Stefan Borson: Leicester City have real risk of ‘increased penalty’ and this is why
Leicester City are at risk of receiving an “increased penalty” after appealing against their points deduction.
That is according to former Manchester City financial adviser Stefan Borson, who exclusively told Football Insider the Foxes appear to be trying to “knock the whole thing out” following their latest move.
Leicester were charged last May with an alleged breach of the EFL’s financial rules in their promotion-winning campaign back to the Premier League in 2023-24.
Following a hearing in November, it was announced on 5 February the East Midlands side have been deducted six points, leaving them now sitting 22nd in the Championship table as they look to avoid back-to-back relegations.
It was confirmed on 19 February Leicester have appealed against the decision to deduct them six points.
- Read More: How Leicester avoided 20-point deduction
How Leicester are planning to have their penalty reduced to zero points
Under the Premier League’s PSR rules, clubs are allowed to lose £105million over a rolling three-year period, but Leicester’s figure was reduced by £22m after spending the 2023-24 season in the Championship.
The commission ruled the Foxes had spent £20.8m over their £83m limit between 2021-22 and 2023-24.
Speaking exclusively to Football Insider, Borson discussed why Leicester have taken the decision to appeal against their points deduction.
“They obviously think that they have at least a chance of saying that the original independent commission got the law wrong in respect of one of their arguments that would have knocked the whole case out, i.e. it would have said zero points,” said Borson.
“I don’t think that they’ve got much hope at all of arguing the scale of the breach. That can only go one way because it can only end up with 37 months rather than 36, so that looks like it’s pretty much fixed at £20m. It means the actual scale of the breach is fixed.
“They can try and argue that the upper limit should have been £105m and not £83m, but I think it’s very unlikely they’re going to win that argument. Then they’re left with some of the competition arguments, which would all probably knock the whole thing out.”
How many more points could Leicester be deducted?
Borson insisted Leicester are attempting to overturn their points deduction following their appeal.
“I don’t think they’re fighting for one or two points,” said Borson.
“I think this is an attempt to knock the whole thing out again in the way that they did with 2023, so they get zero deduction. They effectively don’t get punished at all. That’s their intention.
“That sounds fine, and you sort of go, ‘Well, why wouldn’t you bother?’. But the slight problem here is I think they do have a risk of an increased penalty, which I don’t necessarily think that a lot of the other cases had.
“They had a theoretical risk that the panel could look at it again and increase it from six to seven or eight. But I actually don’t think it was very likely. I think there’s a real chance that a second independent commission could say that it had been too lenient.
“That said, I don’t think it’s going to come because of the Premier League’s appeal, which is that the delay of the information should have been punished by a points deduction.”
In terms of other similar cases, Everton were previously docked a total of eight points after being charged with two separate spending breaches, while Nottingham Forest landed a four-point deduction.
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