Manchester City and Premier League claim victory in Associated Party Transaction tribunal verdict - who really won? - video Dailymotion

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Both sides in the Manchester City v the Premier League legal case have claimed victory. ManchesterWorld’s Michael Plant explains and analyses why this is. Daniel Wales reports.

Transcript

00:00Association party transaction are essentially laws which are in place to

00:05ensure that clubs can't agree sponsorships with associated parties to

00:11inflate their income. So an example being that Manchester City obviously have

00:16links to Abu Dhabi, as do their sponsors Etihad Airways. So they could

00:21hypothetically inflate their sponsorship from Etihad Airways, then clear more

00:25income and as a result managed to navigate around the profit and

00:30sustainability rules. And so what were Manchester City's issues with the rules

00:35and in what way were they victorious over the Premier League? I think City

00:40questioned the how those rules were being implemented and ultimately City

00:45had to had an issue with the fact that two of their sponsorships were rejected

00:50by these rules and I think last year that was the big bone of contention for

00:56City. So they brought this case against the Premier League and in that specific

01:01argument City have won. They have in this case it has been found by

01:06an independent commission and so not someone who works for the Premier

01:10League. That commission has found that in those two particular instances City

01:14were correct and that the sponsorship should have stood. City have now

01:19been invited to resubmit that sponsorship. This wasn't the only

01:23victory for Manchester City in this case, with a further win coming with regards

01:27to shareholder loans. They have also, City, the panel voted in their

01:35favour that the laws actually, that the way the APT laws are being upheld

01:40actually go against UK competition laws, which is pretty significant you have to

01:44say that they're essentially saying that these laws go against UK law. A big

01:50factor in that is that shareholder loans from other clubs were not included in

01:57PSR. In a nutshell what City were saying is how can you say on one hand we aren't

02:03allowed to have financial agreements with sponsorships that are unregulated

02:11from associated parties but we are allowed to have loans from owners who

02:17own the club who have no interest applied to them. Surely that is also an

02:22associated party. However whilst those cases are

02:27embarrassing for the Premier League given their rules breached competition

02:30law, most APT rules are set to stay. Now the Premier League have also claimed the

02:35victory in this very very complex case which as a football journalist I

02:40I've read a lot about it and I've tried to get my understanding but I apologise

02:44I've got any minor parts of this wrong. I'm not a lawyer. But the Premier League

02:49have claimed the victory because what they have said is yes City are right.

02:52City have won two aspects of this case but overall the majority of their

02:57challenges have been rejected.

Manchester City and Premier League claim victory in Associated Party Transaction tribunal verdict - who really won?

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