The most damaging part of the verdict against Manchester City is not the accounting entries or the sponsorship inflation. It is the 35 counts of failing to cooperate with the Premier League’s investigation.
That is the reading of Dan Chapman, Managing Partner and Head of Sports Law at law firm Leathes Prior, who spoke to TeamTalk in an exclusive analysis of the outcome. City were reportedly found guilty of 114 of the 115 charges, according to David Ornstein of The Athletic, whose report broke on 25 September. The Premier League has not officially confirmed or published the ruling, and the sanction hearing is still to come, according to further reporting.
Chapman told TeamTalk that the sheer number of obstruction findings makes a purely financial penalty implausible.
“For serious and multiple offences of obstruction, if that is indeed what City have been found guilty of, for the sanction to be only a financial one the precedent that would be set is inconceivable,” he said.
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Speaking separately to Football365, he added that if the commission has taken a “dim view” of City’s failure to comply, he does not see how anything other than a very serious sporting sanction, as well as a huge fine, will be ordered.
What cooperation earned Everton and Forest
The two most recent Premier League points deductions offer the clearest yardstick.
Everton were deducted 10 points in November 2023 after the commission found the club’s Profitability and Sustainability Rules calculation for 2021/22 showed a loss of £124.5m, £19.5m above the £105m threshold. That penalty was reduced to six points on appeal, and a second breach later cost the club another two points.
Nottingham Forest were deducted four points in March 2024 after admitting they had exceeded their £61m allowable loss by £34.5m. The commission expressly noted that Forest had demonstrated “exceptional cooperation” with the Premier League and reduced what would have been a six-point sanction to four in recognition of that.
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35 obstruction counts, over five years
The 35 charges reportedly relate to a failure to cooperate with the Premier League’s investigation between 2018 and 2023, a period that overlapped with the club’s efforts to challenge the initial allegations.
Chapman referenced the Forest case directly in his TeamTalk analysis.
“During the Forest case in 2024 the commission found Forest demonstrated ‘exceptional cooperation’ with the Premier League during the process, yet still imposed the points penalty,” he said.
The sanctions the commission can impose
Under Premier League rules, the sanction commission can impose unlimited fines, points deductions, transfer bans, expulsion from the competition and the annulment of previously awarded titles. There is no fixed tariff linking a specific breach to a specific penalty.
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A separate sanction hearing will now be scheduled, and City are expected to appeal any adverse liability finding within the 14 days allowed under the rules. That appeal would be heard by a three-person board and could delay a published sanction into 2027.
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