Gary Neville has drawn his line in the sand on the Manchester City case. Fines, points deductions, transfer bans and even taking the Premier League titles back are all on the table. For the former United defender, none of them go far enough.

“The only punishment that would be fair would be have huge consequences, the biggest consequence, would be removing the owners,” Neville said on his Stick to Football podcast.

His intervention lands days after an independent commission ruled that City had systematically broken Premier League rules for nearly a decade. The club was found guilty on 114 of 115 charges relating to breaches between 2009-10 and 2017-18, and the panel concluded that revenue had been inflated by more than £900m through commercial deals it described as sham.

Neville: ‘We’re being dragged through the mud’

Reading parts of the ruling aloud, Neville sounded unsettled.

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“To listen to this, it is chilling. We’re being dragged through the mud!” Neville said, according to the Chester Standard’s reporting of the podcast.

“We always think that we’ve got an enormous integrity, the Premier League. This is now coming to our league,” Neville said.

He pointed to Italy as a warning of how long reputational damage can last, saying the Italian game had suffered immeasurably in the two decades since the Calciopoli scandal, which saw Juventus relegated to Serie B and stripped of league titles.

Carragher wants the Abu Dhabi era closed

Jamie Carragher echoed him the same day, calling for Sheikh Mansour’s group to sell the club.

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“Manchester City are the end of their Abu Dhabi era,” Carragher wrote. “The club can only heal and recover from the shame of their guilt once the custodians recognise they have failed in their duty and sell up.”

City have until Friday to file their appeal

The commission that delivered the ruling was deciding guilt, not punishment. A separate sanctions process will set the penalty, which can run from financial fines through transfer bans and points deductions to stripping titles or expulsion from the Premier League.

City have said they intend to appeal, and under the commission’s own timetable the club must file its challenge by Friday. A new three-person panel will hear it. No date has been set.

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