In many countries football is a key part of life.
Clubs are steeped in over 100 years of history. That history has seen the clubs evolve and become many things to many people. The clubs are frequently a reflection of a community, a town or a city, and what it means to come from that place. That is the link that has been forged over time. To the outsider it is often inexplicable but to those who support a club it is a lifelong umbilical cord.
Maybe that explains why there is such a strong unity amongst football fans irrespective of the teams that they support, and the long held belief in a sense of fairplay. Maybe it is simply a British thing, but having spoken to fans at both ends of the country in recent weeks that sense of fairplay is very much alive and well.
The English football fan cares about the game, its history and its clubs. As much as many despise their arch rivals few would want to see them disappear from the league, after all that rivalry is one of the things that makes a season so interesting.
So it was revealing to hear what many feel about the current charges levelled against Manchester City.
The FA Cup final was an extremely rare situation where Manchester United were playing, and neutral fans actually wanted the team in red to win, which is almost unheard of. Usually neutrals want any team but Manchester United to win!
The British public do not like cheats. They like to see fair play. Yet it would appear that Manchester City has in the eyes of many done just that, cheated..
They have been charged with breaches of the Premier League’s financial rules. Not just once or twice but there are an alleged 115 breaches of these rules. These alleged breaches relate to a “failure to provide accurate and up-to-date financial information,” and “a failure to co-operate with Premier League investigations.”
Manchester City has claimed that it has an irrefutable body of evidence to defend their case.
There has been much speculation as to what the punishment will be if the club is found guilty.
In March Nottingham Forest admitted breaching the profitability and sustainability rules (PSR) threshold of £61 million (AUD$118 million) by £34.5 million (AUD$67 million) and were deducted four points, which saw them drop into the relegation zone. Come the final games of the season they avoided the drop finishing six points clear of Luton Town who were third last.
In November last year Everton were handed the biggest sporting sanction in Premier League history for also breaching the competition’s financial rules. The club received a deduction of 10 points that threatened their 70-year status in the top division. They finished the season in 15th place.
While clubs in other leagues outside of England have been relegated for financial indiscretions Swindon Town remain the only club in England to face such a penalty.
In the 1989/90 season Swindon under Ossie Ardiles won the old Second Division play-off and were due to play in the top flight for the first time in the club’s history. The club was facing 36 charges of breaching league rules, 35 due to illegal payments made to players. They were advised to admit the charges, which they did, and were relegated to the Third Division — giving Sunderland promotion to the old First Division and Tranmere Rovers to the Second Division. The scandal saw then-chairman Brian Hillier being given a six-month prison sentence. A later appeal saw Swindon Town being allowed to stay in the Second Division.
Are any of the current Chairmen likely to face a prison term? That is extremely unlikely as they are very powerful individuals with a lot of money.
Swindon would reach the highest division in 1993 after beating Leicester City in the Play off final by then with Glenn Hoddle as coach.
Ardiles had moved on in 1991, and of the team that won under him at Wembley only four players remained in the side when Hoddle won promotion.
Which is something that it would appear has not been missed by football fans across the UK. If Manchester City are relegated how many of their current squad will remain? Will Pep Guardiola stay on as coach?
It is unlikely that many will stay, which is something that is beginning to irritate fans. The players, their agents and the club’s administrators create these problems. Problems that owners should be well aware of, owners who In many cases the game’s Governing body has said are fit and proper people to be running a football club.
Yet at the end of the day if Manchester City are relegated, and if they are stripped of titles and cups won during this period it will be the fans who are the main ones being punished. People who have no control over the running of the club, and the alleged financial impropriety. So why should they be the one’s punished?
The players whose salaries could well be a part of the financial issues simply move on to another club and their management pocket another commission.
While points deductions seem fairer than the fate that befell Swindon Town the feeling among many is that these punishments do not go far enough. Fans that NTFS spoke to on a recent trip to the UK felt the time has come where player agents should be suspended along with the players concerned. After all the agent acts on behalf of the player. The player trusts their agent/manager to do the right thing in the best interests of their career. If it is found that they have not acted in such a way and have put the player in an awkward position as well as the club, should they not be the one’s punished? Maybe then players will pay closer interest to the dealings of their agent and manager than many currently do.
As for those at the club they too should suffer a suspension from involvement within the game. After all as some have alleged they could be guilty of fraud. They have certainly brought the game and the club that employs them into disrepute, so surely they deserve to be punished appropriately.
Of the 115 charges only 14 relate to a failure to provide accurate financial reports for player and manager compensation from 2009/10 up to and including 2017/18.
There are a raft of charges relating to alleged breaches of the Premier League’s profit and sustainability rules dating back to 2009, all of which the club strenously denies.
This denial experts believe will result in the matter not being resolved quickly. Many believing that the case could drag on for years and years. Which is not good for anyone.
Manchester City, thanks to its owner Sheikh Mansour. Khaldoon Al Mubarak has more finances than the Premier League, so they can afford to drag the case out over a number of years. Can the Premier League?
Yet the Premier League and their counterparts across the football world only have themselves to blame by allowing an entity such as the City Football Group to be created and then obtain so much clout.
The City Football Group is now a parent company operating between the executives of the various clubs in their expanding portfolio and the board of Abu Dhabi United Group from which all of their investments are ultimately controlled. After its creation this organisation then set about expanding into as many fields of football as it could. The company now handles football marketing, branding, sponsorship negotiations, academy operations and other football services. According to Human Rights Watch, the investment into Manchester City is intended to “construct a public relations image of a progressive, dynamic Gulf state, which deflects attention from what is really going on in the country.”
So have those running the competitions in which the City Football Group has teams done their due diligence when approving them as owners of clubs in their competitions?
The very real fear among many is that the Premier League is not going to be able to pursue the charges to a satisfactory outcome because the City Football Group is too powerful, and has too much money behind it. Experts are predicting that the worst case scenario may be a 20 point deduction for the club. The feeling is that the Premier League is going to have to negotiate their way out of this, and that the club holds all the cards.
Let us not forget that Manchester City was allegedly one of the driving forces behind the European Super League,, a competition many have said is only on ice for the time being and it will resurface. Could it become a real threat again if the Premier League looks to punish Manchester City with relegation?
It would appear that the club is no longer about its fans,, yet whatever the outcome they will be the ones to suffer the most. Manchester City could well be simply a pawn that enables the City Group to create their own competition, one in which they control every aspect of the game.
Despite the raft of charges against the club it was surprising how so many fans of other clubs felt sympathy for City fans, as they believe that they have lost their club and what it represented for over a century. That is why so many felt that the club should not be punished with relegation, but that individuals who have failed to submit the relevant reports and those involved in any financial misdemeanours are the ones that should be held accountable, and driven out of the game.
Will that happen? It is unlikely as now in sport money talks, and Manchester City’s owners have plenty. Wiat and watch as they force the Premier League’s hand by drawing out proceedings and pushing up the cost of pursuing them. When that happens where will it leave the game? Those running it it will be shown to no longer have control.
