Overturning their two-year Champions League ban should not be seen as a reason for celebrating in the streets, but this is football so it probably will beIf you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine. If there was ever any doubt that Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed was playing this game to win, such thoughts will have been erased for good by the success of Manchester City’s stunning, potentially transformative appeal against the judicial processes of European football.This being football, the success of City’s supremely powerful legal team in junking a flawed two-year ban will no doubt be cast in the most binary terms. Related: Pep Guardiola clear for £150m transfer spend after Manchester City...
When a club ceases to be that hapless entity that drew you in, it seems success is not as much fun as everybody assumesS ilenus the satyr, stumbling with age and wine, was taken captive by the Phrygians and taken before King Midas. But the king recognised him as a friend and joyfully led a celebration of his guest’s arrival, lasting 10 days. On the 11th day the king with gladness came to the field of Lydia and restored Silenus to his foster son, Bacchus. The god, delighted at his father’s return, offered Midas a gift. “Make it,” Midas said, “so Manchester City, whom I supported even in the Third Division days, are the richest club in the world.” Bacchus...
Uefa’s desire to encourage long‑term investment instead of relying on increasing debt is workingIn the days after Manchester City were found to have seriously breached Uefa’s financial fair play rules by overstating their sponsorships from Abu Dhabi companies, some of the ensuing discussion rapidly diverted from that guilty finding to questioning the merits of FFP itself. Approved by Uefa in the 2009 season after years of wondering how to drag European football from overspending on players’ wages, FFP has since transformed top division clubs’ finances overall, and was introduced by the Premier League in 2013.City’s impatient ambitions after the great fortune of the 2008 takeover by Sheikh Mansour of the Abu Dhabi ruling family were based on him bankrolling mega-spending,...
City fan Will Unwin remembers life in League One in the pre-Sheikh Mansour era and knows what he prefersDescribing something as “typical City” is a reference to the club shooting itself in the foot. Previously, it was brought up when discussing Jamie Pollock beating two men before heading the ball over his own goalkeeper to almost certainly doom the club to relegation to the third tier. Twenty-two years on it now seems to be a euphemism for financial doping.The situation the club now finds itself in was an inevitability. Financial Fair Play was announced in 2009 and 11 years later it should not come as a surprise that someone would be found guilty of abusing. Manchester City have done nothing...
In the Premier League and beyond clubs have a set place in the pecking order and despite the odd Leicester-style success that is not likely to changeIn politics it is said that when America sneezes, the world catches a cold. In sport when Manchester United fire a manager – which is rather often nowadays – the chain reaction is felt throughout football. And nowhere more, at present, than at Tottenham. The way the media reacted after José Mourinho was ousted from Old Trafford, it seemed it was already a done deal that Mauricio Pochettino would be United’s new manager next season. It was almost as if it was an embarrassing inconvenience that he had to play along with being Spurs...