The Premier League should leave blanks on the roll of honour for Manchester City's trophies won between 2009 and 2018, rather than awarding them to runners-up, according to Jonathan Wilson. Writing in the Guardian, Wilson argues that the spaces can stand both as a rebuke to an era of greed and as a tribute to the Premier League's pursuit of justice.
A Case of Cheating
Wilson recalls the 2014 League Cup final, where Sunderland led City 1-0 at half-time. Yaya Touré equalised with a 30-yard clip 10 minutes after the break, and City went on to win 3-1. The independent commission has since revealed that City were involved in a prolonged act of cheating at the time, while Touré, according to Der Spiegel leaks, was paid via a dual contract to disguise City's spending. The commission's report refers to payments "not recorded in an employment contract … but instead recorded in a consultancy agreement."
Had Sunderland won, they would have ended a 41-year trophy drought and qualified for the Europa League. Wilson notes that while the extra games could have led to relegation in 2015, the greater exposure and positivity from European football might have led to Premier League consolidation and stability.
Should Rivals Be Awarded Titles?
Wilson acknowledges that Sunderland, Liverpool, Arsenal, Stoke, Manchester United, and every club that competed against City between 2009 and 2018 should feel cheated. However, he argues that awarding the 2014 League Cup to Sunderland is a different question, one where subjectivity is unavoidable.
"Personally, I wouldn't want it," Wilson writes, saying he wants his club's first major trophy to be pure, with memories like the 1973 highlights of Ian Porterfield's goal, Jim Montgomery's save, and Bob Stokoe's celebratory skip. He adds: "I want tears and hugs and community and togetherness, all the things my dad's generation banged on about. I want to get drunk and sing on a train. I don't want to find out via an alert on my phone 12 years after the fact as I unpack the dishwasher."
Wilson argues that awarding league titles to runners-up is even less satisfactory. In the 2017-18 season, City were 15 points clear by the end of January and went on to amass 100 points. The four sides behind them—Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, and Tottenham, separated by five points—had little incentive to prioritise the league. United, Chelsea, and Spurs reached the FA Cup semi-finals, while Liverpool reached the Champions League final. Awarding United, who finished second, the title would seem "not just empty but arbitrary."
Stripping City Is Still Necessary
Despite this, Wilson insists City should be stripped of their titles. "They won them unfairly; why on earth should they be allowed to keep them?" He notes that City's players strived hard, but so did players for teams that weren't cheating, and City's squad was full of high-grade players drawn by disguised money.
Wilson concludes that euphoric memories cannot be expunged, but the rest of the world knows what they were based on. He suggests that leaving blanks on the roll of honour—no Premier League champion in 2012, 2014, or 2018, no FA Cup winner in 2011, and no League Cup winner in 2014, 2016, or 2018—would stand as a memorial to the years when a foreign entity tried to subvert English football, as a warning of the dangers of laissez-faire capitalism, and as a monument to a Premier League that preferred justice and fairness over grubby deals. "Let the years without a champion stand for ever vacant, both as a rebuke and as a tribute. Sometimes, emptiness can be the most eloquent statement of all."
