Not complying with PL rules doesn't necessarily mean not complying with HMRC rules
City and Financial Doping | Charged by PL with numerous FFP breaches | Hearing begins 16th September 2024
- Thread starter VanGaalEra
- Start date
Bang on the money
If City only get a slap on the hand after all this allegations, then you now the integrity of the PL is gone and a Super League should be established with no oil money clubs. This is a real test for the PL.
If player's income were paid under the table, surely it was a matter of tax evasion since their income must be subjected/calculated under UK tax law.
Hope PL are prepared for time barred loophole.
The chances any punishment is retrospective are minimal.
As nice as it is to see City's name get muddied up yet again I'm not getting my hopes up there will be any severe punishment. We've seem them wriggle out of these sorts of allegations before and I'm sure they'll do it again.
I hope the Premier League has a stronger case than the UEFA one the other year but I'm not getting excited.
I hope the Premier League has a stronger case than the UEFA one the other year but I'm not getting excited.
Ah now.
That 80m was because Pep wanted him. City should take the blame for Maguire, Sanchez, Fred and Ronaldo. It's only fair.
Probably true to some degree...
What's interesting about this is it's got nothing to do with fairness.
It's just about the same clubs being locked in to the top of football forever. No one being allowed to come in like Jack Walker, Abramovich or Abu Dhabi and build a club up.
City just took it to the extreme.
If you want a fair league, a squad level salary cap is the answer. Not these ridiculous FFP rules.
No one broke the market more than Chelsea when Roman took over and now with Boehly taking over. But like Roman's businesses it was all above board.
Boehly isn’t doing anything crazy - he’s just spreading payments over a massively long time (so FFP just changed the rules specifically for him).
They'll get a fine, pay some back hands to top brass for their second homes/Swimming Pools/boats and all will go back to normal.
What are you talking about? The league has never been so open.
The only reason why it’s been a closed shop competitive wise is due to fecking City and their cheating. Every club in England are rich, Brighton spend very little and are fighting for a CL spot while you spent 600m and are 10th.
Youre rehashing a shit argument from 2011
Gonorrehea?
If you've sold to them at the prices they've inflated the market by, or buy off them at reduced rates and are a resource they've struck up a good, working relationship with, you'll have a vested interest in them staying where they are as it hurts your pockets having them written off or out the picture entirely.
Those clubs will be in the minority, or might even have a different dynamic to what they used to (Arsenal, for example), mind.
FDJ seemingly available for 75 mil in the summer while Boehly spends 120 mil on a less proven player. Seems pretty crazy to me. But that is for another thread.
Does anyone really want that? There’s no glory in having a few titles added to our haul retroactively. We never celebrated them then and we won’t now.
Wether those titles are removed from them, and not reallocated, is also immaterial. They are tainted in the eyes of everyone.
What is important now is that City are made an example of. A monetary penalty is not a punishment, it’s a tax and just will not do.
They need to have a significant sporting punishment. Like a huge points penalty and demotion and their accounts under audit or placed under a form of special administration to ensure they don’t go back to their old ways.
It's funny that I despise Liverpool more than I ever will City, and yet if I had to pick a club to send into oblivion it would be City every time. Not a scrap of respect for them, a shell of a club.
City have always been irrelevant. Even in a thread about how none of their success means anything, their fans are getting out-meltdowned by Chelsea fans. Up your delusional game lads!
Fully agree.
Liverpool deserve to be where they are - I respect them. City are a joke club
It's called respect.
Liverpool are our rivals because they earned it. City are a financially doped small city rival.
Setting aside the final outcome, it will be interesting to see the effect of the allegations on the pitch right now.
Look at the sheer scale of the charges. Players, manager, owners; they were/are all complicit in the cheating and wage fraud, which should by rights bring them to the attention of HMRC.
There’s got to be some worried players over at City. The club cannot loophole them all out of trouble.
Look at the sheer scale of the charges. Players, manager, owners; they were/are all complicit in the cheating and wage fraud, which should by rights bring them to the attention of HMRC.
There’s got to be some worried players over at City. The club cannot loophole them all out of trouble.
All the players and staff would file personal tax returns. The tax on their salaries that they submit to the Premier League would be paid via PAYE correctly.
Any money outside what the Premier League knows about would be paid from a third party company, either as a dividend to the player themselves or, more likely, paid to a service company owned by the player - their personal tax affairs would then be handled via that company.
I’m an accountant and I’ve dealt with a Premier League footballer before, his image rights were paid by the club to a company he owned. I don’t know if this is what happens across the board because he’s the only one I’ve dealt with but I imagine it is because it’s within the rules and the cheapest way from a tax perspective
It used to be the case that footballer’s entire earnings were paid this way until HMRC took Leeds to court about 10-12 years ago. They forced at least the salary part of a contract to be paid by PAYE because the players should be treated as employees.
What it appears City are doing is just using a separate company for the non-employee earnings. All tax will be correctly paid, HMRC would’ve been involved years ago if not, and none of it is illegal so this is just a Premier League rules issue because it’s not on the books of the company they base FFP on.
For what it’s worth I wouldn’t want to see City relegated over this. For one, I disagree with the whole premise of FFP, the idea is nonsense in my opinion but the bigger reason is that two less derbies per season just makes football less fun. All United’s rivals should be in the same league to keep it interesting.
A two year transfer ban would be funny though.
City were spending crazy money way before the likes of KDB and Bernado Silva. I'd love to see the numbers of your spend compared to ours over the first few years of your takeover. You spent an insane amount despite being nobodies, made yourselves competitive and from then on the genie was out of the bottle and teams had to spend like crazy to remain competitive. The idea that you didn't influence the madness of the transfer market is completely delusional.
What is it with Chelsea fans and completely missing the point here? Instead we get the random variant "you are just jealous of their success" and that you don't care that clubs are doing illegal stuff to compete. And not just illegal under FFP but in company law in general.
The only club with a set of fans who brag about having an 'army of lawyers'. The fact they have an army of lawyers is a massive red flag. Im guessing the irony is lost on City fans who at the same time brag about having an army of lawyers, whilst also playing the victims
They need to be relegated. I mean how can they not be, they have cheated in the premier league for over a decade.
The PL needs to set an example. Because if they dont, the integrity of the Premier League is called into question.
They need to be relegated. I mean how can they not be, they have cheated in the premier league for over a decade.
The PL needs to set an example. Because if they dont, the integrity of the Premier League is called into question.
Not to go off topic but you quote 1 transfer out of numerous. Every other transfer made was at current market value. With the exception of Cucurella possibly. You can be mad we bought a lot of players but we didn’t break an already broken market.
I mean the £70+m for Fofana and the £88m for Mudryk stand out as not market value. Or the £70+m for Kepa and Havertz…
Documents will be shredded and forged, people will be bought, nothing substantial will come out of this, I bet.
At worst - a transfer ban for a window or two and some "huge" fine.
At worst - a transfer ban for a window or two and some "huge" fine.
They talk about the right (wrong in this case ) place at the right/ wrong time.
Despite what most think about the matter there is a vast difference between overspending and keeping accurate records as opposed to overspending and not reporting things accuratey.
Some of the charges levelled are subjective such as not fully assisting in any investigation others such as the claim re hidden managerial payments will be a matter of fact.
Of course City and their fans are feeling a little wounded and claims to being singled out although to a degree are understandable those objections won’t wash with other clubs or of course other supporters.
I was always told that targets drive behaviour and that of course is what FFP and the Premier Leagues sustainability rules appear to have done here. This it seems isn’t about pushing boundaries or finding what some describe as “ loopholes “this it seems is a full on assault and disregard and contempt of the rules.
I read in Bluemoon that some believe their innocence is clear because the likes of HMRC haven’t been all over this. I was employed by the Inland Revenue/ HMRC for all my working life and whilst they may or may not as yet have an open investigation believe me they will at some point be talking to Cities accounts and quite possibly the likes of Companies House will at some point poke their heads above the parape!
Some are linking our transfer spend in the same breath . Some are suggest our accounts are “ dodgy “ . Well there are vast differences
1) Our sponsors were always have never been linked with the past owner.I always thought the likes of Gazpron for instance would be but they never were.
2) Our sponsors have never been out of step indeed some believe this income stream has never been exploited
3) Bohley and his partners completed a deep dive into the financial records at time of their takeover and did uncover some accounting issues so under went voluntary disclosure with the PL and HMRC
I was involved in football administration albeit at a non league level false accounting and believe me the making of undisclosed payments is rife in football. In my opinion it’s why a wage cap would be a futile exercise.
From directors who own their own companies employing a players wife or a brown bag full of £10 notes appearing in the post or even a sponsorship suddenly being invented to fund the education of a players child I have heard of things at non league level that would make your hair curl.
Having said all that I am lapping it all up. Does that make me a wicked person ?
I’ll take your bet
Thanks.
Different things to Juve shennenigans.
Fofana was the price that Leicester were prepared to sell for. Remember Harry M. Mudryk hasn’t yet cost £88m he could be with add ons but not at this point in time
Kepa technically wasnt a transfer his buy out was paid ( by the player ) and yes I know he would have been reimbursed and Havertz still hasn’t developed into the player he could be.
Exactly. Hate them and in the same time respect them.
CIty was always irrelevant and their titles too. Now it might be official that they won it based on fraud.
The problem with that argument is that the allegations being thrown at City are not just about the costs base. But the artificial inflating of their revenues. Having a salary cap won't stop any artificial revenue inflation or falsely created revenue streams.
How come PL acted now and let it all happen all those years.
Yea if found guilty of cheating in previous years it’s hard to then say but the title remains there’s. A guilty verdict in any given season and I think the right thinking world will deem that season a forfeit anyway. Like letting Michael Johnson keep his gold medal.
Maybe they were gathering more detailed information/evidence after UEFA botched up their case?