2022-23 UEFA Champions League

Of course Utd did not break FFP rules in ‘99 as they didn’t exist until a decade later. They were of course playing in a completely different financial sphere to most other teams, indeed it was only when this hegemony was threatened by sugar daddy owners that such clubs got ‘interested’ in fair play.

They absolutely did not cheat

There are rules in both competitions that City have been found to have broken. One they got a reduced punishment due to a technicality(they were still fined) and the other is ongoing - and it’s ongoing because even though they publicly claim to have incontrovertible evidence and are happy to assist the PL, their lawyers are ensuring every request is dragged through the courts for as long as possible.

The argument about Uniteds spend is moot. They worked within the confines of each tournament.

City are cheating by wilfully ignoring the rules they signed up to in each competition. Everyone knows this, and none of their achievements will be remembered in the same regard as others because of this. I think West Ham’s European win this season was more impressive when you consider the resources they have.

Complete and utter nonsense as others have already rationalised in detail.

City spent their first few seasons under Abu Dhabi signing every player United had been linked with, Aguero, Silva even Robinho was under the impression he was going to United when he signed for City.

That and they took nearly half of Arsenal's first team over the course of a couple of seasons.

City were so determined to do things differently to the established clubs that they aped everything they did and cooked the books the whole way along. Such an underdog story.

Meanwhile United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal, Spurs you name a club who've been around the top of the table in recent years and they've all been bringing young players into their first teams from their academy, City have token academy boy Phil Foden on the bench as some sort of grudging nod to youth development as if they aren't playing a completely different game to everyone else.

I dunno where I read it, but by being able to have 5 subs, a team like city are able to changeover nearly half their team with superstars during a match.

Never thought about it before as most teams have a noticeable drop off in quality from the first team to the bench. Not so in their case.

I know it didn’t happen last night, but had extra time would have seen the likes of Mahrez, Alvarez and Laporte come on. A World Cup winner, a Spanish international and captain of the Algerian team.

Thats not right or normal to have a bench that strong.

Some real apathy to the game last night. The local was only half full with only one City fan who to be fair had supported them for over 30 years. Other than that anyone else interested was supporting Inter and the rest not bothered by it. If it was any other club going for a treble I imagine there would have been alot more interest and the pub owner would have been alot happier with his till receipts at the end of the night.

I'd be surprised if there is any tax issue, they are probably scrupulous about making sure every penny is paid and if anything erring on the side of over-paying.

HMRC has zero interest or concern with the rules of football or FFP. So if say Haaland is getting his salary bumped by ultra-generous airline sponsorship deals in the background in order to keep his official football salary low, then it's a potential breach of football regulations. But all HRMC would be concerned about is that the correct overall tax is paid regardless of how the income is funnelled to each person.

They're brilliant.

But as brilliant as they are, they're not the greatest football team of all time, which has been asked repeatedly recently.

It's not based on last night only, they have only won 1 game away in the CL this season, they can play great football but they can also be stopped by organised teams. That's not trying to take away from them winning, they did what they had to, but the way the broadcast media hype them, you'd think they were the best team ever, not even close for me.

As Darragh Maloney and Liam Brady rightly said. everyone spends money these days.

I thought about it think of Liverpool throughout the years signing Andy Carroll for stupid money from Newcastle in a panic buy. Liverpool signing Coutinho and selling him for silly money to Barcelona. Liverpool is club which likes to pretend it is not capitalist. Liverpool 'This means more'.

Then there is the big one from the 70's Keegan sold to Hamburg for 500,000. Then Dalglish was sold to Liverpool from Celtic for over 450,000. That is just one club as an example. All in all Liverpool spent their money in the right way in their history more often than not. They got the signings right then had a period of success.

1977 Dalglish to Liverpool @1:26 Paisley said Hamburg 'stole' - then said 'well they didn't steal him they paid for him' then said 'Took away' to Hamburg. And basically implied Liverpool did not cry about it so Celtic should not cry about loosing Dalglish either.

That to me is just Soccer finances have pull. But the good managers mould the players and pick the right ones regardless of their cost.

As Maloney rightly pointed out when Hughes was manager of City he spent big but spend incorrectly - with no real plan. Maloney said there is no point having money if it spent badly.

Soccer has always been awash with money and the the bigger monied teams hoover up the other teems players. Soccer is the ultimate world wide capitalist business. People like to pretend it is a sport but to me it is business.

I think of PSG they thew massive money to get the CL but yet they never managed to get a team to gel to win the CL. The spending has to be correct and done well. A team has to be moulded.

I think of the great AC Milan backed team by Berlusoni he spend big Gullit Rikard Van Basten etc. There is the obvious Real Madrid policy of signing big names. A club who was historical state backed. I think of Napoli splashing the cash on Maradona and others in late 80's/90's. Barcelona now how did they get out debt tv rights etc - suddenly they get Rafinha and Levendowski etc. Money talks that is soccer - deals are made off the pitch.

Moving the 'economic levers' bringing in about 700m to rebuild their side. 'More than a club'?

Barcelona is more Soccer politics than Soccer itself in my opinion. Big business.

Selling the TV rights - Spotify sponsorship - 1.5billion in loans - soccer is capitalism even for the clubs who think they are 'more than a club'

Now I have no dog in the fight but people who pretend to be horrified at Man City's spending don't seem to realise the capitalist nature of Soccer historically and what a business Soccer is.

Many in Ireland follow the PL instead of the LOI for example? Why that is where the money and glamour is. The global capitalist fans follow the money as simple as that. To complain about a team like Man City to me is hypocritical. When the whole premise of soccer is a financial - an ultra capitalist one at all levels.

As for Pep himself. I think he did a great job moulding a team getting the correct signings that is what managers do. Pep has clearly improved his players Grealish/Stones/Foden for example that is what managers do. The change in Stones is up there with Paisley changing Alan Kennedy from a forward to full back. Excellent managers see things that other don't which ironically in the world of Soccer is priceless.

All moot.

Did those clubs cook their books?

My original point was that they were over hyped, lauded by the British and Irish media as if they are the greatest team of all time, but they're not. It keeps getting called a historic treble and, while a great achievement, they're not the first English team to do it.

Nope.

So I'm supposed to accept City's depraved backers, who have doped the club to the hilt, because Barcelona and Madrid have dodgy pasts, which we all know about. Madrid were torn to shreds on here when their debt was forgiven, and we all know how Barca and Real had TV rights by the balls for ages. None of that is new.

None of that changes any of the City stuff. And its not the same. This narrative that 'football is dirty, therefore just accept it' is absolute toss. I'm sorry, the Glazers don't have bottomless pits funded by despicable regimes in order to artificially pump the place full of money into every orifice of the club. Same for FSG. Same for the Kroenkes. Etc. It just doesn't happen.

City are not the same. And pretending they are is insanity.

I'm not against owner investment either and I want the lesser clubs to challenge the established elite but it needs to be controlled. If an owners wants to invest 100m over 2 or 3 seasons in players all the more power to them.

What city are doing is cheating though, sponsorship deals funded by the owner, off the book payments to managers and probably players. This a club that can't fill their stadium, no one really supports globally yet claim to have the largest commercial revenue in football, it's absolutely farcical.

They'll spend another 200m this summer after winning a treble.

It was a MASSIVE pressure game for them. Many teams have looked nervy in CL finals. City no different.

They've now overcome that massive hurdle. The prospect of them having more confidence in themselves after winning the CL and achieving the treble...

I switched off fairly quickly last night after the game as the BT coverage was making me sick. Talk about OTT. Watching Jake the presenter crying with Grealish tipped me over the edge.

Thinking about it today, I think Pep was really panicking last night. They didn't play well, and as someone else said a fairly average Inter team pushed them right to the end and on another night would have taken the game to extra time (where city might well have won with a better bench)..

But it showed that they can be got at. I think back to that Madrid semi. Had Carlo played all the youngsters in midfield, rather than 2 old boys, madrid would have been more in their faces and made a game of it, with better players than inter up front. But city played well that night and were on a different level.

This is peak city now you'd think. Haaland was more of less marked out of the game, KDB wasn't doing much before going off, their midfield didn't have the run of the pitch. Hopefully managers will see this and try to play more like Inter played last night.

All the noise about other clubs spending money blah blah blah isn't relevant to this discussion.

Lots of clubs get taken over by new rich owners but the situation at City has never occcured before.

The only other club close to them albeit not as well run (a warning for my fellow United fans hoping for a Qatari takeover) is PSG.

Chelsea were taken over by Roman Ambramovich and at the time it seemed like he was setting Chelsea up to dominate football, but that wasn't what happened, Chelsea became contenders for trophies they hadn't previously been in the running for, although they had a decent side leading into that takeover who had some cup success. City by contrast were a basket case of a club the model for professional dysfunction in football who suddenly became the biggest richest club in the world game.

City's takeover (their second in as many years) went in a different trajectory where they bypassed merely being contenders and peers of the established big clubs to quickly dominating all the established clubs to the point where they are now almost unchallenged by anyone bar a freakishly good Liverpool side a couple of years ago now.

This wasn't achieved just by splashing cash, they have deceived the football authorities in England and Europe by paying money under the table to countless parties in their employ.

They say they want the 115 charges issue cleared up ASAP yet drag their heels through the courts attempting to leverage their financial might against the Premier League who's competition they compete in and dominate and have done for more than a decade now.

And we're supposed to accept that their behaviour is to be excused because other amoral things have occcured in football in the past? What sort of a bar are we setting when we say something like that?

If this is what we settle for then in no time at all we'll be watching City Newcastle and PSG duking it out for the title in the European Super League because all semblance of football as we know it is what's at stake, these people make the corruption of Real and Barca or Calciopoli look tame by comparison.

bUt WhAt AbOuT yEr IpHoNe???

Large sweeping generalisations about why people hate what City represent isn’t much of an argument.

As much as their defenders argue that this is just business as usual in a different form, everyone knows this is hugely different and potentially damaging to football as a whole.

Can other teams replicate City’s business model? Not unless they’re bought by an owner with endless funds who doesn’t care about it being financially profitable. Chelsea is brought up a lot because of their serious recent spending but if those players don’t work out then they’ll have to deal with the impact of that. Not so for City - they were in a Position to tell one of their key players last season. to f*ck off in January without missing a beat. No other team has that luxury.

And this is always the case with City. They’ve gotten it right because there’s zero risk when your club can relentlessly spend without any risk of it not working out, because they will be promptly replaced.

And with their spending power, they artificially inflate the football market. Teams will price their players for as much as they can get for them - so in other words, the state backed clubs. We’ve seen this already with PSG paying 200m for Neymar, and then Barca paying over 100m for players as a consequence, and now bang average players are being mentioned with prices in the 60-70m range. As long as City/PSG etc can do this without any punishment, prices will continue to artificially increase.

I absolutely hate what City represent in global football, and I firmly believe that it will ruin the game if left unchecked. It has nothing to do with footballing rivalry, anyone who genuinely think that is just telling themselves that to make themselves feel better.

It's probably just a coincidence but Pep's Man City team are under investigation for 115 financial cheating charges and Pep's Barca team are under investigation for bribing referees.

Hasn't won the CL outside of that.