Manchester City have been found guilty of 114 of their 115 financial charges, and now the Premier League are waiting to see what will happen next.
Of course, as Manchester City’s main rivals in recent years, Arsenal have a keen eye on this situation, especially as the idea of stripping City of their titles has been floated.
Arsenal will be keen to see what happens with City as they do stand to benefit from this guilty verdict.
However, there could still be another twist in the tale according to top City journalist, Sam Lee, speaking on the Let Me Talk Podcast.
As an Arsenal fan, what punishment do you think Man City deserve?
Fine, relegation, stripped titles? What do we think?
Man City still confident of appeal process.
Speaking on the Let Me Talk Podcast, Lee shared his understanding of City’s current situation.
The journalist says that this situation reminds him of City’s Champions League ban in 2020, which was eventually overturned, claiming that, internally, the club remain confident that everything will be ok.
Interestingly, Lee says he, personally, isn’t as confident as he was six years ago about this situation being overturned, but as for the club, it’s business as usual.
“Do you remember in 2020? Obviously they got banned from the Champions League, and everyone was, like, ‘well, they’re definitely guilty, they’ve definitely done it,” Lee began.
“And then a few days pass, Pep does a press conference, there’s more stuff comes out from the club, and you think, oh, maybe there’s more to run.
“Do you remember I was always saying, City are very defiant publicly, but from what they’re saying behind closed doors, that’s genuinely what they believe.
“This isn’t just like a PR thing. It’s not a press thing. They genuinely do believe this. They genuinely are telling their own people this.
“That was in 2020. From what I can make out, it’s still the same. I have to say I’m less confident that they’re going to, like, overturn it on appeal than I would have been six years ago, because it just feels like, you know, this 114 element and 99% and all that.
“It feels like they’re really on the canvas here. They’re 5-0 down at half-time, it seems. But it’s not like they’re in-house going, Yeah, we’re screwed here. We need to batten down the hatches. They are just the same as they were before. There’s a long way to go on this.
City’s appeal process could take years to finalise, and, to be honest, given the power of those involved, you wouldn’t be shocked if this did get overturned and everything just blew over, exactly as it did in 2020.
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