THE REDS AND GUNNERS JUST HAVE TO WIN THIS TITLE ON THE FIELD

Is the English Premiership over? That’s the question on most people’s lips this week. This after both Arsenal and Liverpool lost at home in freakishly similar ways.

Both dominated large stages of their weekend games and then conceded and were unable to come back. Meanwhile, City just cruised home 5-1 against Luton.

The way things are going it does seem like déjà vu and that the inevitable is going to happen again. And yes, City have won the league in five of the last six years. While City fans are over the moon, many others are looking to every excuse to get back at them.

At my local, after their dismal showings, both Arsenal and Liverpool fans raised the issue of City’s case against the Premiership. It sounds like sour grapes, but what exactly is the Man City story?

Manchester City was not really much of a team before Abu Dhabi royal, Sheikh Mansour, bought the club for £200 million (R4,7 billion) in 2009. In fact, they were borderline bankrupt. However, three years after he took over, Uefa introduced “the financial fair play rule ”.

The rule simply was that a club could not spend more money than they earned. This was created to protect clubs and keep football fair. And then in 2014, Uefa fined nine clubs for breaching this rule and City was one of them. Despite denying they had broken these rules, they paid the €60 million fine.

It then all went away until 2020, when a series of press reports featuring leaked City e-mails, led to another investigation by Uefa.

The entire case was based on over-inflated sponsorship deals.

The leaked mails showed City had concluded deals with sponsors linked to its Abu Dhabi owner.

The sponsors then paid more than the market value and that inflated the club’s income and allowed City to spend more money. This time Uefa charged City with serious breaches of Uefa regulations and banned them from European competition for two seasons.

City took the matter to the Committee for Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and they ruled in City’s favour.

But this was also based on a technicality — some information was presented too late. And this had happened because City had conveniently refused to co-operate with investigators. City was re-instated and to put a finger up Uefa’s nose, they ended runners-up in the Champions League and won the Premiership.

And so finally, the Premiership got the kahunas to challenge City in February 2023.

The charges included the failure to present financial information with specific reference to revenue and sponsorship for the period 2009-18. They were also accused of not providing details of players’ salaries and failing to co-operate with the league’s investigation. Possible sanctions included losing their title, hefty fines or points deductions.

But City continued to deny the charges and subsequently in May 2023 launched their own case against the Premier League — questioning the legality of the process.

So, what does this all mean? It could be years before the issue could be settled. Sorry Liverpool, Arsenal, you have to win this title on the field.