August 25 – Manchester City chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak (pictured) said his club wants to make peace with UEFA following the bitter legal battle over financial fair play, saying life’s too short to carry grudges.
Last month, City won their appeal at the Court of Arbitration for Sport against a two-year ban imposed by UEFA for alleged “serious breaches” of Financial Fair Play (FFP) regulations but were nevertheless fined €10 million for failing to co-operate with the UEFA investigation.
Al Mubarak was convinced from day one that the club obeyed the rules and says it now wants to develop a “constructive relationship” with European football’s governing body.
In an interview with the club’s website, he held out a peace offering to UEFA.
“Life is too short to carry grudges,” Al Mubarak said. “It’s behind us, end of story as far as I am concerned, I am focused on one thing. How I can help this club compete in this competition (Champions League) and win it and how to have a constructive relationship with UEFA, I think it’s the only way to go.”
City are still striving to get beyond the quarterfinals having once again come up short this season. “It is an important competition,” said al Mubarak. “It is one of the most prestigious competitions in the world of sports and it is a competition we want to win and it is a competition we have to respect in order to win.”
Meanwhile, UEFA President Aleksander Ceferin, commenting on the case for the first time, said he was “not happy” that City’s ban from European competition was overturned.
UEFA’s view was that City disguised the source of at least €204 million of income as sponsorships from companies linked to its Abu Dhabi ownership. But CAS threw the claim out.
“Nobody wants to lose a case,” Ceferin told The Associated Press. “We were not happy with the decision of Court of Arbitration for Sport. But we have to respect the decision of the body that we agreed is the last instance in our decision-making process.”
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