Man City banned from Champions League for 2 years

[phonics]

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hahahahahahaha. No wonder Pep wanted out.

[Waffdon]

Saves them the bother of another QF exit.

[Pleb]

Amazing.

[Yevrah]

It'll be appealed, no?

[Disco]

You can almost hear the fivers being stuffed into brown envelopes.

[Ian]

I for one refuse to believe they're guilty of any wrongdoing.

[Pleb]

So who gets their Champions League spot next season? :sherlock:

[bruhnaldo]

lmaooooooooooooooooooooo

[Smjffy]

:D It couldn't have happened to a nicer club. If the inevitable appeal fails then there's no way Guardiola is going to stick around, surely?

[Pleb]

He'll throw a massive MELTDOWN and fuck off back to Barca or something.

[Spikey M]

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Lol

[bruhnaldo]

So long as this doesn't spur them on to winning it this year :drool:

[John]

The spot should just transfer to fifth, shouldn't it?

If they appeal and lose I'd expect them to go fucking tonto on signings next year. A few of their better players will be getting over the hill by the time that's up, and if they're banned anyway the annual spending doesn't matter so they'll be able to go mad in one season then bring the average down so they stay under the three year limit. Wouldn't be surprised if they went and signed Mbappe on the promise of a mental wage and a real push for the CL when they get back in.

Although I also wouldn't be surprised if De Bruyne forces his way out. He's good enough to win the thing elsewhere, and he'll be thirty one by the time he gets to play in it again if he stays at City.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I think this is UEFA going to war with the big clubs more than it is anything specifically to do with Man City. It's a war that needs to happen.

[Jimmy Floyd]

On a more selfish note, does this open up 5th place for the CL?

[Smjffy]

It would be pretty special to see Sheffield United participate at Man City's expense.

[phonics]

I think this is UEFA going to war with the big clubs more than it is anything specifically to do with Man City. It's a war that needs to happen.

Think they would have done the same to PSG but the leaked e-mails from Man City make this one easier to prosecute.

If it does go to fifth, Arsenal are 5 points off Champions League places. It's happening.

[Lewis]

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:lol:

[randomlegend]

They're appealing it so the punishment will get delayed and not apply this season I'd imagine.

[Kikó]

:D It couldn't have happened to a nicer club. If the inevitable appeal fails then there's no way Guardiola is going to stick around, surely?

Dunno. Could happen to Liverpool.

[Lofty]

I'm sure there was a reported statement from City's chief exec and repeated by Big Bazza Glendenning basically saying 'lol if you consider banning us from europe we will hire the most expensive legal team ever assembled and destroy you' so the outcomes are either UEFA capitulates, or City accelerate the new super league project.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Football at the moment seems to be a strange and increasingly bitter tripartite war between UEFA, Fifa, and the Big Clubs. All of them are desperate not only for the moolah but to control all the ways of making the moolah. It's a sort of arms race to secure all the dollar bills, because whoever doesn't race for 100% of the cash will be eaten by the others who are. Until now things have functioned reasonably smoothly, because they all need each other: UEFA needs the Big Clubs, FIFA needs at the very least their players, and the Big Clubs need the platform of UEFA's and to a lesser extent FIFA's competitions - until, that is, they decide that they don't.

If every such episode in the history of sport is a guide, it will end up with the Big Clubs winning easily and either getting to dictate terms to UEFA and FIFA in perpetuity, or just fucking them off and going it alone.

[niko_cee]

It's a bit of a tricky one. On one level this is probably richly deserved, City (and PSG) have obviously taken the piss with their sponsorship arrangements since forever, but, on the other hand, FFP is a crock of shit designed to protect and entrench the rich and powerful clubs as they were circa its invention. There's no obvious solution so maybe this is the best they can do. For all their bluster City don't have the clout to form a breakaway league. The other big English clubs aren't going to abandon the Premier League so the super league falls at the first hurdle. Much like the Atlantic League of whatever it was going to be for all the 'big' tier two (and lower) nation clubs. Football is a national game primarily, and thus will it remain.

[Kikó]

I'm looking forward to the retrospective Liverpool title win taking the gloss off this years canter.

[niko_cee]

United might get one back too for the 'centurion' season. That'd be beyond funny.

/notgoingtohappen

[Disco]

Football is the one sport that doesn't need a closed league system yet some of the clubs seem so very desperate for one.

[Manc]

Not a real club. Get rid of this lot then PSG.

[niko_cee]

Add De Bruyne to my 'cheeky bid for Laporte' list from a few weeks ago.

[Gray Fox]

I do like how their #TaintedTitle talk has now come full circle.

[Spikey M]

The only reasonable decision would be to swap them directly with whichever team is second from bottom in League 1. Players, finances, the works.

[niko_cee]

I like the fact that City (fans) are so desperate to drag Liverpool into this 'UEFA big club conspiracy', referencing their participation in the 2006 Champions League (a problem caused by the stubbornness of the Premier League as much as anything seeing as there was actual precedent for a defending champion [Real Madrid] participating albeit at the expense of the lowest placed League entrant from Spain [ironically Villareal who knocked Everton out in the qualifiers that season]) as evidence, as, presumably, they don't really fit the 'we need to be allowed to outspend these established commercial giants' narrative very well (being as they were basically bankrupt and hadn't been relevant at a Eurpoean level for years when FFP came in).


The only reasonable decision would be to swap them directly with whichever team is second from bottom in League 1. Players, finances, the works.

You say that, but I've seen some fairly outlandish suggestions that they could be relegated to League 2 for gypping the Premier League version of FFP. Make it so (number 1).