Do Manchester City Have Any Grounds To Win Appeal?

Manchester City face substantial hurdles if they are to have any chance of winning their appeal after being found guilty of breaking the Premier League’s financial rules, a leading lawyer has told BBC Sport. The club have been found guilty of all charges related to breaches of the Premier League’s financial rules between the 2009-10 and 2017-18 seasons, and creating sham contracts to inflate sponsorship deals by £830m. City have said they are innocent of the accusations made by the Premier League and they have irrefutable evidence the ruling contains clear material errors of law, principle and fact, and is unsafe.

In their appeal, City will argue the payments were made by the United Arab Emirates government as a shareholder of the sponsors, while there are inconsistencies in the Commission’s judgement. Therefore, City say the sponsorship amounts were legitimate and not topped up by the owners. James Severn, Member of the London Solicitor Litigation Association (LSLA) and Partner at Penningtons Manches Cooper, told BBC Sport the appeal is not simply an opportunity to invite a new panel to get the verdict overturned.

“City will need to identify a material error of law, principle or fact, or serious procedural unfairness, which materially affected the Commission’s decision.”
— James Severn, Penningtons Manches Cooper

Legal Arguments and Defense Strategy

City must prove available evidence was misinterpreted. Etihad Airways, one of City’s principal sponsors at the centre of the case, had previously stated that the Abu Dhabi government had not paid for its sponsorship of Manchester City. That came in court documents as part of a US investigation in New York in 2015. City will argue this does not have the full context of the situation and is not proof they have been inconsistent with evidence. The club are adamant government documents fully support their case – but Severn noted that if these were already available to the Commission they may not be much use in an appeal.

“The bank statements, government records and contemporaneous payment documents could be powerful evidence if they establish a clear audit trail showing the disputed funds came from the Abu Dhabi government rather than the owners,” Severn added. “However, if that evidence was already before the Commission, which nevertheless concluded that the arrangements were a sham, City will face an uphill struggle to demonstrate the finding was materially wrong.” Shortly before City’s appeal was confirmed, Etihad Airways issued a statement saying it had never been given the opportunity by the Premier League to be represented, to provide relevant information, or to ensure the accuracy and fairness of information relied upon.

Scrutiny Over Process and Evidence

A key part of City’s defence will be that the Independent Commission relied too heavily on the emails obtained through the Football Leaks files. “If City can demonstrate the Commission fundamentally misunderstood the emails, failed to consider their proper context or reached conclusions inconsistent with other contemporaneous documents, that could amount to a material factual error,” Severn added. “City’s difficulty is that the Commission heard extensive witness and documentary evidence but nevertheless made serious findings of sham arrangements and disguised owner funding.” Kieran Maguire, professor of football finance at the University of Liverpool, told BBC Sport the commission found the documents were retrofitted to fit the crime.

“The Commission must have concluded that the evidence and the credibility of the witnesses put up by Manchester City were poor,” Maguire said. “However, from a legal point of view, this is an area they could attack if Manchester City’s team can prove that the commission itself was a flawed construct in the sense that the members were Premier League picks rather than Manchester City’s, and therefore the deck was stacked against the club to begin with. But that seems remote.” Severn added that the retired senior judges and leading barristers, who sat on the Commission, have spent their careers interpreting complicated facts, dealing with witnesses and applying relevant weight to evidence.

“Given the lawyers that have been recruited by Manchester City, they may go down what’s been described to me as a mess and noise approach.”
— Kieran Maguire, Football Finance Expert

While adding that it would be impossible to assess reliably the chances of City winning their appeal, Severn added that doing so will not be easy. But Maguire believes that while it will be difficult for City to be successful, there is a route. City have brought in Mark Howard KC to advise the club in their appeal, while Etihad Airways has enlisted the services of respected law firm Quinn Emanuel. Even though Premier League regulations state an appeal must be heard within 12 weeks, or by Christmas Eve, Severn added that given the scale and complexity of the proceedings, a final outcome may not be known for some time.