Man City might be biggest cheats sporting world has ever seen. What comes next? - Bangkok Post

Ben Johnson’s Olympic gold and Lance Armstrong’s 7 Tour de France titles were wiped out. Will City’s English Premier League crowns go the same way?

A general view outside the Etihad Stadium, Manchester, Britain, on March 6, 2024. (Photo: Reuters) HONG KONG — "Don't get me started on financial fair play," Vincent Kompany said, immediately after his Bayern Munich team had beaten Aston Villa in a pre-season friendly at Kai Tak Stadium last month.

The same billionaire-owned Aston Villa that in May won the Europa League; that is competing in this season's Champions League yet was forced to sell a host of A-list stars over the summer to comply with financial regulations.

As Bayern head coach, Kompany hugely benefits from the spending restrictions that are ostensibly designed to protect a privileged few historically successful clubs, capping the ambitions of newly-moneyed prospective challengers.

Witness Newcastle United's unimaginably wealthy Saudi Arabian owners having to play poor when what they really wanted after their 2021 takeover was to embark on a Roman Abramovich-style raid of domestic and European rivals.

As a player, Kompany joined Manchester City in August 2008, one month before the club was bought by the Abu Dhabi United Group.

His 11-year stay included the period between 2009 and 2018 that is now viewed through the lens of City having been hit with 80 charges relating to financial wrongdoing over those nine years. Another 35 charges over failing to cooperate with a Premier League investigation from 2018 to 2023 were added to the club's charge sheet.

Manchester City's Vincent Kompany lifts the trophy as they celebrate after winning the FA Cup on May 18, 2019. (Photo: Reuters)

Ferran Soriano, the City chief executive, vowed that it would "take a lot more time" before a conclusive outcome is reached, with the club planning to vigorously appeal against the landslide verdicts.

Juventus were stripped of their 2005 and 2006 Serie A titles after being busted for match-fixing. So endemic was the corruption in Italy's top flight during the former campaign that the Italian Football Federation decided against crowning a champion.

The following year's title was reassigned to third-placed Inter Milan. Juventus were relegated to Serie B for the 2006-07 campaign.

Away from football, Ben Johnson was stripped of his 1988 100m Olympic gold after testing positive for an anabolic steroid. The Canadian's title was awarded to Carl Lewis, who would later be revealed as one of six men in the Seoul final to have committed doping transgressions during their careers.

For seven straight years from 1999, the Tour de France is listed as having no winner following the exposure of "champion" Lance Armstrong as an incorrigible drugs cheat.

US Postal Service Team rider Lance Armstrong of the United States raises his arms as he crosses the finish line to win the 204.5-kilometre long 17th stage of the Tour de France from Bourd-d'Oisans to Le Grand Bornand, France, on July 22, 2004. (Photo: Reuters)

Should the Premier League's judgment on City's guilt survive the appeals process, and they go down the route of redistributing the three titles that went to the Etihad Stadium in the nine years from 2009, the beneficiaries would be Manchester United, twice, and Liverpool.

The runners-up to Pep Guardiola's team in their five title-winning campaigns between 2018 and 2024, in order, were Liverpool, Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal and Arsenal. Three self-sustaining clubs, with their global fanbases and rich revenue streams, who perhaps stood to gain most in England when the introduction of an FFP framework was agreed in 2009.

In 2013, Liverpool agreed a £1 million [around US$1.3 million] settlement fee with Manchester City after employees of the Merseyside club, apparently, repeatedly accessed their rivals' scouting database.

City's alleged crimes came to light in 2018 following a Der Spiegel investigation, launched after the German website was sent leaked emails by Portuguese computer hacker Rui Pinto.

Now living under police witness protection, Pinto tweeted the City verdict "was a historic decision for English football, and one that comes to crown the work I carried out through [his website] Football Leaks".

"Today, we all know that, through structural manipulation and financial manoeuvring, Manchester City did not merely circumvent the rules, they turned them into a mere formality, challenging any attempt to preserve the integrity of the competition," Pinto wrote.

Pinto uncovered evidence of Manchester City employing various underhand methods to misrepresent their financial situation.

Among other offences, they were said to have inflated the value of sponsorship deals, and paid Roberto Mancini, the head coach who led City to the 2012 title, via two contracts to obscure the reality of his salary figure.

In February 2023, the Premier League issued a sledgehammer statement outlining the 115 alleged rules breaches committed by City. Fifty-four related to their failure to provide accurate and up-to-date financial information between 2009 and 2018, while they faced 14 charges over failing to provide accurate reports for player and management compensation over the same period.

Between 2015 and 2018, City were said to have breached the Premier League's profit and sustainability rules. Five charges centred on the club's failure to comply with Union of European Football Associations (Uefa) rules, including financial fair play regulations. The 35 charges over failing to cooperate with Premier League investigations were added to the rap sheet.

It is believed that the number of charges against City has since climbed from 115 to 130.

In charge of Burnley at the time of the Premier League's offensive, Kompany, three-and-a-half years ago, said: "I kind of look at it and sometimes roll my eyes a little bit.

"No doubt there's a lot of righteousness in the world to come and tell you what you've done wrong.

"And then if everybody looks at themselves, I think the football industry, in general, is not one that can afford to point the finger too many times."

City's case was heard by a three-person independent commission, from Sept 16 to Dec 6, 2024. That more than 21 months elapsed after the 12-week hearing before a verdict surfaced, via leaks to the media, would support Khaldoon Al Mubarak's assertion that "the Premier League process still has a long way to run".

In an open letter to supporters on the club website, the Manchester City chairman added: "Our confidence and intent in proving the club's innocence is just as strong as when this began."

Joe Hart, the goalkeeper in City's 2012 and 2014 title-winning sides, said he had "no reason not to trust Khaldoon".

"I'm very proud of what I've achieved and what I did with Manchester City, and what we achieved as a team, and that doesn't change," Hart added.

Back in 2020, City successfully appealed in the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) against a two-year Champions League ban imposed by Uefa, the European governing body. They were fined €10 million [around US$11.3 million] for not cooperating with Uefa's investigation.

In this instance, they will have no recourse to CAS, instead having their plea heard by a new independent three-person panel. Theoretically, that appeal verdict will draw a line under the process, but should City be unhappy with the result, they could potentially argue in the High Court that the initial verdict seeping out through unofficial channels compromised their case. They cited media leaks in their action against Uefa six years ago.

Regardless of how it plays out, this episode has infiltrated every corner of the Premier League, driving a bus through the English top flight's pompous claim to be the world's best domestic competition.

A penny for the thoughts of executives at Sky Sports, currently paying around £1.3 billion a year to screen a league where nobody knows whether what they have watched over the past 17 years was for real, in legal terms, at least.

With their wish to tighten the belts of fat cats who would have gladly poured their own cash into clubs, and, by extension, invested in the English game, the Premier League has tied itself in knots. Railroaded into straitened circumstances, clubs are increasingly selling major assets overseas, leading to a steady talent drain.

A general view inside the Etihad Stadium in September 2026. (Photo: Reuters)

Still, if Manchester City are found to have ridden roughshod over rules they agreed to be bound to, all bets are off regarding their punishment.

Everton have been hit with six and two-point deductions for offences that pale in number and significance against those City are said to have committed, while the Merseysiders have been ordered to pay Burnley £35 million over the supposed impact on the Turf Moor club of their rules breach. In 2024, Nottingham Forest had four points taken off them for one rule infringement.

Leicester City, architects of the most uplifting story of the 34-year Premier League era, were last year hit with three charges over financial misdemeanours. Their six-point penalty cost them their Championship status.

Optimism for City, in the event that the charges are upheld, comes in the shape of the £10 million fine and transfer ban imposed on Chelsea this summer, after their owners self-reported 74 breaches of Football Association (FA) rules that occurred under the chairmanship of Abramovich.

The nuclear option for the Premier League would be to relegate Manchester City. Italian football's slide from relevance accelerated after Juventus' enforced demotion. In the 20 years since, two of the country's clubs have been European champions, against 10 in the previous 50 years.

Writing in The Times newspaper this week, former striker Tony Cascarino, who joined the French club for their first season in Ligue 2, said that despite them regaining their top-tier status after two seasons, "Marseille have still not recovered from their demotion, and it happened 32 years ago".

In the tribal, cash-driven world of football, sympathy will be in short supply should Manchester City suffer a similarly sorry fate, regardless that nobody is suggesting they ever resorted to nefariously influencing matches.

No, they stand charged with distorting their balance sheet, the document that increasingly determines modern football's winners and losers.