Man City could face years of legal battles after Premier League verdict, experts say

MANCHESTER, England, Sept 30 : Manchester City's case over breaches of Premier League financial rules could run for years, lawyers say, as appeals and further claims threaten to prolong a saga that has already reshaped English football's financial landscape.

The League said on Tuesday that City had used "sham" commercial contracts as part of schemes to inflate revenue and understate costs by more than £900 million ($1.2 billion) over nearly a decade.

The case has hung over the Premier League for years, raising wider questions about financial governance, competitive integrity and the organisation's ability to hold its most powerful clubs to account.

"Unless the Premier League take control and bang their heads together, and say, right, this is it, it could take years," Yasin Patel, a leading London-based sports law barrister, told Reuters.

"There's clubs now looking to sue for loss of income, bit like the Burnley-Everton situation. That hasn't been resolved yet, there's an ongoing appeal."

He was referring to the decision taken by the Premier League in June to order Everton to pay Burnley around £35 million in compensation for the impact of Everton breaching financial rules in 2022 when Burnley were relegated. Everton rejected the findings and their appeal is being heard in January 2027. 

"There's others who will have been potentially promoted. There's trophies that were lost, European places that could have been won or lost, even certain players signing for Man City, who may have been signed by Hull or wherever, they lost the opportunity of that player," Patel said.

An independent commission found City guilty of all charges relating to breaches of the league's financial rules over nine seasons, as well as three of four charges