Man City could land devastating financial blow after 115 charges twist – Borson
Manchester City could be forced to pay compensation to up to 35 clubs if they are found guilty of serious breaches in their 115 charges case.
That is the view of former Man City financial adviser Stefan Borson, who exclusively told Football Insider clubs could argue they would have finished higher in the Premier League table or they suffered a loss of chance due to the alleged breaches.
Man City were dealt the charges by the Premier League in February 2023 for allegedly breaching the financial fair play (FFP) rules over a nine-year period between 2009 and 2018.
An independent commission hearing into the 115 charges started on 16 September and is scheduled to last around 10 weeks.
The Times reported on 5 November a number of Premier League clubs have reserved the right to seek compensation against Man City.
It is so far unclear how many clubs have taken this action, but 35 teams played in the top flight during those nine years in question.
Man City could face compensation claims from 35 clubs
Borson admitted, however, it could be a “very long time” before any compensation is paid out due to the deep complexity of the case.
“It’s a very complicated issue,” Borson told Football Insider.
“The first thing to say is yes, in theory, if City lose and the substantive charges are proven, then you can expect many clubs to seek compensation of some sort. What that compensation looks like is really quite difficult to assess.
“If you think about the number of teams that have been in the Premier League over the last 10 to 15 years, the period under which City are alleged to have breached from 2009 through to 2018, you will have 30 to 35 teams.
“All of those clubs could say ‘Well, at the very least, we lost one place and, therefore, we are all owed at least £2million’. Beyond that, every individual club has their claim for what their particular circumstances meant over those nine years, for losses, for impacts, and other consequences of City’s, if proven, breach.
“Each of them would then need to put forward a claim to either the independent commission or via arbitration within the Premier League because none of this can go to the court because all the clubs agreed to privately arbitrate between themselves.
“But the independent commission does have the power to award compensation to interested parties, so it may well do that in the future.
“But to get to that point, the independent commission or the arbitration panels will need to assess each individual case for loss and also causation, which is whether the things City did in this scenario caused the impact that is alleged.
“Laid on top of that for extra complexity are things like loss of a chance. Within English law, you can establish that you have a claim of loss based on the loss of a chance.
“It may be that one club successfully argues that but for City’s breaches and accounting issues, they might have finished in the Champions League places. Maybe they can establish that they had a 20 per cent chance of finishing in those places. Under English law, that may well give rise to a claim for compensation, adjusted for the risk for the proportion of chance that there was.
“All of it is extremely complicated. There are many parties involved. The processes of the Premier League are not really set up to deal with something of this nature. It could take a very long time and it has deep complexity.
“We won’t know really for quite some time.”
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