The Premier League has issued a statement confirming that an Independent Commission has found Manchester City guilty of all charges relating to serious breaches of the Premier League's financial rules over a nine-season period. The Commission also found the club guilty of the majority of charges relating to its failure to cooperate with the Premier League's investigation.

Premier League Statement

An Independent Commission has found Manchester City Football Club guilty of all charges relating to serious breaches of the Premier League's financial rules over a period covering nine seasons, as well as guilty of the majority of charges relating to the club's failure to cooperate with the Premier League's investigation.

The Independent Commission found that, between the 2009/10 and 2017/18 seasons:

Manchester City entered into "sham" contracts with several commercial partners, which misrepresented the true agreements between the parties, and relied upon other "sham" agreements, artificially inflating the club's revenues and reducing its costs.

The club submitted false accounts and concealed its true financial position from its auditors and football regulators.

Manchester City seriously breached the Premier League's and UEFA's spending restrictions.

During the Premier League's investigation, Manchester City repeatedly breached its obligations to cooperate with the league and to act in the utmost good faith, with three of the four charges being found proven.

The Independent Commission found that Manchester City had entered into "sham" commercial arrangements with several sponsors as part of a concealed funding arrangement under which those companies were required to pay only part of the relevant sponsorship fees. The remainder was funded by Abu Dhabi United Group Investment and Development Limited (ADUG), the owner of the club.

As part of this arrangement, further "sham" agreements funded by ADUG were also entered into, enabling the club to record lower operating expenses than it had actually incurred. There was also a "sham" circular arrangement with Fordham, an entity that purchased the image rights of the club's players, with funding again being provided by ADUG.

The Commission found that the purpose of these arrangements was to artificially increase the club's revenues and reduce its costs by more than £900 million during the relevant period, thereby making the club appear compliant with the financial rules.

As determined by the Commission, the consequence was that the club submitted false accounts and concealed its true financial position from its auditors and football regulators.

The Commission concluded:

"From its conduct, it is clear that the club intended to circumvent the Premier League's rules."

Manchester City therefore failed to accurately report its revenues and expenses for the purposes of the Premier League's Profitability and Sustainability Rules and UEFA's Club Licensing and Financial Fair Play Regulations.

The Commission found that, had all relevant agreements been accurately reported in the club's accounts, Manchester City would have breached the Premier League's and UEFA's spending restrictions by a very substantial margin.

Failure to Cooperate with the Investigation

In addition, during the four-year investigation conducted by the Premier League, the club repeatedly breached its obligations to cooperate with the league and to act in the utmost good faith.

The Commission concluded that the club had "acted in concert to obstruct and impede the Premier League's investigation."

Premier League Chief Executive Richard Masters said:

"The core judgment establishes the truth of what happened at Manchester City during this period. It sets out in detail how the club systematically breached the Premier League's rules over almost a decade.

"It also demonstrates that the Premier League was right to pursue this case against Manchester City. Although the process to date has been lengthy and difficult, the league has remained determined to have the facts independently established.

"A key responsibility of the Premier League is to ensure that the rules approved by the clubs themselves are upheld in order to protect the integrity of the competition. It is vital that the league maintains a competitive and fair environment for all clubs and supporters. We take this responsibility extremely seriously.

"This disciplinary case and this judgment are among the most significant in the history of the Premier League. There remain matters to be determined, most importantly what sanctions these breaches should result in. Now that we have the Commission's judgment, we are committed to progressing the remaining stages swiftly in order to provide certainty for the league, our clubs and our supporters."

The findings of the Independent Commission are contained in a "Core Judgment", an anonymised and redacted version of which has been published.

The Commission's judgment consists of the Core Judgment together with a substantial number of appendices. The Premier League has committed to publishing these documents as soon as it is able to do so.

Final Determination and Right of Appeal

The Premier League is able to publish the Core Judgment because the Commission has determined, and the Appeal Board has confirmed, that the Commission's decision constitutes a "Final Decision."

As the charges have now been proven, the issue of sanctions will be dealt with at a further hearing before the Independent Commission.

Under the Premier League's rules, that hearing will remain private and confidential until such time as the outcome is permitted to be published.

The club has the right to appeal the findings of the Independent Commission and may exercise that right by Friday, 2 October.

The Premier League Board intends to complete the entire process as soon as possible, including any appeal and the publication of any related decisions.

Premier League Investigation and Independent Commission Proceedings

The Premier League began its investigation into Manchester City in December 2018 and subsequently issued a complaint under Rule W of the Premier League Rules in February 2023.

The Independent Commission held a hearing lasting 42 days, which concluded in December 2024.

Explaining why it had taken so long to provide its decision to the parties, the Independent Commission stated:

"We have taken considerably longer to produce our decision than we would have wished, and longer than we anticipated at the conclusion of the hearing. This is regrettable.

"However, throughout the preparation of our decision, we have had the benefit of access not only to all of the documents used at the hearing, but also to (a) the verbatim transcripts of the evidence given by every witness and expert at the hearing. These transcripts amounted to approximately 7,000 pages, and (b) extremely detailed written submissions from the parties on the evidence and each of the numerous issues that we were required to determine in these proceedings, supplemented by four days of oral submissions at the conclusion of the hearing."

Premier League Investigation, Independent Commission and Appeal Board

The Premier League Board has the authority to investigate any suspected or alleged breach of the Premier League Rules.

Following an investigation, or otherwise, where the Board considers that there is a suspected or alleged breach of the rules, it has several options available to it. One such option is to issue a written complaint and refer the matter to a Commission.

The Premier League has established an independent judicial panel consisting of a number of legal, financial and other experts.

Members of the judicial panel are appointed by its independent Chair. The Chair of the judicial panel also selects the members of the independent Commission, which operates independently of the Premier League. At the time the complaint in these proceedings was issued, the Chair of the judicial panel was Murray Rosen KC. The current Chair of the judicial panel is Sir Gary Hickinbottom.

All proceedings convened under Rule W are confidential and are conducted in private.

Commissions appointed under Rule W have broad discretion in relation to the sanctions they may impose. The non-exhaustive list of sanctions set out in the rules includes fines, points deductions and other sporting sanctions.

Whenever a Commission makes what is described in the rules as a "Final Decision", that decision is published on the Premier League website.

A party wishing to challenge a Commission's decision may appeal under Rule W of the Premier League Rules, with the appeal being heard by an Appeal Board.

The Appeal Board is also appointed by the Chair of the judicial panel and must consist of three members, one of whom must have held judicial office and serve as Chair of the Appeal Board.

The Appeal Board has broad discretion in relation to an appeal and may allow the appeal, dismiss the appeal, or make any other order it considers appropriate, including varying the Commission's order.

For further information regarding the disciplinary process, please refer to Rule W of the Premier League Handbook.

Confidentiality

The disciplinary proceedings between the Premier League and the club have remained confidential in accordance with the Premier League Rules.

The Premier League Rules provide for the publication of the outcome of a Commission's Final Decision.

It has recently been determined that certain aspects of the Commission's findings in these proceedings may be published under the Premier League Rules.

At this stage, the Premier League has only been permitted to publish a redacted version of a summary of the Commission's "Core Findings."

The proceedings remain ongoing, and any further information relating to the proceedings that has not yet been published by the Premier League remains confidential. When the Premier League is permitted to do so under its rules — unless legally prohibited — it will publish the full judgment and any further updates. In the meantime, all aspects of the ongoing proceedings will remain confidential.