Uefa’s financial fair play rules watered down at Soccerex – good news for City!

According to reports, the European Club Association (replacement for fans favourite, the G14)  have won several concessions in the “financial fair play” rules being brought in by Uefa. Rather than applying from 2012 onwards, the rules will now be phased in between 2012 and 2015, with Uefa assessing club’s finances over a rolling 3 year period.

Money from benefactors, such as Sheikh Mansour, to underwrite transfer spending and wages was to have been banned but will now be permitted within limits. Unfortunately these have not been specified, so we’ll just have to wait and see what the figure is.

Investment will have to come in the form of equity rather than loans, which is ok for City. There will be no restriction on investment in youth academies and stadiums.

Uefa had wanted the rules to apply to only clubs with annual revenue greater than 50 million euros, but this has been scrapped.

Clubs will need to break-even over a three-year period to be allowed to particiapate in the Champions League and Europa League from 2015.  These agreements don’t apply to the Premier League, who have been arguing against limiting the investment from benefactors.

Whilst it’s good news for City to see Uefa’s initial proposals watered down, there is still a need for the club to drastically increase it’s revenues if we’re to compete at the highest level. Regardless of who owns United, our revenues are barely a third of theirs, while Arsenal’s matchday revenues for 2008/09 were £100m compared to our £20m.

Getting into the Champions League and expanding the ground will be a great start, but there’s still a lot of work to do for Garry Cook and co.

Karl-Heinz Rummenigge:

“I recognise that the Premier League is No1 in the world. That won’t change because they are doing a good job here in England and that is good for football because we need clubs like Manchester United, like Chelsea, like Liverpool and like the ‘new’ Manchester City.”