Manchester City continue to protest their innocence as the Premier League navigate a lengthy appeals process regarding the club's breaches of financial regulations. Away from the pitch, the club's legal battle is making waves, with a top barrister and a Liverpool legend both weighing in on the saga.
City's on-pitch response
Manchester City players showed their focus remains on football as they ran out 3-0 winners over Liverpool at Anfield on Sunday, their first game back after the international break. The Cityzens were met with boos and jeers, with many Liverpool fans brandishing banners referencing how they felt cheated through City's alleged breaches of financial rules spanning 2009 and 2018.
Ryan Gravenberch was sent off in the 62nd minute for a clumsy second yellow card, and the floodgates opened shortly after. Erling Haaland broke the deadlock three minutes later, with Jeremy Doku doubling the lead moments after. Rayan Cherki put the game out of reach with around 10 minutes to play, as City returned to Greater Manchester with all three points.
A £9million decision
As per The Lawyer, Manchester City are being advised by Mark Howard KC in their legal battle with the Premier League. A description on the Head of Brick Court Chambers site reads: "He is widely regarded as one of the leading commercial silks at the bar, and has very wide experience of commercial and 'City' litigation, along with banking, professional negligence, fraud, energy and insurance and reinsurance."
Howard has previously worked with the likes of Roman Abramovich and Elton John, and received £9million to oversee a separate case in 2023 — the highest-known fee ever paid to a barrister in the UK. Everton also engaged Howard to lead their defence following an investigation into their breaches of financial rules, which concluded earlier this year. Those breaches related to the 2021/22 season, with Everton ordered to pay Burnley £35m in compensation after the Clarets suffered relegation that year while Everton survived by just four points.
Two-part punishment demanded
Steven Gerrard has demanded a strong punishment for Manchester City should they lose their appeal. Speaking on the Overlap, the Liverpool legend explained how City need to "suffer" for their alleged wrongdoing. He said: "Multi-year punishments, that would be my opinion. I’m not saying that’s the right opinion, but that’s just how I feel sitting here in this chair."
"I think putting them down to the Championship is not fair on the EFL. I don’t think it’s enough, because they’ll bounce back. You look at that team yesterday. Can you imagine that in the Championship? With all due respect, it’s not fair on the teams playing against City week in, week out. It’s not fair on the potential team that could be the third team to come up."
"I think it needs to be a transfer ban. I think it needs to be points over a period of time. And make them suffer like they’ve made everyone else suffer for the nine, ten years that they’ve done it for. That would be my opinion. But there needs to be an example set."
Warning sent to Premier League
As per the Independent, discussions have already been held between Premier League executives regarding whether Manchester City should be dropped from the English top flight with immediate effect. One senior figure from a top-flight club has argued against such a strict sanction, warning that the alleged breaches have manufactured a 'farcical' situation with the potential to turn 'violent.'
The same report explains that 15 fellow member clubs would need to push to trigger such a vote, given that is the number needed in agreement to vote for expulsion. However, this seems highly unlikely to occur, given divided opinion among clubs.
