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    "original_url": "https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/7643269\/2026\/09\/29\/manchester-city-verdict-charges-premier-league\/?emc=edit_ufn_20260930&nl=from-the-times&segment_id=227293",
    "parsed_content": "Manchester City have been found guilty of \u201csham payments\u201d and artificially inflating their revenue and reducing their costs by more than \u00a3900million ($1.19bn) in a damning verdict reached by an independent regulatory commission investigating more than 100 charges levied by the Premier League.The Premier League confirmed on Tuesday that, as revealed by The Athletic on Friday, the club had been found guilty of almost all charges \u2014 including the most serious breaches of the league\u2019s financial regulations \u2014 between 2009 and 2018.After a regulatory process lasting almost two years, it is a devastating verdict, with the club\u2019s hierarchy found guilty of \u201cartificially inflating\u201d its revenues in moves \u201cclearly intended to circumvent\u201d the Premier League\u2019s financial regulations.City were found to have overstated revenues by \u00a3855.2m and understated expenses by \u00a366.2m by the commission.The Manchester club, which has won eight Premier League titles since being bought by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan in 2008, has also been found guilty of multiple breaches of its \u201cduties of cooperation and utmost good faith\u201d.It leaves the club facing severe sanctions, which are to be decided by at a further hearing of the commission, the Premier League said.The league said City have the right to appeal the findings of the independent commission and has until Friday, October 2 to do so. City confirmed they would appeal in a statement published shortly after the Premier League\u2019s announcement, \u201con the basis that the opinion contains clear material errors, of law, principle and fact, and is unsafe\u201d.What do other Premier League clubs think of Manchester City?Nnamdi OnyeagwaraCity said they were \u201cdisappointed and surprised by the opinion of the Premier League commission, that has been published today.\u201cThe club is innocent of the accusations made by the Premier League and a comprehensive body of irrefutable evidence exists in support of all of its positions, relating to this case. The club will therefore be relentless, and where necessary proactive, in any and all appropriate regulatory and legal forums.\u201dPremier League chief executive Richard Masters claimed vindication of the decision to pursue a case against City for irregularities which were discovered by a Portuguese computer hacker and first revealed by German magazine Der Spiegel in 2018.Masters added that \u201cthis case, and this decision, are the most significant in Premier League history. There are elements of the case that remain to be decided, including, importantly, what sanction must follow for these breaches.\u201cNow we have the commission\u2019s decision, we are committed to moving swiftly through the remainder of the process, to provide certainty for the league, our clubs and fans.\u201dHow City reactedAnalysis by Manchester City correspondent Sam LeeShortly after the Premier League and Manchester City released their statements relating to the independent commission\u2019s findings, a video was sent to City staff aiming to reassure employees about the next steps.It showed CEO Ferran Soriano insisting that the club had given \u2018irrefutable evidence\u2019 to the commission which proved that sponsorship income was paid entirely by the sponsors.\n \n \n \n Soriano also vowed that the club would take all possible action to overturn the commission\u2019s decision and appeared confident that they will be able to do so.City were very strong in their statement and continue to stress that they have been wronged, though the details of the commission\u2019s decision appear extremely damning and will surely bring the harshest of punishments.City, clearly, will continue to fight this as far as possible and a messy saga looks set to continue.\u2018Damning conclusions drawn about City hierarchy\u2019Analysis by senior football writer Oliver KayHowever damaging anyone imagined the commission\u2019s verdict might be for City, the statement issued by the Premier League was so much more damning.Not only has the club been found guilty of all but one among the more than 100 charges it faced, but the language used by the commission \u2014 \u201csham contracts\u201d, \u201csham agreements\u201d, \u201cartificially inflate\u201d, \u201cmisstated accounts\u201d, \u201cconcealed\u201d, \u201cclearly intended to circumvent the Premier League rules\u201d, \u201cmultiple breaches of its duties of cooperation and utmost good faith\u201d \u2014 is devastating for the image of both the club and, significantly, its ownership in Abu Dhabi.City are expected to appeal and sanctions will follow. Judging by the tone of the commission\u2019s conclusions, it will recommend the severest penalties. Points deductions? Expulsion from the Premier League? Nothing will be off the table now.So much of the public conversation since Friday, when The Athletic revealed the scale of City\u2019s defeat at the hands of the commission, has focused on whether the club\u2019s successes over the past 15 years might be expunged from the record books, whether some of those eight Premier League titles might be reallocated, and whether those clubs who have missed out might pursue compensation cases against City.But the matter can now be seen to be more than just requiring a reappraisal of recent history.The conclusions drawn about the City hierarchy are so damning not just in how, according to Masters, \u201cthe club systematically broke Premier League rules for nearly a decade\u201d but also in how, in the words of the commission, the club committed \u201cadditional and perhaps more egregious acts of non-cooperation by making inaccurate, dishonest and\/or misleading statements\u201d during the arbitration process.So much of this is pinned on \u201cthe club\u201d. But the deceit and dishonesty are about individuals working for a club that is owned by Sheikh Mansour, the vice president and deputy prime minister of the United Arab Emirates, a powerful figure on the world stage. To be clear, there is no indication that Sheikh Mansour had any direct involvement in what City have been accused of, but whatever reflected glory this acquisition has brought to Abu Dhabi, the commission\u2019s verdict has now brought the opposite for both the club and its ownership.How does the appeal process work?Analysis by managing editor Sian HarrisonCity have until Friday to appeal against the decision, indicating the club was given the ruling on September 18, as Premier League rules allow 14 days to lodge a challenge.According to the rules, either party may appeal to a fresh, three-member commission appointed by the league\u2019s judicial panel. Any appeal hearing \u2014 which is a review of the original verdict and not a full rehearing \u2014 is limited to five days and must be completed within 12 weeks of the appeal being lodged, with a decision due no later than 30 days after the hearing\u2019s conclusion.After the appeal process has been exhausted, either party may also consider an arbitration challenge to a further panel, but these can only be made on limited grounds. Any further challenge could be brought in the commercial division of the High Court, but only against an arbitration decision.What the findings tell us about City\u2019s financesAnalysis by The Athletic\u2019s Chris WeatherspoonCity\u2019s total commercial revenues over the period in question, 2009-10 to 2017-18, were \u00a31.335billion. Of that, per the independent commission\u2019s report, \u00a3949.9m was attributable to Abu-Dhabi based sponsors, or 71 per cent.Within that \u00a3949.9m, the commission found that just \u00a3119.3m was paid by those sponsors with the remaining \u00a3830.7m paid by City owners, ADUG.Stripping out ADUG\u2019s payments, but leaving the amounts actually paid by those sponsors, would have left City\u2019s commercial revenues over the period at \u00a3398.7m. That figure would have been the sixth-most in England across that time: around \u00a3200m higher than seventh-best Aston Villa, but over \u00a3100m behind the next-lowest of the \u2018Big Six\u2019 clubs, Tottenham Hotspur.City were adjudged to have overstated revenues in the period by \u00a3855.2m: \u00a3830.7m in disguised sponsorship payments from ADUG, and a further \u00a324.5m from Fordham, a purported third party which the commission described as \u201clittle more than a front for ADUG\u201d.The size of that overstatement is staggering on its own and even more so in context. At \u00a3855.2m, City\u2019s overstated revenues were more than the total revenues in the same period of every English football club bar eight: the other \u2018Big Six\u2019 teams, Everton, West Ham and Newcastle United.Furthermore, City were found to have misstated finances by \u00a3921.4m over nine seasons, a mix of \u00a3855.2m in revenue overstatements and \u00a366.2m in expenditure understatements, whereby ADUG covered costs that went unreported in City\u2019s accounts.City received \u00a31.287bn in correctly reported funding from ADUG between the 2008 takeover and the end of the 2017-18 season but, at least in the club\u2019s accounts, owner funding largely ceased after 2014-15.The commission report makes clear that, in reality, huge sums kept flowing. Combined, across the previously reported equity and the disguised sponsorship and other payments detailed today, City received \u00a32.209bn in owner funding during their first 10 years under Abu Dhabi ownership.\nOliver Kay|Football WriterFollow Sam Lee|Manchester City CorrespondentFollow Sep 30, 2026Connections: Sports EditionSpot the pattern. Connect the termsFind the hidden link between sports termsPlay today's puzzleWhat did you think of this story?MEHSOLIDAWESOME",
    "published_at": "2026-09-29T21:51:43+00:00",
    "author_name": "Nnamdi Onyeagwara, Sam Lee, Oliver Kay, Sian Harrison, Chris Weatherspoon",
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    "ai_headline": "Manchester City found guilty of \u2018sham payments\u2019 and inflating revenue by \u00a3900m in damning Premier League verdict",
    "ai_simplified_title": "Manchester City found guilty of financial breaches by Premier League",
    "ai_excerpt": "Manchester City has been found guilty of 'sham payments' and artificially inflating revenue by over \u00a3900 million by an independent regulatory commission. The club faces severe sanctions and plans to appeal the 'devastating verdict'.",
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