Has equality truly been distorted in the world of sports? We all know the classic example of a referee who might hold some favoritism for their favorite team, but what if inequality was present in a “textbook” case?
The Premier League is the top division of soccer in England. The commission of this league enforces FFP rules (financial fair play rules) in order to stop more financially privileged teams from taking the power of the sport away from the pitch and into the hands of billionaire investors. On paper, these rules are decently effective and create a much more equal playing field. However, this is not the case when these rules are put into practice.
One team that has taken advantage of the faulty guidelines is Man City. This is a team that has been known for their lucrative spending ever since they were taken over by billionaire, Sheikh Mansour. In the past, Many City have been found guilty of many FFP violations but have simply just paid the fines instead of facing the penalties.
(Sheikh Mansour on the left)
This is the first clear fault of the FFP rules. For a team like Man City, a $10 million fine is barely an expense when they have a yearly budget of close to a billion dollars. However, for smaller teams, a $10 million fine can completely ruin that team’s season and potentially send that team into economic turmoil.
The second major fault of these rules is their real-world application and bias. Everton is also a team in the Premier League but is smaller than Man City. In November of 2023, Everton were found guilty of one violation of an FFP rule. As punishment, they were deducted 10 points and therefore sent close to the bottom of the league standing, risking potential relegation from the league. For Everton, this deduction is worth more points than automatically losing three games.
While many may contest that this deduction of points is fair, that is not the controversy that I wish to shine some light on. Man City is currently under investigation for over 115 breaches of the FFP rules and absolutely no points have been deducted.
As of today, Man City and their board have refused to cooperate with the Premier League and have not even been pressured to do so. The Premier League is now strongly considering backing off and letting these 115 violations “slide.”
The question that many fans now have is: why was Everton given such a harsh penalty for 1 violation and Man City received absolutely no penalty for over 115 violations? It seems that the league simply cares a lot more about top teams because they are the real money-makers. If the league were to make Man City unhappy by deducting points or banning them, they would lose millions, if not billions of dollars in viewership profits.
Sadly, the world of soccer is once again shifting in the direction of money=power.
Thank you and have a wonderful day.
Wow, this blatant skirting of the rules is absolutely infuriating. But once again, we see this common pattern where those with money can do whatever they want. This reminds me of the case in Formula 1 where teams like Mercedes and Red Bull with incredibly deep pockets are able to do so much more and get away with so much more than smaller teams like Williams Racing. How do even begin to fight this corruption however? No one can contest it but no one is willing to do anything about it. Maybe team budget caps could potentially help.