Premier League Confirms Manchester City Have Been Found Guilty of 114 of 115 Financial Charges, and Could Now Face Relegation

• Manchester City have been found guilty of 114 of the 115 charges brought against them by the Premier League in February 2023 for breaching financial rules between 2009 and 2018.
• The independent panel has not yet decided on sanctions, which range from a fine to a heavy points deduction, expulsion or the stripping of titles, and City intend to appeal.
• Rival clubs including Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal are already said to be assessing what the ruling could mean for prize money and finishes they missed out on in that period.

A Points Deduction Severe Enough to Threaten Relegation Is Now on the Table

Manchester City have been found guilty of all but one of the 115 charges brought against them by the Premier League in February 2023, according to reporting from the Athletic’s David Ornstein. The charges cover financial breaches the league alleges took place between the 2009-10 and 2022-23 seasons, with the most serious accusations centred on false accounting around sponsorship revenue, payments involving related parties and operating costs. No sanction has been decided. City intend to appeal.

The scale of the case sets it apart from anything English football has dealt with before. Everton were docked six points and Nottingham Forest four for single breaches of profit and sustainability rules in the 2023-24 season, both comparatively narrow cases next to the 115 charges levelled at City. Chelsea were fined and given a suspended transfer ban after effectively reporting themselves over irregular payments made under the club’s previous ownership, and cooperated with investigators throughout. City did neither. The club denied every charge and did not cooperate in the way Chelsea did, according to legal experts who have followed the case, which makes leniency far less likely when sanctions are eventually set.

That is why a squad built around Erling Haaland could now be staring at a points deduction heavy enough to make relegation probable rather than a remote possibility. The Premier League’s Richard Masters will oversee submissions on what sanction the league believes should follow, after which City’s lawyers can argue for a lighter outcome. Both sides will make their case to the same independent panel that delivered the verdict.

Titles Could Carry an Asterisk Without Ever Being Formally Removed

Whether City’s titles from the period in question would be stripped is unresolved. A case exists for treating every result between 2009 and 2018 as void, on the basis that the financial advantage the club is accused of manufacturing helped build the squad that went on to dominate English football for the following decade, culminating in the 2023 treble. A competing case holds that what happens on the pitch cannot retroactively be undone.

Pep Guardiola addressed the question directly back in 2023, before the verdict was known. “Come on! Those moments belong to us, regardless of the sentence,” he said. “Think about what we’ve done… that goal from Sergio Aguero against QPR; nobody can remove that. I don’t know, are we responsible for Steven Gerrard slipping at Anfield?” City were not responsible for that slip. What they are alleged to have been responsible for is the financial breach that put Manuel Pellegrini’s side in a position to take advantage of it in the first place.

Former Liverpool midfielder Danny Murphy has made a similar point from the other side, arguing that the memories themselves cannot be taken away no matter what happens to the medals. Jurgen Klopp, whose Liverpool side finished second to City in 2018-19 and 2021-22, said before the verdict that he would get the beers in and hold a parade in his own back garden for his old players if City were found guilty.

Rivals Are Already Working Out What the Missed Prize Money Cost Them

The financial fallout stretches well past City’s own accounts. Manchester United, who finished second to City three times across the period under review, are reported to be assessing the economic impact of the breaches on their own earnings, and Liverpool and Arsenal are expected to look at the same question. City are also alleged to have denied other clubs top-four finishes that would have brought Champions League qualification and the prize money attached to it. Working out what that is worth in lost revenue is not simple, and any compensation claims would likely take years to resolve alongside City’s own appeal. Arsenal, who lost out on two Premier League titles to City across the period, are believed to be looking at the same numbers.

That is the wider problem the Premier League now has to manage. Whatever sanction is eventually applied to City, the league’s own credibility over an 18-year period is tied up in how it is seen to handle the biggest financial misconduct case in the sport’s history. A fine and a token points deduction would be read by every rival fanbase as proof the rules only bite when convenient. A points deduction severe enough to send City down would be without precedent for a reigning force of this size, and would guarantee years of legal argument regardless of what the panel decides.

City have continued to deny all wrongdoing throughout the process, and nothing about their trophies or their record has been erased at this stage. But the guilty finding on 114 of 115 charges leaves the club facing a sanctions hearing with far higher stakes than the two comparable Premier League cases of the last two seasons, at a time when Haaland’s side are still trying to compete at the top of the table under the shadow of a case that has run for more than three years.

Guardiola’s Own Position Has Never Wavered

Guardiola has managed the club through the entire case, from the original charges in February 2023 to the verdict now being reported. He has repeatedly told reporters he trusts the club’s version of events and has no plans to leave regardless of the outcome. His squad, built around Haaland, Rodri’s long-term successor and a rebuilt midfield, is still competing at the top of the Premier League table this season, unaware for now of what sanction awaits once the appeal process concludes.

That uncertainty is itself a problem for a club trying to plan recruitment, wages and long-term strategy. A points deduction handed down mid-season, rather than applied at the start of a campaign the way Everton and Forest’s sanctions were, would scramble a title race and a relegation battle at the same time. The Premier League has never had to work out how to apply a sanction of this scale to a club sitting inside the top four while the case against it was still being finalised.

Other Leagues Are Watching How England Handles This

The case has been followed outside England too, given the scale of City’s global ownership model under the City Football Group. A guilty verdict of this size, if it results in meaningful sanctions, would be read across European football as evidence that state-backed ownership projects are not immune from domestic regulation, however deep the resources behind them. A verdict that produces only a fine would send the opposite message, and rival leagues that are reviewing their own financial fair play frameworks are likely to take note of which way English football goes.

For City’s own supporters, the mood described by those close to the club has shifted between defiance and exhaustion over the three years the case has run. Chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak wrote to fans and chief executive Ferran Soriano warning that the process could still take years to conclude even now a verdict has been reported, a message that suggests the club itself does not expect a swift resolution to the appeal.

What Happens Next

The independent panel now moves to hearing submissions on sanctions from both the Premier League and City’s legal team. City have confirmed they will appeal whatever punishment is handed down, meaning a final resolution is unlikely for some time yet. Until then, every result Manchester City have recorded over the past decade sits under a guilty verdict that neither side disputes was reached, even as the two sides fight over what should happen next.