Jamie Carragher believes redistributing Manchester City's winners' medals to the runners-up will be a meaningless gesture for opposition players after the club were found guilty of the majority of their 115 financial charges.
It was reported last Friday that City had been found guilty on all but one of their long-standing charges, stating the club's Abu Dhabi owners broke the Premier League's rules by artificially inflating commercial income between 2009 and 2018.
On Tuesday, the Premier League confirmed the accuracy of those reports by revealing City had close to £900m inserted into their accounts by their owners across a nine-year period, in a move that was "clearly intended to circumvent the PL Rules".
Carragher on medals and memories
Those finances helped City supercharge their squad building to bring some of the finest footballers of the modern era to the Etihad, and their trophy haul between the years they have been found guilty of stands at seven, including three Premier League titles.
Talk of stripping City of their honours between those years has surfaced since Friday's initial reports. While that would potentially see Liverpool given a Premier League crown for 2013/14 and the 2016 Carabao Cup, Carragher does not see the value in such a move for those footballers whose medal collections would technically be bolstered.
"Well I think I'm the only one who is not going to get a medal by the sounds of it," Carragher told Sky Sports. "I think I am just the cut-off point with it. But the thing about medals, I do think Man City's medals or trophies they have won it this time should be taken off their list, I do believe that."
"Whether other clubs should get them, I think is slightly different. But what Manchester City have done is, they have not just hurt their own players in terms of no-one looking at their trophies and medals now in the same way and they never will. But the players we are talking about getting medals...I've been very lucky to win some medals and I never look at the medals years later."
Feelings over trophies
Carragher explained that medals themselves are not what matters to players. "But what happens is my mind goes back to those moments, I get a feeling in my stomach and I remember the referee blowing the final whistle of a big game. I remember Jerzy Dudek saving a penalty (in the 2005 Champions League final) and that feeling I got. Those [Man City] players will never get that feeling [again] and it was robbed of them by Manchester City."
"I don't think any player will care if you go and give him a medal and they put it in their medal collection, in their trophy room. He'll never look at it. He won't get that feeling, that memory."
"And that is why I don't think it'll make a difference if these players get a medal because they have lost the moment."
"And when you win things as a footballer, nobody remembers the medals, it's what it felt like; going for a night out with your mates after it, what you did, where you went, the people you bumped into."
"As I said, the referee's final whistle, someone scoring an amazing goal - these are the feelings you can't explain and that is what is special about being a footballer."
"So this thing about giving trophies or medals back. Whether you do it or not, it doesn't mean anything. They have lost that feeling. And it is supporters as well, it's not just players."
City's next game at Anfield
City's next game is a trip to Anfield on October 11, in what is expected to be a white-hot atmosphere. Enzo Maresca's league leaders are aiming to end Andoni Iraola's unbeaten start on Merseyside, but Carragher thinks City's conduct has left many within the game angry.
Carragher, who made 737 appearances for the Reds, added: "Well, one of the biggest problems about what Manchester City have done is the Premier League gets beamed around the world and it's one of the greatest success stories in this country."
"The whole world watches the Premier League, the whole world loves the Premier League and I think that is why everyone is so angry with what Manchester City have done over this last decade."
"But we are never short of drama and that is what makes it so special. So how it has happened that Manchester City are going to Anfield [next] and Liverpool are probably the biggest losers in all of this when you think of that Jurgen Klopp team, missing out on a couple of league titles, probably missing out on being an Invincible as well (in 2018-19), and then to see that City's first game at Anfield, the atmosphere will be electric, as it always would be."
"The last five, six or seven years, Manchester City versus Liverpool has been the game for the Premier League and that is what we have got now. And it's even better that it is at Anfield in terms of drama and atmosphere as well."
"I don't think Liverpool supporters will be shy in letting their counterparts from Manchester know how they all feel. We'll all be watching."
