Rodri breaks silence over Man City guilty verdict and possible punishment | Football

Rodri insists he believes Manchester City are innocent after the club were found guilty of breaking the Premier League’s financial rules.

On Friday, it emerged that City have been found guilty on all but one of the Premier League’s 115 charges following a decision by an independent panel.

City, who deny any wrongdoing, were initially charged in February 2023 with breaking financial rules over a nine-year period, dating from 2009 to 2018.

The Premier League has not yet decided on the sanctions, while City are expected to appeal the verdict as they could face a significant points deduction, a financial penalty or even relegation.

Rodri, who won 12 major trophies including four Premier League titles during his time at City, believes the team’s success on the pitch is not related to the financial rule breaches.

The 30-year-old, who joined Barcelona in the summer, also claims he received full reassurance from City’s hierarchy that the club had not broken any Premier League rules.

Man City’s 115 charges in full

Failure to provide accurate and up-to-date financial information (2009-2018) – 54 charges

Failure to provide accurate financial reports for player and manager compensation (2009-2018) – 14 charges

Failure to comply with UEFA’s regulations, including Financial Fair Play Regulations – 5 charges

Breaching Premier League Profitability and Sustainability regulations (2015-2018) – 7 charges

Failure to co-operate with Premier League investigations (2018-2023) – 35 charges

When asked about the verdict on Friday evening, Rodri said: ‘We have faced something similar back in 2020, we’ve had a similar judicial process, a different accusation but similar process, and in the first instance we were found guilty but we believed in the club, we believed in the innocence that the club maintained and we ended up being acquitted, so I believe in the justice system and I believe in the innocence of the club.

‘We always try to think in a positive day. When you live daily in that club and all the people’s hard work all these years to have all the success we had, not only Pep [Guardiola] and the players, all the structure from the owners to the guys who work daily, what we did they cannot take it out of us.

‘It’s not something paid by money, it’s effort, partnership, being shoulder to shoulder every day, and we had a lot of successful years.

‘I can only tell you everything was deserved and I’m glad I could leave one of the best eras of English football.

What punishment could Man City face?

The Premier League does not have set sanctions for financial rule breaches which means City could face a points deduction, a fine, or even expulsion from the top flight.

In 2024, Everton were deducted six and then two points for breaching the Premier League’s Profitability and Sustainability Rules.

In that same year, Nottingham Forest were deducted four points.

In 2020, UEFA banned City from competing in Europe for two seasons for ‘overstating its sponsorship revenue in its accounts’.

City immediately submitted an appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and their two-year ban was overturned.

CAS also reduced City’s €30 million (£25m) fine to €10m (£8.9m) after finding that ‘most of the alleged breaches reported were either not established or time-barred’.

‘They [City’s hierarchy] always told us the confidence they had of the innocence. When you look in someone’s eyes and they’re talking in that way, we had the example in 2020 that the process was the same and in the end nothing happened.

‘We were very calm in this way, we never saw the team nervous about these things.

‘Nowadays, I’m not saying it’s normal but many teams go through this kind of situation, it’s part of football today, everyone has to follow the rules but they always expressed the confidence that they never did anything wrong and we believe in that.

‘Until the moment they are proved wrong we will believe the club. I’ve been there and I know how they work and how they co-operate, that’s what I can tell you.’

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