Manchester City reportedly explored a financial settlement with the Premier League before the guilty verdict was made public, but the discussions did not progress. According to Bloomberg, the two sides had been in talks over a substantial payment that could have brought the dispute to a close. That prospect disappeared quickly for one basic reason: City would not accept wrongdoing.<\/p>\n
The collapse of those talks came just before the Premier League confirmed City had been found guilty of inflating their finances by \u00a3900 million ($1.2 billion) between 2009 and 2018. Any punishment is expected to go well beyond a straightforward fine, leaving the club facing the possibility of sanctions that could still prove significant.<\/p>\n
This outcome sits alongside a long-running public position from the club. Since the charges were first brought nearly four years ago, City have consistently maintained that the matter would eventually be resolved in their favour. They have repeatedly said they possess \u201cirrefutable evidence\u201d to support their case, but the panel examining that evidence rejected their argument and found major rule breaches.<\/p>\n
Even after the verdict, City\u2019s stance has not shifted. The club continue to insist on their innocence, while manager Enzo Maresca echoed that confidence in his first press conference since the decision, describing the appeal as a matter of \u201cwhen,\u201d rather than if, the club succeed.<\/p>\n
If City overturn the verdict, there would be no sanctions at all. Their refusal to contemplate a settlement suggests the club remain convinced the final outcome can still be changed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
City reportedly rejected a settlement route before their guilty verdict, instead backing an appeal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21724,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[238],"tags":[1836,59,182],"class_list":["post-21725","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-city","tag-2026-27-premier-league","tag-featured","tag-transfers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21725","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21725"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21725\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}