Man City’s appeal faces major hurdles after guilty verdict

Manchester City’s appeal faces “substantial hurdles” if they are to overturn the guilty verdict, after being found guilty over Premier League financial rule breaches from the 2009-10 to 2017-18 seasons, and for creating “sham contracts” to inflate sponsorship deals by £830m, BBC Sport reports.

City say they are “innocent” and that the ruling is unsafe due to “clear material errors” of law, principle and fact. In the appeal, the club plans to argue the payments were made by the United Arab Emirates government as a shareholder of the sponsors, and that the Commission’s judgment contains inconsistencies. Their case is that the sponsorship amounts were legitimate and not topped up by the owners.

What City must prove

James Severn of Penningtons Manches Cooper said City can’t simply seek a fresh panel to overturn the decision. To succeed, they must identify a material error of law, principle or fact, or “serious procedural unfairness” that materially affected the Commission’s decision. He added that Etihad Airways’ complaint about not being given the chance to be represented “does not, of itself, establish procedural unfairness,” and that any weight of new evidence would depend on contemporary documentation.

Kieran Maguire, professor of football finance at the University of Liverpool, argued the Commission effectively “retrofitted” documents to fit the wrongdoing. He noted City’s legal route could include questioning the Commission’s make-up—Premier League picks rather than City’s—though he said chances of winning are hard to assess. City have brought in Mark Howard KC, while Etihad has enlisted Quinn Emanuel.