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Naughty Emirates Marketing Project - Spot of Compo??

robp135 said:
It will be political suicide for any Politician to be seen as pro City.
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Yeah, I’m actually not worried that Burnham is actually going to do anything here either. His comments were just extremely ill judged. Very odd. But there’s nothing he can do. One, the government has no power over an independent panel. Two, if it ever leaked that anyone was putting pressure on, it’s career suicide. Three, the wider UAE has defence and security partnerships with the UK and wants the UK for its prestige, as a place to set down their wealth, their property, legitimacy from us. We certainly get things too, in terms of investment, but it’s tough to see the UAE spending actual diplomatic capital to pressure Burnham seriously because he actually can’t do anything.

City is a soft power asset for them. It’s not the whole country. They’ll kick and scream and claim they were misunderstood and the world is against them but they are getting punished.
 
SissokoWasGood (BoL) said:
Yeah, I’m actually not worried that Burnham is actually going to do anything here either. His comments were just extremely ill judged. Very odd. But there’s nothing he can do. One, the government has no power over an independent panel. Two, if it ever leaked that anyone was putting pressure on, it’s career suicide. Three, the wider UAE has defence and security partnerships with the UK and wants the UK for its prestige, as a place to set down their wealth, their property, legitimacy from us. We certainly get things too, in terms of investment, but it’s tough to see the UAE spending actual diplomatic capital to pressure Burnham seriously because he actually can’t do anything.

City is a soft power asset for them. It’s not the whole country. They’ll kick and scream and claim they were misunderstood and the world is against them but they are getting punished.
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These countries don't buy football teams for footballing success.........a conversation that goes back last year

DubaiSpur said:
True, but nobody truly wealthy invests in football to make money off it. That approach is restricted to relative small timers like Levy and Lewis, who are the proverbial pound shop two-bit halibut swimming in a pool of much bigger sharks, billionaires-wise.

Mostly, investors in football use it as a signalling and influence-buying exercise. Qatar invests in PSG because it secures an audience with the French government, which then leads to favorable geopolitical alignment on issues of import (see: them buying Dassault Rafale fighter aircraft).

Saudis invest in Saudi Sportswashing Machine as a way to get the ear of the British government, and also to ensure widespread support in Saudi Sportswashing Machine itself for their wider plans for real estate investment in and around the city.

Football is basically a signaller for intent, for those with wealth to spare. This would be especially true for anyone buying Spurs, a relative blue-chip club for a blue-chip price in the capital of the UK. Buying Spurs gets you instant access to a lot of UK politicians due to the significance of the Premier League.
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DubaiSpur said:
That's fair. Personally I'm resigned to the fact that being a pawn in grander geopolitical games is the future of nearly all clubs in the Premier League. No other way to compete, unless you luck out and get a rich American that wants to win for his ego, like Stan Kroenke at Arsenal.

Countries see British clubs (and European clubs more broadly) as good investments to promote influence over key decision makers. This is the reality of the UK (and Europe more broadly) no longer being a significant generator of global wealth, but rather a conduit for it and a storehouse for it, while also still retaining significant defense and diplomatic capacity to help countries with wealth advance their own agendas if bought.
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A new twist?

Findings from the Premier League's case against Emirates Marketing Project require scrutiny from His Majesty's Revenue and Customs, the chair of a cross-party group of MPs has told the tax authority.

www.bbc.co.uk

Man City: HMRC urged to scrutinise tax implications of verdict revealed by Premier League

The Treasury Committee, which is responsible for overseeing HMRC, has urged the body to scrutinise tax implications of the Emirates Marketing Project verdict.
www.bbc.co.uk www.bbc.co.uk
 
MadSpurs said:
A new twist?

Findings from the Premier League's case against Emirates Marketing Project require scrutiny from His Majesty's Revenue and Customs, the chair of a cross-party group of MPs has told the tax authority.

www.bbc.co.uk

Man City: HMRC urged to scrutinise tax implications of verdict revealed by Premier League

The Treasury Committee, which is responsible for overseeing HMRC, has urged the body to scrutinise tax implications of the Emirates Marketing Project verdict.
www.bbc.co.uk www.bbc.co.uk
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Another situation which will doubtless see years spent and lawyers earning generational wealth. This really is going to be the boardroom equivalent of blocking off the keeper at corners until someone has the stones to punish it properly.
 
Had a discussion with someone who is fairly well versed in this kind of 'stuff'. They said expect the various Governments to be thrown into the headlights very soon. Their reasoning was, that the only way to buy time, to leverage the position would be, to ensure the discussions about appeals, penalties etc were being had at the very highest level of Government. Ideally with someone who was either sympathetic or would be happy to become sympathetic based around a very chunky investment in Britain. Those investments usually are black and sticky or they are defense based. You can sense the panic among the advisors when the 'PM' started being questioned about it. Especially with his proximity to it all and his penchant for being a self-serving, hugely ambitious individual. He spoke, then came the instant balancing act. It will be fun to see how this unfolds. Reach for some popcorn but expect to be disappointed from a Spurs' POV.
 
I still think this might come down to the other 19 clubs turning around to the PL (who FAPL Ltd work for) and saying don't even send our club to the Etihad, and we are definitely not hosting City at our ground until the sanctions are proportionate.

I can genuinely see this happening. In some ways the other clubs need to be throwing this thought process into the mix sooner rather than later.

There is a massive part of me that thinks that the 19 clubs hold more weight than anyone else in this equation including governments, broadcasting companies and governance bodies.

The 19 clubs should have their own meeting.
 
Muttley said:
I still think this might come down to the other 19 clubs turning around to the PL (who FAPL Ltd work for) and saying don't even send our club to the Etihad, and we are definitely not hosting City at our ground until the sanctions are proportionate.

I can genuinely see this happening. In some ways the other clubs need to be throwing this thought process into the mix sooner rather than later.

There is a massive part of me that thinks that the 19 clubs hold more weight than anyone else in this equation including governments, broadcasting companies and governance bodies.

The 19 clubs should have their own meeting.
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Saudi Sportswashing Machine, Forest, Villa, Chelsea and maybe others (those with similar owners) won't necessarily go against City. I'm not sure what the majority would need to be to carry a vote.
 
Muttley said:
I still think this might come down to the other 19 clubs turning around to the PL (who FAPL Ltd work for) and saying don't even send our club to the Etihad, and we are definitely not hosting City at our ground until the sanctions are proportionate.

I can genuinely see this happening. In some ways the other clubs need to be throwing this thought process into the mix sooner rather than later.

There is a massive part of me that thinks that the 19 clubs hold more weight than anyone else in this equation including governments, broadcasting companies and governance bodies.

The 19 clubs should have their own meeting.
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I think the issue with that is, it leaves City open an avenue of appeal on fairness / due process. Essentially if you kick them out of the league that way, they will claim bias and it opens up a route for them to argue about due process and competition which might actually be legally sound, annoyingly.

But, I think the PL have been very smart in how they’ve handled the case. They deliberately didn’t make a distinction on UAE Governance, who is really the owner etc, it was more about the fact that City didn’t comply, invented stories, had witnesses who lied, and invented a paper trail after the fact to try and make their story stack up. These are all things that are really clear and difficult to argue against. So Soriano can claim that the PL or the panel didn’t understand how money moves in the Gulf all he wants, it doesn’t matter. There’s enough that ties them up without that.

Also it seems like there has been an off ramp left to enable this to come to a conclusion, namely there is a redacted ‘senior decision maker’ who did not know that this was all going on. That senior decision maker can then ‘credibly’ be the barrier between Khaldoon, Mansoor, etc and the unfortunately people that actually are going to get thrown under the bus beneath him.

All in all, reading more into it I think it’s been a very well done case. City don’t actually have anywhere to realistically go, they are going to get punished. I think it’s going to be stripping and one relegation at the minimum, and fines and compensation will be paid to clubs that missed out. The only route available to them is to try and make sure the punishment isn’t as severe as it might otherwise have been. But the reason the other clubs should not expel City, and leave it as an option open to the sanctioning part of the process, is because that way it doesn’t give City anything to legally argue about.
 
Gutter Boy said:
Saudi Sportswashing Machine, Forest, Villa, Chelsea and maybe others (those with similar owners) won't necessarily go against City. I'm not sure what the majority would need to be to carry a vote.
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If you were any of those clubs wouldn’t go against City if only to have one rival for a CL place thrown out? They may all have owners with similar ambitions to spend as much as possible, but what unites them all isn’t the desire to spend the money, it’s their frustration that they can’t spend more because they are actually adhering to the rules.

Not that I think they will vote to expel, but City’s cheating is so egregious that I think all clubs should be whether publicly or privately lobbying for the biggest possible sanction and compensation possible.
 
Mikey10 said:
It’s his fatal flaw; he finds it hard to be disliked by anyone. It’ll eventually f uck him up as a PM.
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Yeah, I agree. Reading his original statement back today, it just looks completely effing mad. On pretty much the day that it is explained why City are guilty of the biggest fraud our game has ever seen, he feels the need to equate them to Everton as also being unfairly treated. Completely insane. I know he had a lot on with their conference but it does worry me that without the benefit of a SPAD that is actually the sort of thought running through his head.
 
Raziel said:
Who it affected the most (just European qualifications), interesting, it's us for CL mostly, followed by Everton (for EL spots)

View attachment 23487
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Ha - I know this is just European qualifications but so much of the reporting has been how much Liverpool missed out on because of the close title race (was it 2 title races?) but clearly us and Everton have missed out on ample opportunity here to better establish ourselves in the upper echelon of the game a lot sooner.
 
Clarky said:
Had a discussion with someone who is fairly well versed in this kind of 'stuff'. They said expect the various Governments to be thrown into the headlights very soon. Their reasoning was, that the only way to buy time, to leverage the position would be, to ensure the discussions about appeals, penalties etc were being had at the very highest level of Government. Ideally with someone who was either sympathetic or would be happy to become sympathetic based around a very chunky investment in Britain. Those investments usually are black and sticky or they are defense based. You can sense the panic among the advisors when the 'PM' started being questioned about it. Especially with his proximity to it all and his penchant for being a self-serving, hugely ambitious individual. He spoke, then came the instant balancing act. It will be fun to see how this unfolds. Reach for some popcorn but expect to be disappointed from a Spurs' POV.
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Can you see UAE on the whole spending serious diplomatic capital in order to pressure another world leader to influence the sanction of a soft power asset they control, when that world leader actually has no power or influence over the sanctions themselves? And can you see that leader expending the political capital to do it?

It would be madness to me. If it remotely looked like Burnham or his government was doing anything to soften the punishment here there would be complete uproar. Their Football Regulator also doesn’t have jurisdiction on this case. They could get involved and declare the owners unfit, and maybe that’s a way to influence and by a stay of execution. But in terms of the sanctions coming to City, I don’t think they can be impacted,

We need investment from UAE but they also need things from us. It’s not worth blowing the whole relationship up because their football team was found guilty,
 
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