Manchester City guilty of all financial breaches - as bosses deny pumping extra £900m into club and vow to appeal
The Premier League said the club had been found guilty of all charges related to breaches of its financial rules between 2009-10 and 2017-18
Manchester City has been found guilty of all charges of financial breaches - as the club vowed to challenge the ruling.
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The Premier League said the club had been found guilty of almost all 115 charges related to breaches of the league's financial rules between 2009-10 and 2017-18.
The league said Manchester City arranged "sham" contracts with several of its sponsors.
This was found to have inflated the club’s revenues and reduced their costs by more than £900million during the affected period, the league said.
Manchester City said they will now pursue an appeal “on the basis that the opinion contains clear material errors, of law, principle and fact, and is unsafe”.
Read more: What are the 114 charges Manchester City were found guilty of and what punishment will they get?
Read more: 'Nothing has changed', Manchester City chairman insists as he vows to prove 'our club is innocent'
Further “sham arrangements” the club were found to have entered into enabled the club to record lower operating expenses than they actually incurred, the Premier League’s published statement said.
The commission found the club had therefore filed misstated accounts and concealed the true state of its finances from its auditors and football regulators.
The commission concluded that “by its conduct the club clearly intended to circumvent the Premier League rules.”
The club has the right to appeal the independent commission’s findings until October 2.
Manchester City say they will now pursue an appeal “on the basis that the opinion contains clear material errors, of law, principle and fact, and is unsafe.”
The commission found that had information been accurately reported, the club would have been in breach of Premier League and UEFA spending limits “by a very large amount”.
The club were also found to have committed multiple breaches of their duty to co-operate with the investigation, and tried to “stop and frustrate” the Premier League’s investigation, which began in 2018.
Richard Masters, the chief executive of the Premier League, said: “The core decision establishes the facts of what happened at Manchester City during this period. It details how the club systematically broke Premier League rules for nearly a decade.
“It also vindicates the Premier League’s decision to pursue this case against Manchester City. While the process to date has been both long and difficult, the league has remained determined that the facts be established independently.
“It is a key responsibility of the Premier League to ensure that the rules, approved by the clubs themselves, are upheld to protect the integrity of the competition. It is paramount that the league remains competitive and fair for all clubs and for the fans. We take that role extremely seriously.”