Legal experts say Manchester City faces steep odds in appeal over financial rule breaches
Manchester City have been found guilty of every charge relating to breaches of the Premier League’s financial regulations between the 2009‑10 and 2017‑18 seasons, including the creation of “sham contracts” that inflated sponsorship income by £830 million. The club maintains that it is innocent of the accusations, claiming to have “irrefutable evidence” that the ruling contains material errors of law, principle and fact and is therefore unsafe.
In its appeal, City will argue that the disputed payments came from the United Arab Emirates government as a shareholder in the sponsors, and that inconsistencies in the Commission’s judgment undermine the findings. The club says the sponsorship figures were legitimate and not artificially boosted by the owners.
James Severn, a member of the London Solicitor Litigation Association and partner at Penningtons Manches Cooper, told BBC Sport that the appeal is not simply a chance to ask a new panel to overturn the verdict. “City will need to identify a material error of law, principle or fact, or serious procedural unfairness that materially affected the Commission’s decision,” he said. “The Appeal Board does have broad powers to allow or dismiss the appeal, vary the decision or make any other order it considers appropriate.”
Etihad Airways, one of City’s principal sponsors and a key element of the case, previously stated in 2015 court documents from a U.S. investigation that the Abu Dhabi government had not paid for its sponsorship of Manchester City. City will argue that the documents lack full context and do not prove inconsistency in the club’s evidence. The club insists that government records fully support its case, but Severn warned that if those documents were already before the Commission, they may have limited impact on an appeal. He added that bank statements, government records and contemporaneous payment documents could be powerful if they clearly show an audit trail linking the funds to the Abu Dhabi government rather than the owners. If the Commission had already considered that evidence and still concluded the arrangements were a sham, City will face an uphill battle to prove the finding was materially wrong.
Just before the appeal was confirmed, Etihad issued a statement saying it had never been given the opportunity by the Premier League to be represented, to provide relevant information, or to ensure the accuracy and fairness of the information relied upon. Severn said the complaint does not, by itself, establish procedural unfairness. “Etihad was not the respondent and is unlikely to have had an independent right to participate in the proceedings,” he explained. “It is likely that either party could have obtained and presented such evidence to the Commission. If the Appeal Board is prepared to consider new evidence from Etihad, it will carry greater weight if supported by contemporaneous documents.”
A central element of City’s defence will be the claim that the Independent Commission relied too heavily on emails obtained through the Football Leaks files. Severn noted that if City can show the Commission misinterpreted those emails, failed to consider their proper context, or reached conclusions that conflict with other contemporaneous documents, that could constitute a material factual error. He cautioned, however, that the Commission heard extensive witness and documentary evidence before making its findings of sham arrangements and disguised owner funding.
Kieran Maguire, professor of football finance at the University of Liverpool, told BBC Sport that the commission concluded “the documents were retrofitted to fit the crime.” He suggested that, from a legal perspective, City could challenge the composition of the commission, arguing that its members were selected by the Premier League rather than by Manchester City, which might indicate bias. Maguire added that this line of attack seems remote.
Severn said the retired senior judges and leading barristers who sat on the commission have spent their careers interpreting complex facts, dealing with witnesses and weighing evidence. He said it would be impossible to assess reliably the chances of City winning the appeal, but that success will not be easy. Maguire believes there is a route, albeit a difficult one.
City has retained Mark Howard KC to advise on the appeal, while Etihad Airways has engaged the law firm Quinn Emanuel.