Former Manchester City goalkeeper Joe Hart has said he has no reason not to trust chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak's comments on the club's 115 charges, speaking on BBC 5 Live after Al Mubarak addressed the issue on Saturday.
"My honest opinion is I've got no reason not to trust Khaldoon. What he said is enough for me," Hart said. "I loved how he spoke. I loved the letter because that was from someone who cared about the club."
Evidence points to guilty verdicts
Hart's view flies in the face of the evidence available. City are expected to be found guilty of the majority of charges by the independent three-man panel. CEO Ferran Soriano telling bosses of other European clubs on Monday that the Blues will appeal supports that, and even if there is still no published verdict neither have there been any denials from the club - or the Premier League, for that matter - about the reports.
Sticking to the principle of innocent until officially guilty is not wrong, despite it seeming unlikely. It is also hard to get away from the idea that Hart's view is hugely influenced by the fact he knows Al Mubarak well having been at the club for several of the years in question.
Players' trust in Al Mubarak
Rather than dismiss Hart as parroting the views of his former club, it is worth asking why he is still willing to take the word of his former chairman in the face of what feels like overwhelming evidence. Maybe the fact that guilty verdicts would undermine Hart's successes at the club has something to do with it, but there is definitely something in how players react to Al Mubarak.
Al Mubarak has an outstanding reputation around the world in sports, business and politics and is very good at convincing world leaders and top CEOs of the merits of his argument. It should not be a surprise then that the footballers he is in contact with take him at his word. As well as speaking well when he needs to, he is also a visible presence at the club on a regular basis so that strengthens his relationship with the players.
Hart believes Al Mubarak because he knows him from his years with the club and trusts what he says. The same goes for Pep Guardiola, Erling Haaland, Enzo Maresca and anyone else who has said that they trust the club on the charges - or anything else, for that matter; Haaland rang Al Mubarak up on joining and said he was going to win the Champions League for him.
Impact on the squad
And he did - months after the charges first dropped. A City side that were in danger of seeing their season implode after miserable defeats to Nathan Jones's Southampton, Erik Ten Hag's Manchester United and Antonio Conte's Spurs instead used the fire of the perceived injustice to beat Bayern, Real, Inter, Arsenal, Liverpool and everyone else to make history instead.
That isn't to say that this squad will or can repeat that, but those months are more relevant evidence than Marc Guehi messing up against Spain in weighing up the state of mind of the players. Rather than pore over the Premier League rulebook or spend the rest of the season on the phone with their agents, it is safe to say that City's squad will be able to park this - however serious the consequences could be - and get on with playing football; if they weren't able to, they wouldn't be the top athletes they are.
However much Al Mubarak and other members of City's leadership team are believed by the current squad, the message is enough for now to take it and move on. Hart signposted this, for anyone who took the time to actually consider his comments.
