General Premier League Thread 2023-24 Mod Note in op 27/6/23 And 21/05/24

Is there somebody saying they did nothing wrong back at the start?

It doesn't matter though because nothing will be done about it. Nothing will be done to Chelsea either.

There are lads half following the debate and jumping in on points without following whats been said already and what the point of the discussion is.

Anyway I already said I was done on this topic so am definitely bowing out now.

Scary how the indefensible can be defended.

Its ridiculous, City get one 12.30 kick off on the Saturday after the international break and Pep starts making noise. Watching everyone of those "injured" players to be togged and flying it on Saturday morning.

I don't follow... Was your point all along that City cheated at the start but are now fully legit?

You can't rob a bank, set up a business with that money and then claim that the business is fine because it came afterwards. That is absolute lunacy.

I've seen nothing to suggest that the City sponsors are legit now either - the numbers just don't add up. As has been said here many times I would love to see the other bids for sponsorship that failed to the conveniently owned companies willing to sponsor. What were they valuing the market rate at?

A blind man could see they were cooking the books early on.

I suggested earlier that with all their success they have become a lot more popular and now have the option to make deals with companies where they sponsor City, it'll help their businesses greatly, and then get a sizeable portion of the money back from Mansour in deals struck between businesses completely unrelated to City.

There's nothing that can be done about that.

there is a reason a lot of City fans make a lot of noise about their present financial health - it's a tactic to drown out the noise about cooking the books in the early years. 

i don't think even the most one-eyed rival fan could argue that City aren't NOW a massive club.  new City fans are popping up in schools everywhere, and when they go on overseas tours all over the world, they are followed by a huge amount of fans.

Nobody with a brain really disputes where they are in the football period now.

But how did they get there?  

and this is the thing ... they KNOW they cooked the books.  so many will say 'how else could we compete?' or 'if we didn't, it would be the same teams competing' - and those are used as justifications for whatever they did in those early days.  and they are weird justifications - because the implication is blatantly that cheating is allowed because other clubs are too strong after years of success.  well, tough.  nobody has a divine right to success.  it is earned.  does the local grocery store have a divine right to compete with Tesco?  no, it doesn't.  The Premier League is already incredibly equitable, hence we're seeing how competitive the likes of Villa, Newcastle (even with more financial restrictions than City had), Spurs etc can be.

This argument of ‘the same 4 teams are awesome, so we should be allowed to cook the books in order for that to stop’ is a mental one.

What I suggested may be happening cannot be regulated because businesses that have no relation to the team cannot be investigated.

I'm saying that team X sponsors City. Team Y owned by the man who owns the soccer club, but which has no contact or relationship with the club, gives the money back through deals with team z who have no relationship with the club.

That's sportswashing in a nutshell.

It's why @POKERKING asking "well what's wrong with this years accounts?" is diversion tactics (I don't think he's knowingly doing it).

Basically, forget all that stuff previously, what's wrong now? That's the end goal of sportswashing. For fans of The Wire, it's no different to Stringer Bell laundering drug money.

You are calling me a wind up merchant?

Did you see my post about City cheating to get to where they are and most likely still at it but in a smarter way?

How about you go and check out my posts immediately prior to one you quoted. Of course you didn't read this part of my post.

And I said they were cheating. That doesn't mean they haven't become popular worldwide.

It's really only in the UK and Ireland that people care about what's going on behind the scenes.

Same as you don't hear many going on about PSG over here. We don't care nearly as much about that.

Success and great players increase popularity and the Premier league is the most watched league in the world. They keep winning it and now they've added a Champions league. On top of that they have had De Bruyne for what 8 years or so now and now Haaland.

Barca are the biggest club on the planet. They are still living off of having Messi for so long. Xavi was a huge name as well and he's the manager now. And they've always brought in a couple of big names. Lewandoski keeps them up there and Yamal looks like another superstar in the making.

Real Madrid are huge, second most popular club. The signing and performances of Jude Bellingham are drawing more fans to them, they also have Vinicious Junior whose another huge name.

Bayern Munich signed Harry Kane which will at least maintain their current status.

Can you name another club with lots of recent big tournament wins and bigger names than I've mentioned above, outside of the Saudi clubs?

I'll shorten it for you.

City cheated and probably still do.

Success brings popularity and City are one of the five most popular clubs in the world as a result of success.

You need to check ranker.

I remember when this success = popularity guff was to be "dropped" yet here we are still incorrectly banging that trope drum.

Whenever I think of side-deals, I always think of Xavi coincidentally winning the Doha lotto while playing for a club based in Doha!

I would go looking up if the same people were involved in the bank/club but there's no point as it's too much effort, and we all know the answer really.

Outside of stripping titles along with relegation, like Serie A did, they any other punishment opens the flood gates for Newcastle and whoever else comes after them.

Same goes for Chelsea really, who aren't even bothered trying to hide it anymore.

Weren't they already done for dodgy dealings with underage players and given a transfer ban?

Be honest though, you know nothing will happen. They are bigger than the Premier league, Mansour I mean.

They have so much money they could keep this thing in the courts until all the people investigating it are dead from old age.

It used to really bug me but I've seen this powerful money show it's power too many times now and there doesn't seem to be anything that can be done about it.

These Newcastle owners can do what they like, murder, war crimes, kill members of the LGBT, treat women like **** and still come in and make a deal to buy the PGA tour, which for years has proudly stood as an honourable, non-profit organisation.

Mansour controls nearly £300 billion. He can do what he wants when he wants and nobody is going to stand in his way. The best outcome if someone does is that they'll end up broke. The Premier league will end up broke if they try to take City down.

As an Arsenal fan, being beaten by City and Chelsea over the years hasn't bothered me as much as others. To me, they were always playing a cheat card so losing to them didn't really count as a defeat. It just didn't hurt the same way.

I'd be willing to wager that City's 2022 accounts are just as dodgy as their 2015 accounts.

Honest question here...

What courts exactly will City be able to keep this ticking over in while they compete in the PL?

If the PL rules that they broke their rules and or FA, UEFA or FIFA rules then Man City's membership can be revoked.

It's on the PL website :

"Any serious breach of the Rule Book results in an independent three-person tribunal sitting to hear the case, ascertain guilt and set the punishment, which can range from fines to points deductions and, in extreme cases, expulsion from the competition (this has never happened in the history of the Premier League)."

If the PL rule to expel City then who exactly are City going to bring this to?

CAS is out and there is no time barring to save the day here. UEFA? Not likely to get involved.

FIFA can never be sure of but again what can they realistically do. The rules are clear and so is the punishment for breaking those rules.

I've no doubt City and their crooked legal team will try all the tricks but I just don't see how they drag it out once the PL charges them.

The only question is the severity of the punishment. A 10 point deduction for Everton seems like they can only go down the more extreme routes for City now.

There no way this just goes away. Hopefully City as a football club doesn't end up folded because of this.

That would be a concern - at the end of the day Mansour can just walk away from the club if it no longer fits his purpose. Buy another European club and take aim at the PL that way.

City fans have been obnoxious over the last few years and their head in the sand approach has been infuriating but they don't deserve to lose their football club.

Especially the fans that never asked for this