MANCHESTER: The Premier League said Tuesday that an independent commission has found Manchester City guilty of all charges tied to serious breaches of the league's financial rules, in what the league's chief executive called the most significant disciplinary case in its history.
Sanctions have not been announced. Under the Premier League handbook, potential punishments include a points deduction, an unlimited fine or expulsion from the league.
City has consistently denied wrongdoing. In a statement Tuesday, the club said it would "pursue the appeal avenues" and is "innocent of the accusations."
The commission found City "arranged 'sham' contracts (which misrepresented the true agreement between the parties) with a number of its commercial partners, as well as relying on 'sham' agreements with others, to artificially inflate the club's revenues and reduce its costs," the league said.
The Premier League published the commission's 40-page document, with multiple sentences and graphs redacted. It covers the 2009-10 through 2017-18 seasons and describes what the league called "strong, cogent evidence" of "serious wrongdoing."
According to the document, City "concealed the true state of its finances." Income across those years was overstated by more than 830 million pounds (over $1 billion), the document said. The club also understated its expenses by tens of millions of dollars.
The league said the schemes were intended to inflate revenue and reduce costs by more than 900 million pounds to make the club appear compliant with financial rules. As a result, the commission found, City filed misstated accounts and hid its true financial position from auditors and football regulators.
The league also accused City of failing to cooperate with the investigation, citing "multiple breaches of its duties of co-operation and utmost good faith towards the League."
City CEO Ferran Soriano struck a defiant tone in an internal video message to staff obtained by CNN. He said the club stands behind "irrefutable evidence" of its innocence and described the accusations as based on "a single false accusation" and a "Premier League conspiracy theory."
Premier League Chief Executive Richard Masters said the decision vindicates the league's pursuit of the alleged hundreds of rule violations.
"This disciplinary case, and this decision, are the most significant in Premier League history," Masters said. "There are elements of the case that remain to be decided, including, importantly, what sanction must follow for these breaches."
The league charged City in February 2023 after an investigation lasting more than four years. The commission held a 42-day hearing that began in September 2024 and ended that December. It said Tuesday that it regretted the time it took to release the evidence publicly.
The league also accused City of failing to comply with UEFA's financial fair play regulations between 2013-14 and 2017-18, and of breaching Premier League profit and sustainability rules between 2015-16 and 2017-18.
City won eight trophies during the period covered by the case: three Premier League titles, three League Cups and one FA Cup. The 2010-11 FA Cup was the club's first major trophy in 35 years, since 1976. The 2011-12 league title was the first of eight Premier League crowns the club has won to date.
Before the hearing began, then-manager Pep Guardiola said he welcomed a resolution. "Everybody is innocent until guilt is proven," Guardiola said. "An independent panel will decide, and I'm looking forward to the decision."
It is not the first time City has faced such allegations. In 2020, UEFA banned the club from European competition for two seasons over "serious breaches" of financial fair play rules. The Court of Arbitration for Sport overturned the ban and cut the accompanying fine from $34 million to $11.3 million, ruling that City had failed to cooperate with UEFA.
