Is Man City case keeping Andy Burnham awake?

0:00This is a global production. So I don't think this is purely a footballing decision. I think this does move into geopolitics. On one hand, you've got Andy Burnham who thinks, bloody hell, the book should be thrown at Manchester City. Look what happens to my beloved Everton. And on the other hand, he was the mayor of Manchester, who was in receipt of billions of pounds worth of inward investment that transformed East Manchester. Hello and welcome to the Sports Agents. The Manchester City case is now raising an even bigger question. Should the club's owners be allowed to stay as calls grow for them to go? The Prime Minister says he'd be sorry to see them leave. So what happens when football collides with politics, investment and Britain's relationship with Abu Dhabi? Joining us today on the Sports Agents, the news agents John Soaple and the time sports writer Owen Slot. Owen John, thank you for your time. Owen Slot. Owen John, thank you both as we do Manchester City yet again.

1:03It's the story that keeps on giving. Let's start with your article, Owen, about cities owners and whether they are suitable going forward, given what we know to be the owners of Manchester City. What was your point in your article? My point was we're all trying to work out what should happen as a result of what we now know. And there's a lot of specced about how far they should be relegated. And you know, should city just a roll over and die in that? And in my opinion, there's a lot of people who are going to pay for this. And so that's probably primarily the fans, especially if they go down a division or down to divisions, whatever. But they're not responsible. The players aren't responsible. The only people that we know are responsible are the people that write at the top who have planned this intentional cheating from a decade and a half ago.

2:05So in my opinion, they are the people who should really be paying for this. And there is actually a form of punishment waiting in the Football Governance Act, which came in last year. And I'm not really one for going through legalities and reading these sort of things. But there it is. It says that this right and proper ownership that new owners have to go through, that can now be applied retrospectively. And if an owner has found not to be a suitable owner anymore, then the ultimate is to force them to sell, to effectively relieve them of the ownership of their club. Now, I can't answer to how that would happen or who would buy it. But for me, that seems about as appropriate as a punishment could get, because they are responsible for this. That they betraying this football, not the fans, not the players.

3:06And there's a lot of other, there's a lot of... Just tons of stuff to follow on from this about who gets to pay and who deserves to be recompensed for their losses in previous years. But who carries the camel, the people who perpetrated this, are the people at the very top. And in that Football Governance Act, part three section 38, it's there. It says, an unsusable owner can go. And I can't possibly think of anything that an owner could do that would be more unsusable than this. So many questions that need to be asked from that point. One, you said, you know, who would buy it? I think there won't be any shortage of buyers for Manchester City if they came to market because it was judged that that section should be invoked. But in terms of a punishment, that can't surely be the only punishment, you know, because that just means one set of owners are removed, another set come in and Manchester City stay where they are.

4:07That doesn't seem like it's going to satisfy the fans of other clubs. It doesn't seem like it's going to satisfy the Premier League. But the other question I want to ask you is around the Abu Dhabi question, because obviously, you know, if the owners go, that relationship that this country has in many areas with Abu Dhabi comes into focus, doesn't it? And Andy Burnham has already seemingly come to some kind of defence with wearing his Everton hat, looking at this in a kind of slightly more partial way, maybe, than you might have had from the previous Prime Minister. So that opens up all kinds of questions, doesn't it? If ownership was to change, how this country, this government would respond to that, Owen? Yeah. OK, so first of all, I'm certainly not arguing that it should just be an ownership change. I do think that the very least city should be at least one division down from next season, and they're going to have to pay a whopping fine, but that's clear.

5:10Or on the ownership thing, Andy Burnham's point that the city of the, sorry, that Abu Dhabi have been very good for Manchester. I think that's completely clear that they've been great owners in that respect. If you compare that to what's happened to the Saudi ownership of Newcastle, they haven't invested in the city infrastructure in anything like the same way. But does that mean that if you bring the city ownership to an end, does that mean that Abu Dhabi's relationship with the country should come to an end completely? I don't know, that's kind of geopolitical. Well, I'm not saying it should, but would they decide they're going to take their ball home and play, not play anymore, because they're not interested in doing deals with this country because they feel that they've been slighted. It's so interesting, isn't it? Because normally, when a verdict comes, we've had the kind of verdict, the investigation into what's happened.

6:10That's normally the end of the matter. I feel that we're at the start of something now with what is going to happen next, because there is so many permutations of what could happen, what should happen. Owen has set out the grounds on why Manchester City may not be fit and proper owners of a football club. But then you've got the investment that comes into the UK from the UAE, which is in the tens of billions, and UKPLC would be low to lose that. And does that start to bleed into a decision over the football rights and wrongs of this? Because you can imagine a situation where the UAE government, because let's face it, the ownership and the government are intertwined in the UAE, that Abu Dhabi say, no, this will have serious ramifications for Britain if you force us to sell Manchester City, or if you relegate us to a different division. And that will have some sway.

7:12And I made the parallel, and it's a very imperfect parallel. Back to when Saudi Arabia had done an arms deal with Bait B.A.E., there were allegations that there was bribery. There was going to be a serious fraud office prosecution of various executives, and Saudi Arabia said to the British government, you've got to stop. And what did Tony Blair do? He stopped. And so foreign countries have a lot of power when they are such big inward investors in the country. And so I don't think this is purely a footballing decision. I think this does move into geopolitics. And on one hand, you've got Andy Burnham who thinks, bloody hell, the book should be thrown at Manchester City. Look what happens to my beloved Everton. And on the other hand, he was the mayor of Manchester, who was in receipt of billions of pounds worth of inward investment that transformed East Manchester. And this relationship with the U.A.E. and the UK is obvious to say, but it isn't just Manchester. Manchester has benefited, and by the way, they have benefited from Manchester.

8:14I mean, they're their property portfolio in Manchester. You know, they're not doing, I would suggest they're not doing... It's not the Netherlands. They're not doing that as the kindness of their hearts, no. No, exactly. And look, it would be lovely to say, here we are, great Britain, the fifth biggest economy in the world. We don't need any of these people to come. No, we do. That's the fact of the matter. You know, a lot of the investment that has taken place in Manchester, not just from Abu Dhabi, but from China as well. This is where, you know, and the Qataris have been big investors in UK property as well. You need these people coming into the country. But don't think it doesn't come with a string or two attached. Because I think, you know, it means that these countries do have some clout. And in the past, when we've had rows with the UAE, with Saudi Arabia, with certain other things, we found ourselves having to tread very gently indeed, just as we do with the United States of America if they're imposing tariffs on us. We find ourselves treading very lightly because we are vulnerable.

9:15And there is a vulnerability in Britain now. No, the other player here, though, John, that we haven't mentioned is the Premier League, who also bring in a lot of money for this country, 33 billion, to the UK economy between 2025 and 2028. Right? So that's over 10 billion pounds a year. Obviously, they're bringing tax revenues. They create jobs. You know, they are the ones who've come out surprisingly to a lot of people, quite hard and forthright on this. Because a lot of people thought this was just going to go away somehow. It was going to capitulate and it was never going to be as out there as this has been. You know, nobody expected it to drop when it did. Nobody expected 114 and 3 quarter of the 115 charges to be proven to be true. Or in there, obviously, the appeals coming. So the Premier League, surely, surely Owen has some say in this as well, because they are a big player in the UK economy. They're not going to just roll over and let the government dictate that the Saudi, that the Abu Dhabi consortium can just carry on owning a football club

10:20because it suits the country or it suits the coffers of the country. I think you're completely right that the Premier League is going to suffer financially because of what's happened. Who knows if TV rights will go down and sponsorship and the value of the Premier League will suffer because of this? I mean, it surely will, but we don't know how much. The question is that does the Premier League become more valuable or does it lose less value if it takes a really hard line on City? I would say that the Premier League will probably want City back up as soon as possible. You know, I think that if you look at narrative arcs, which is effectively what sports TV is selling, then the idea of man City going down and then coming back again, I mean, everyone's going to be wanting to watch that and their value will go up again. But at the same time, we're talking about the integrity of football and it's just fascinating because I'm talking about integrity of football

11:23and John's talking about the welfare and future of our nation. I mean, where does one win and the other lose? It strikes me that integrity of football is probably not as important as the financial future of the country. This is what we're talking about. But Owen, the other point of that is that, you know, this is one of the great British export industries. It's one of the great British exports. You know, the Bundesliga, Serie R, none of the others come anywhere close in generating the sort of revenues that the Premier League does, the EPL, and you travel the world and you see, you know, kind of all the England shirts of the various teams for sale all over. Because these have become international global brands now as a result of the Premier League rights. So look, the Premier League has to judge two different things, doesn't it? There is one, the harm to the reputation, which is obviously immense to English football because of what has happened at Manchester City. But on the other hand, you want to smooth it over as fast as possible

12:25because you don't want your television rights to go down in value when you put them in the marketplace. For Burnham himself, how difficult a situation do you think this is? For him, given that 24 hours before this was announced, he stood on that stage in Liverpool and his whole speech was kind of hope and integrity and doing the right thing and looking after each other, how difficult do you think this subject is for him? I think it comes face to face. It's like, you know, you heard, and it wasn't just about hope. It was also about him saying, why is it that the shareholders always and the punters always lose? How do we take back control from these mighty kind of organizations that have got all the power and we've got none? And here he is, the Prime Minister, having to adjudicate 24 hours afterwards. 24 hours afterwards on Manchester City and the power and the might of Abu Dhabi and all their billions in Mubadal or in the Sovereign Wealth Funds

13:26and all the rest of it. And I think that's a really uncomfortable place for me. I thought that Lucy Powell standing up and ending the Labour Party conference by making a joke about Man United and saying, you're crap and we, you know, you are. I just thought it was very, very ill judge because I think this is much more serious. And look, you know, in the great scheme of Donald Trump and tariffs or what's happening in the straight of all moves, no, this isn't as important. But you could see how this does become important and does require some delicate judgment along the way. The other thing that I was going to throw in here, which then comes, comes back to what we've all been talking about here. And the Premier League, Owen, is that at the time of recording this, Sky Sports News have been reporting that they have been told that many rival clubs consider cities such a key part of the commercial attraction of the Premier League, both here in the UK and globally, that if rival clubs voted to expel them, I demote them, it would be as if those clubs were cutting off their

14:28noses to spite their faces. And again, you have this, you have a contradiction that Andy Burnham is having to deal with. You have a contradiction that the Premier League and these chief execs are dealing with, which he met complete odds with fan bases up and down the country. They look at this. It's nothing new. This is it. From a business perspective and nothing more, Os fans are still in our naive way going, it's all about the sport and all about the integrity. They can't marry. I'm not convinced that if in two years time, Mancissios are in league two or something, or I'm not convinced that the fans of other Premier League clubs will be enjoying it as much as they've effectively killed them off. I think most fans are just most Premier League fans will be dying to get city back into their home grounds so they could give them the benefit of their opinion.

15:30It would be a great game to be looking forward to every single season, wouldn't it? And the other thing is, Mancissios City aren't in whatever form they come back in, they're not actually going to be charging up to the top of the table and winning anymore, because we know that they only triumphed because they cheated. If they didn't have all that illegal money, they would probably be a mid-table Premier League team. That would be great fun to see that this team is struggling again. I'll go back to what I said before. I think it's the narrative arc. People want to see more of this story. Some people have said, if we relegated them to the FL, would the FL take them because they're poisonous. They're sort of a canister, if you like. And I'm thinking, well, the FL would absolutely love it. Just imagine a season of Mancissios playing all our clubs. Just imagine the TV audiences and the sell-out crowds. You know, that Mancissios City are a great appeal now to everyone.

16:30Quick reminder you can catch up on our previous episodes on YouTube, global player, or wherever you get your pods. Make sure you subscribe, follow. Leave us a review while you're there and we'll have more from Owen and John next. Just on what happens next, it's been, obviously, a lot of conjecture. A lot of, you know, you're talking there about, you know, would the FL want them? Of course, they would, you know, some clubs say, well, we're not necessarily going to take them because they're trying to make some kind of statement here. But this was coming in some shape or form. The Premier League has been investigating this for years now and a lot of money, as you made the point in your article, a lot of money, an obscene amount of money has been spent on legal bills with, with obviously Manchester City, presumably taking the cream of the crop when it comes to legal counsel. How, how have they got to a situation where they don't know how they would deal with something like this? Because, you know, the governance of the Premier League, presumably,

17:33have had these conversations that we've not been privy to to say, right, if, if any of these, or most of these charges are proven to be true, what is the course of action? Manchester City cannot be allowed to win the league this season, can they? This has to be sorted in a couple of months' time, or at least, you know, well before the end of the season. So there is certainty for those clubs who both have ambitions at the top and the bottom. Yeah, I would be astonished if, if they, if they've got to the end of the decision and found them guilty of all these crimes against the Premier League, and then go, all right, tomorrow we're going to start about, start talking about sanctions. I mean, they must have had a committee on sanctions working on this for months and months. They would be just nuts if they hadn't. I mean, the problem that they face in the future is what the Premier League really wants is for this story to to disappear. It's been,

18:33it's been again, it's been a great story for a while, but, but the longer it goes on, the worse it is for football. So, and we know that that all the rival clubs who have, who have effectively been defrauded by City are looking at their own financial positions. So I would, I would strongly expect in the, in the financial penalty that's levied against City at the end of all this, I was strongly expect them to, it to be an absolutely massive fine, but a fine that would take in the compensation to all the other clubs. Because if you've got, if you've got two, three, four years down the line, Liverpool mentioned, I did Arsenal Spurs doing their own, conducting their own court cases against City, and this carries on and on. Then that it looks worse and worse for the Premier League. So I think, I'd be amazed if they don't try and just sell the whole thing in one go. Do you think it can disappear eventually, Owen? And the only reason I asked that, and you've covered a lot of sports in your time, I also did James Horncastle the other night

19:36about Calciopoli and the eventous scandal of 20 years ago. The eventous were still involved in legal action. Last year, I think it was, to do with Calciopoli and lost revenue. And James' view was that 20 years on, that was 2006, 20 years on, Serie A still has not fully recovered from what happened. Yeah, I mean, the thing about cities, as we know very, very well, is they don't show any signs of showing humility, apologising, hands up, we got this wrong, that they appear to want to take legal recourse right to the bitter end. So as you say, Mark, maybe, maybe this is going to be a legal fight for a very, very long time. I've got one other frame of comparison, because I used to be the rugby correspondent for the Times, and I come up with a Sarasun story very closely. And I thought that was going to have a hangover for a very long time.

20:42And I know that Prem Rugby is not the Premier League, but it was astonishing how well Sarasun dealt with it. I was amazed that their players stood by them, didn't say, we want to leave, we want to go somewhere else. They managed to retain a real club culture, ethics, we're in this together. I think the players were persuaded that the club were hard done against rather, that were sinning against rather than were sinning, if you like. And the rest of the league has managed to move on quite quickly. The questions of who should have won in reparations, and that died out pretty fast. We got covered quite quickly after that. So maybe that helped, there was another debate altogether. So I'm not saying that's going to happen now, but if we're looking for Araya Sunshine, I've just tried to love one in. So John, there's all the different

21:44parties here that we've discussed. The Premier League, you've got fans, you've got other clubs, potential legal action coming, unless it's sorted as Owen pointed out there with one huge fine that covers all their claims. Then you've got the government and their relationship and with both Abu Dhabi and also the Premier League as well. Andy Bernan didn't need this, did he? At the end of, as Mark pointed out, what was a pretty good week for him, because if this does rumble on and on, it's hard to extricate yourself from as the government. Yeah, look, I think what Mark has just sketched out of what happened in Italy is the absolute nightmare scenario for football and for the government in some ways, because football is a major part of the UK economy. It generates a huge amount of income. It generates revenue abroad for the Premier League that comes back into this country and is taxed and therefore part of the, I would think that the Department of Culture, Media and Sport and the Department for Business will be looking at this and trying to informally not be kind of get together in a public conference,

22:52but get the clubs together and do one and done. Get this done. Whatever the punishment is, hand it out, move on, move on fast. Because I think if this drags on for years, just as you talk about Syria and the kind of the hangover from that, I think that the, you know, the British government would want to avoid that at all costs. If there is going to be punishment, let it be meeting out, if there's going to be compensation, let it get paid, but don't let this drag on for a year after year after year. When you talked about the Tony Blair and B.A.E. Yeah. Was that easy? Do you think that was easier to sort? Because look, there would be more attention on it from political journalists and business journalists, but what's going on with B.A.E. in the Saudis doesn't see through international compensation. On to the terraces. On public consciousness. On to the terraces, back pages. I mean, the city case is everywhere. It's what everybody, everybody is talking about. Yeah, but it was politically incredibly difficult,

23:52very controversial, that you know, and it wasn't, it was nothing that had happened on Blair's watch. It had happened in the thatcher years, in this Al Yemama arm steel, and it was the hangover from that, but the serious fraud on this investigation had gone on. There was a recommendation that there should be prosecutions brought. And at that point, you think, right, let the, let the course of justice carry on because justice must be blind and all the rest of it. And then you get a prime minister saying, no, I'm going to stop the prosecutions. I want this to stop. This has to stop. And it was very, very difficult politically for him. But yeah, you know, on the terraces at White Heart Lane, or, you know, wherever, they weren't talking about God. Have you read about the Al Yemama arm steel? Body outrage. It just straights me. It was easier to make something with the serious fraud office go away than the NIST, which is, which every Premier League football fan, and any football league fan, you know, my son's mad southampton supporter and he's seen what's happened to southampton after, you know, cheatgate or whatever. They must be thinking, thank

24:55her lucky stars at the moment. This says, this is completely taking the attention off of. But if you're a football fan and that's the, you know, yeah, everyone's got an opinion on it. And I think that that, and that means it does matter for Burnham and the government, because this is real voters with real opinions, not just elite pages of the financial times. I can't remember your subsection, Owen, from the 2025 Act. What was it again? Oh, 38. Yeah. Is there a world in which Abu Dhabi don't wait for that to be involved? And they, and they, the owners just go, you know, what we're out of here. We've done our bit. We're, we don't want any of this mess and we sell because there are, I mentioned this on the podcast couple of weeks ago, there are 125 American-owned football clubs in Europe. Many of the top Premier League clubs have American ownership. There are loads more billionaire American families that would like Premier League football clubs. So, so it wouldn't be, it, it, and fees, it would be completely possible to go and find a new owner. I imagine in the next few months,

25:57if they wanted to. Would, would they likely do that, John, do you think? Goodness knows. I mean, look, you, you, yeah, I, if it gets done and dusted and Manchester United are forced to sell, I bet you, you know, there's plenty of people in America with plenty of money who would just let, and it's become the new favorite thing. It's you knew, you're new Bourbon. Once you've got the private yacht and you've got the, and the private jet, what else do you have? Well, why don't I get myself a football team? And that is the attitude of a lot of these consortiums that are piling in and know absolutely nothing about soccer and a buying a football team because it's, it's the must have accessory. I just say, I think broadly that works, but is it going to work for, for, for buying the dirtiest team in the history of the Premier League? I think if the, if the consortium think there's money to be made, I think they'll kind of say, oh, yeah, a bit mucky, but we'll get it at a better price because of it. Yeah, because I did a little bit, but you come in as new broom, don't you? Sorry, you come in as new broom and everything that's happened was under different ownership and this is, this is new. Yeah, you,

27:02you could do, but I suppose maybe that means you, you buy it at a pretty low share value and can accelerate it quite quickly. Yeah, I'll have a bit of it. Do you have sympathy for employees of Manchester City at the time and what they are having to talk about if their claims are true that they, they were told by the ownership there was nothing to worry about? I mean, Guadalajara is one of those. Obviously, there are, there are other ex players who are being put on the spot at the moment. I actually feel sorry for some of the players. I'm thinking just imagine if you've given the best years of your, of your playing career to, to a project that turned out to be fraudulent or you might get stripped of your titles, but everyone will be go, your titles aren't worth anything, even if you're not officially stripped them. I, I, I think, I mean, I don't know what, what happens if Kevin De Bruyne had died

28:06decisive, say, legal action against his club for, for, for cheating him. We have probably haven't talked about that. But yeah, yeah, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, people who work in the offices, who have also might be losing their jobs if there's a downsizing, which is inevitable, who have given their careers to building this, this, this fallacy. Also, I, I've got a lot of sympathy for them. We're not feeling sorry for the fans yet because I haven't haven't really seen many fans sort of showing the humility, the humility that all of us once, you know, we sort of demand this kind of a, I've heard the opposite. I mean, I've heard on phonons fans saying, well, you can't take that away from me. You know, that was, that was the most incredible few years of, of my life as a city fan and that, you know, there was, it was the opposite of humility. And it, are there signs? Do we think, though, of, of fracture and a little bit of discord in this camp in terms of the playing staff and the, and the management when you've got

29:06Pep being wheeled out? Does that show as marked, you think that, that actually it's not, you know, it's not the ideal time anyway, is it when there's an international break to, to try and galvanise the troops? But it's, it's going to be hard, isn't it? To, you know, well, it is. And as we keep saying, it is, it is an amfield, the first game back on, on Sunday, the 11th. I mean, in some ways, you couldn't write that. Could you really? From the owner's point of view, whilst they are defending themselves and vigorously defending themselves, the longer this keeps going, the more a lot of their staff are getting the treatment that we are expecting will come their way at amfield. Question. Who actually turns up from, from the Manchester City executive, you know, if you, if you were a director or, or, or, or an owner, would you show up at amfield? I mean, I'm not sure that I would be interested in seeing what the city fans are like. The, the only

30:07people we know have to show up at, at the players and the manager who, who we, I think, agree, are probably not responsible for anything. Well, the city fans will go there and be defiant. And, and, and as a, as a fan, not of either city or Liverpool, I would, I would, I think, if I was in that situation, I, I would want to be defiant because this is, whoever owns it, this is my club. And this, this, you know, this is, was my club before owners took over. Hopefully it would be my club after other owners have got, I'm not talking about city here, but that's always my, wouldn't you also be livid? Yeah, but, but I would, well, yes, I probably would be livid, but, oh, yes, I would, and I'd be sad, I'd be disappointed, but my job, if I was going to amfield, would be to be as defiant and supportive of the team and the players and, and, and be as, be as proud to, to be the fan of the club that I am supporting. That, in that situation, on a match day, that's what you're there for. On you, you're there to support your club and you're there to support your team

31:11to try and get them to get three points. I tell you what, if the, if the directors did not turn up, I mean, you have to face the music for the, for the, you know, for the owners and the, you know, the, the, the panjandrums of Manchester City, if they stay away, what a terrible, terrible sign that would be that we don't want to face the music, we're skulking away, we're hiding, we don't want to face the appropriate mother fans. I mean, you've got to, you've got to be there, surely. And I think there's one other thing that, and, and, and I got a text from a, from a city fan that, that I was just looking for. And I think this is another point that city fans are making, which is for a whole different podcast, but I think is a, is a relevant point as, as well. Me as a fan, I just want to move on and restore the integrity of the competition. And also, look at what rules could be to enable controlled investment. We do need economic growth. And then you end, but it's going to be loud for the foreseeable future, especially at Amfield. Going to be a bananza for solicitors,

32:14isn't it? Well, that's the one of the points that you made. My learning friends, my learning friends will be having very expensive holidays off of this. Owen, John, we'll leave it there. Thank you very much. Get in touch, please. The email is the sportsagents at global.com. You can find us on social media at the sports agents, all of our episodes on global player or YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. Please subscribe and leave us a review. And we'll be back soon. Has been a global production.