You have a Commission making findings that directly implicate #ManCity’s principal sponsor - yet Etihad says it was NEVER contacted, NEVER represented and NEVER given a right of reply.
Then those findings are reached on a “more likely than not” standard of proof - not “beyond reasonable doubt”.
The @PremierLeague now has serious questions to answer about the fairness of this process.
This is extraordinary.
The Commission says #ManCity’s sponsorship arrangements were “shams” and that £830.69M of supposed commercial revenue was really owner funding.
Yet Etihad — City’s principal sponsor and the company directly implicated by those findings — says the Premier League NEVER contacted it, NEVER allowed it to provide evidence and NEVER gave it a right of reply.
Then there’s this: the Commission also says there was no direct evidence that a key redacted individual knew about or authorised the alleged scheme, yet concluded it operated without that person’s knowledge (hugely rumored to be HRH Sheikh Mansour).
So we are being asked to accept a vast, multi-year funding scheme involving hundreds of millions of pounds — while one of the main commercial parties says it was never even heard, and a key individual supposedly did not know it was happening.
That is extraordinary.
City say the central allegation is simply wrong. Etihad now “categorically rejects” the implications against it and is taking legal advice.
This is nowhere near over.