By Andrew Warshaw
April 29- Uefa are refusing to confirm that big-spending Manchester City and Paris St-Germain are facing sanctions for breaching financial fair play (FFP) rules.
Around 20 clubs are known to have failed to meet Uefa’s strict criteria and are being made settlement offers in terms of sanctions depending on how great the losses incurred are.
Reports circulating in the UK suggest that City and PSG, bankrolled by Abu Dhabi and Qatar backers respectively, are among those who have been offered such settlements ahead of this week’s meeting of Investigatory Chamber of Uefa’s Club Financial Control Body.
The clubs in breach must now decide whether to accept the punishments offered to them – most likely fines and reprimands but possibly also being ordered to impose a squad salary cap– or appeal within 10 days to the CFCB’s higher adjudication panel.
Uefa have promised to name and shame clubs who failed break-even rules in early May – apart from those who have asked to take their cases to the adjudicatory panel for a final decision in June.
Uefa has made its first FFP rulings based on club accounts from the past two seasons – 2011-12 and 2012-13. Under this monitoring period, total losses of €45m were permitted as long as club owners could cover such amounts.
Although no clubs are in danger of being excluded from the Champions League, their image in terms of the way they do business will certainly be questioned once Uefa announces the names of those who failed to sufficiently balance the books.
City, who have franchises in both the United States and Australia, posted combined losses of £149m for the last two seasons – £97m in 2012 and £51.6m in 2013 and have been accused in some quarters of “creative accounting” as have PSG for wiping out losses after allegedly backdating a huge sponsorship deal with the Qatar Tourist Authority.
Uefa boss Michel Platini, who conceived ffp, last week said he was unsure if such an “innovative” arrangement by PSG was playing by the rules. “Is it viable?” he asked.