Investigators say a money trail ultimately exposed Manchester City's financial schemes

AI Summary

An independent investigatory panel found that Manchester City used alleged sham deals to conceal owner funding and circumvent Premier League financial-fair-play rules from 2009 to 2018. The findings describe schemes involving the club's Emirati owner, Abu Dhabi United Group, as City rapidly established itself as a leading English football club.

A series of “sham” deals to disguise payments made to Manchester City by the club's Emirati owner, according to investigators, reveal a ploy to circumvent European soccer's financial fair-play rules that is both sophisticated and, at its core, as simple as it gets. An ambitious club with a fabulously wealthy new owner was in a hurry to reshape the landscape of global soccer's richest and most popular league, according to the bombshell findings of an independent investigatory panel that were released Tuesday. According to the Premier League, City set up complex schemes to disguise that it was unfairly being bankrolled by its owner, the Abu Dhabi United Group, or ADUG, from 2009-18 — nine years in which it established itself as a powerhouse.