Club with record profits v club charged with record FFP breaches
Two clubs with contrasting approaches to financial management meet at the Amex as record-breaking profit makers Brighton host the great sportswashing project which is Manchester City, whose name is stained with 115 charges for breaching financial fair play rules.
£122.8 million was the headline number from the Albion’s accounts, released last month. Brighton are currently the model for a Premier League club. Signing young players, developing them, selling them on and yet still managing to challenge for a European place.
115 is the headline number which will cast a shadow over City, even if Abu Dhabi do hire the best lawyers in the world or bully decision makers into letting them off the hook.
There will forever now be doubt over whether all they achieved was done via cheating. The charges against City are far more serious than those which have seen Everton and Nottingham Forest deducted points.
The Toffees and Tricky Trees broke profit and sustainability rules by racking up bigger losses than allowed. Their own submitted accounts told us as much.
City’s 115 charges relate to submitting fraudulent figures over a sustained period to pass PSR. To win its case, the Premier League has to prove this. It is not as simple as the rule breaking being there in black and white on a balance sheet.
The reason Manchester City will be so keen to challenge any punishment or tie the case up in technicalities so it drags on for years is because being found guilty is a disaster for the reputation of the football club.
By association, this means it is a disaster for the reputation of Abu Dhabi. Which is the complete opposite of why Sheikh Mansour bought City in the first place.
Yes, our favourite subject here at WAB – sportswashing. By owning City, Abu Dhabi hopes its name will be associated with the transformation of an historic English club, brilliant football played under Pep Guardiola by some of the best players of the world and lots of trophies.
Rather than its human rights record, practices of modern day slavery, role in the war in Yemen and treatment of the LGBTQ+ community.
Those attempts to make the world ignore the bad stuff about Abu Dhabi because it owns the best football team in the world will be out the window if it is found City are only the best football team in the world due to cheating.
The visit of a Manchester City side with 115 FFP charges hanging over them serves as a timely reminder that this is what Brighton are competing against in the Premier League.
Clubs like City and Newcastle United, backed by billions of petrodollars. Chelsea and their more-money-than-sense American owners. Manchester United. Liverpool.
Even Arsenal are now spending over £100 million on a single player after years of being frugal whilst reducing the debt from building the Emirates.
It might feel disappointing that the 2023-24 has gone off the rails in recent months, but is it really a surprise? Clubs with far greater resources can build deeper, higher quality squads capable of competing on multiple fronts and dealing with lengthy injury lists.
Brighton cannot do that. To have beaten Liverpool, Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea and taken a point off City last season on the way to being the sixth best team in England now looks an even greater achievement than it did at the time.
What chance do the Albion have of repeating their 1-1 Amex draw against Manchester City this time around? Very little if we are being honest.
Roberto De Zerbi is minus nine players, the latest injury news being that Evan Ferguson and Pervis Estupinan are now out for the season.
Brighton need a full strength side playing at the top of their game to have a chance against the champions. So many absentees makes it nigh-on impossible to compete.
The injury situation again highlights the disparity between the Albion and Manchester City. Much has been made about Erling Haaland being ruled out.
Great news for Brighton, you might initially think. Then you remember the Seagulls still have Kevin De Bruyne, Bernardo Silva, Julian Alvarez, Jack Grealish, Rodri, Jeremy Doku and Phil Foden to worry about. Foden who seems to score every time he faces Brighton.
One injury to a key player does not impact City because they have spent the money to build a squad which can cope with it.
Whether they only had that money to spend under FFP due to submitting fraudulent figures, we will hopefully find out soon.
Brighton meanwhile lose Kaoru Mitoma and their points-per-game and goals-per-game ratios drop off considerably. It is not a level playing field, even before you consider clubs who break the rules.
Football though remains a game of hope. And there is hope the Albion could upset City. Would it not be Typical Brighton to bounce back from a 1-1 draw at Burnley and one of the worst performances of the season by defeating the champions?
Losing to an out-of-form Albion with almost an entire starting XI would be almost as embarrassing as being found guilty of cheating FFP.
