Man City found guilty of serious financial breaches

Manchester City face severe sanctions after being found guilty of serious breaches of the Premier League’s financial rules over a nine-season period, the league said on Tuesday.

Abu Dhabi-backed City were found to have arranged “sham” contracts with a number of commercial partners to artificially inflate the club’s revenues and reduce costs by more than ￡900 million (US$1.2 billion) between 2009 and 2018.

In doing so they concealed the true state of their finances and avoided breaches of Premier League and UEFA spending limits as a result.

Manchester City chairman Khaldoon al-Mubarak, left, and coach Pep Guardiola celebrate with the Premier League trophy in Manchester, England, on May 19, 2024.

Photo: AP

An independent commission also found the club guilty on the majority of charges in relation to their failure to co-operate with the league’s investigation.

No sanction has yet been imposed and City said they would appeal the decision.

However, the ruling would send shock waves through English soccer, with City’s place in the Premier League at risk and questions over whether titles could be stripped.

“The core decision establishes the facts of what happened at Manchester City during this period. It details how the club systematically broke Premier League rules for nearly a decade,” Premier League chief executive Richard Masters said in a statement. “This disciplinary case, and this decision, are the most significant in Premier League history.”

The commission found City arranged commercial deals whereby companies were only required to pay a portion of the relevant sponsorship fees. The remainder was funded by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed al-Nahyan’s Abu Dhabi United Group Investment and Development, which owned the club.

Further arrangements, funded by the group, enabled the club to record lower operating expenses than they actually incurred.

As a result, City failed to accurately report income and expenditure for the purposes of the Premier League and UEFA’s financial sustainability rules.

The scheme was found to have inflated revenue by more than ￡830 million, while income from image rights was overstated by almost ￡74 million, with liabilities for staff contracts understated by nearly ￡17 million.

The commission found they would have breached spending limits “by a very substantial amount” if City had reported accurately.

In addition, City were found to have “made concerted efforts to stop and frustrate the Premier League” during a four-year investigation.

The commission found that evidence given by several important factual witnesses on behalf of City was “false in a number of key respects.”

It added that “certain of those factual witnesses had given evidence at the hearing that they knew to be untrue and so had been dishonest.”

“It’s incredibly serious, the Premier League report is incredibly stark,” British Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Lisa Nandy said.

Since a 2008 takeover from Sheikh Mansour, vice president and deputy prime minister of the United Arab Emirates, City have become the Premier League’s dominant force.

They have won eight Premier League titles, four FA Cups and seven League Cups over the past 15 years and also won the Champions League for the first time in 2023.

That same year they were hit by the Premier League with more than 100 charges following an investigation into alleged breaches of rules.

“If the appeal fails, Manchester City cannot stay in the league, they have to suffer, and I say that as a supporter and a fan,” former City chairman David Bernstein said.