale and that is ok and fans of other clubs shouldn't be bothered !

Blimey O'Riley ( Irish International 🤔) Chelsea won 21 trophies in 19 years under the Russian agent Oligarch Abramovich and if you don't have rules you have anarchy.

Man City have won 26 trophies since 2008 under the vast wealth of Abu Dhabi united group.

47 trophies that could have gone to other clubs iF the cheating started early in the tenure of either Clubs by the present owners of Man city and the past owner of Chelsea.

So what about the trophies won by Arsenal / Man Utd / Liverpool in the decades before?

Ferguson won around 30 trophies in a 20-year spell... Man City have won 26-trophies in an 18-year spell...

Why was that okay? - Because the rules setup to protect those same clubs weren't in place? - Disguised as a means to protect the small clubs from themselves, so that the likes of Bury (when it eventually happened) would be a limited case, but hasn't stopped Sheff Wed / Reading from very almost going the same way.

How can you compare fergusons record with citys.Ferguson was at united nearly 4 years before he won a trophy.City came and just put unlimited cash towards instant success.Ferguson built his great team around wonderful home grown talent and very astute buying,not just hoovering up every top player that became available.Arsen Venger built his team from scratch and today Arsenal are still probably the best run club in the Premier league.I really hope that this does lasting damage to City,also Chelsea,as they are now slowly slipping from the top table.

Sorry what?

Ferguson broke the transfer record countless times and had a free run at most of the leagues top players (Rooney, Rio, Keane, Berbatov, Carrick, Cantona, Cole, Yorke, Ince, Van Persie, Sheringham etc) because United were the biggest club and had the most money.

If there was a player doing well at a lesser club, Ferguson tried to sign him. I think the only major ones he failed with domestically in 20+ years were Gazza and Shearer.

Don’t forget Ralph Milne

Nor Sean McGinty...the last player sacked by Ferguson before he retired.