Jason Burt and Mike McGrath

Updated September 26, 2026 — 4:30am,first published 1:33am

Manchester City have been found guilty on 114 of the 115 charges relating to breaches of Premier League financial regulations.

No sanction has been announced yet, and City are expected to appeal the verdict. Sanctions could include the stripping of titles won by City, a points deduction or financial penalty, or even relegation from the top flight.

A City spokesman said: “The Premier League process remains ongoing, with significant elements to be completed, and subject to strict confidentiality. As such Manchester City FC’s position remains consistent with the club’s statement of February 2023.

“The club have diligently respected due process for eight years on the basis that the Premier League board and executive would behave as an independent, impartial and fair-minded regulator, free from partisan influence.”

City have always denied the charges, promising “irrefutable” evidence in support of their position, and had assembled some of the most expensive lawyers in the country to argue their case.

The independent commission, though, has found against them in key accusations about the provision of accurate financial information, inflating sponsorship deals with links to their Abu Dhabi owners and failure to disclose payments to players and their former manager Roberto Mancini.

The charges span from the 2009-10 season until the five-year investigation ended during the 2022-23 campaign and leave a cloud hanging over the 20 major trophies that have been won since Sheikh Mansour’s Abu Dhabi United Group completed their takeover of the club in 2008.

Pep Guardiola, who oversaw a treble triumph in 2023 and an unprecedented fourth straight Premier League title in 2024, left the club at the end of last season.

The verdict vindicates the Premier League’s decision to launch an investigation after explosive allegations that City had routinely broken financial rules were first made in Der Spiegel in 2018 based on the Football Leaks documents.

UEFA has previously also accused City of breaches of its financial regulations and announced in 2020 that it was suspending the club from the Champions League for two years for “overstating” sponsorship revenue between 2012 and 2016.

City denied the UEFA charges and, after an appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), the two-year ban was overturned. CAS found that a number of the claims brought by UEFA had fallen outside a five-year “time bar” and others were “not established”.

It did, however, still impose a €10m fine after ruling that City failed to cooperate with investigators. City had previously also agreed a settlement with UEFA of €20 million ($32 million) in 2014 following an investigation into their finances.

The Premier League statement in February 2023 said that “a number of alleged breaches” had been referred to an independent commission. It then detailed each specific rule against each season in which the alleged breach took place. The precise number was not clear from the statement and led to varying reports between 115 and 130. Friday’s news suggested the figure was 115.

All the way to 2009-10, the first full season following the club’s takeover by Sheikh Mansour, who is a member of the Abu Dhabi Royal family and the vice president of the United Arab Emirates. There were charges relating to all 14 seasons until the Premier League completed their investigation during the 2022-23 campaign. In that time, City won seven Premier League titles, six League Cups, three FA Cups and the Champions League. They have since won another league title – the first club to do so four times in a row – as well as the UEFA Super Cup, the FIFA Club World Cup and the FA Cup and League Cup double last season.

They can be split into five groups. The biggest relates to the seasons from 2009-10 until 2017-18 and the requirement for clubs to provide accurate financial information and act in the utmost good faith.

The next set of rules concern the full disclosure of manager and player payments. The alleged manager breaches related to the period between 2009-10 and 2012-13, when Roberto Mancini was leading the team. The alleged breaches with respect to player payments relate to all of the seasons between 2010-11 and 2015-16.

As well as providing financial detail, clubs were required to meet UEFA and Premier League rules which were designed to bring a club’s spending broadly in line with their income by placing set limits on losses. City were charged with breaches of UEFA’s licensing and financial fair play rules from 2013-14 until 2017-18, and the Premier League’s profit and sustainability rules from 2015-16 until 2017-18.

The final set of charges spanned the five seasons during which City were being investigated by the Premier League and rules that require members to cooperate in the utmost good faith by providing information and documents.

A full picture will only emerge when the commission publishes its findings, but we know that the Premier League investigation began in December 2018 following allegations in the German newspaper Der Spiegel based on the Football Leaks documents. These included alleged payments to former manager Mancini for consultancy work at an Abu Dhabi-based club that was separate to his regular contract at City.

We also know that City were alleged to have breached rules over setting out image rights payments to players in their club contract. Der Spiegel reported that the Premier League investigation also focused on payments to under-age players, as well as whether club sponsors were paying for commercial deals themselves or a significant proportion was in fact effectively coming from owner Sheikh Mansour.

City have always denied breaking any rules. In response to the Premier League statement about the alleged breaches, they said that they have “irrefutable evidence” to support their position and “look forward to this matter being put to rest once and for all.”

At the start of the hearing in September 2024, Guardiola also said: “Wait for the independent panel. We believe we have not done anything wrong.”

Of the Football Leaks documents, City said: “We will not be providing any comment on out-of-context materials. The attempt to damage the club’s reputation is organised and clear.”

The Telegraph, London

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