No sooner had the article in The Australian reporting on the two-year ban by UEFA of Manchester City from European competition appeared, then some in Australian football sprung into action highlighting that one of the men whose emails are widely quoted in the case is Simon Pearce of City Football Group (CFG). 

Pearce, who is deputy Chairman of Melbourne City, is largely credited with spearheading the action to bring Constitutional change to Football Federation Australia (FFA) and upending the 15-year reign of the Lowy family. 

Since then, he is said to have brought in CFG specialists to advise local A-League clubs on how to develop the A-League once (or if) separation happens. He is the person who convinced former English Premier League chief executive, Richard Scudamore, to provide some expert consultancy services to the owners. And he is essentially the poster boy for everything some in the football community delight in hating about the A-League.

CFG has not denied the veracity of the emails that first appeared in Der Spiegel magazine in Germany. 

David Conn, writing in The Guardian UK, sets out the grounds for the UEFA decision, including CFG’s response.

Conn notes that the CFG are not supporters of UEFA’s financial fair play (FFP) rules – which is a type of salary cap on steroids - and they have previously been fined for breaking them, along with Paris St Germain in 2014. The Chairman of CFG, Khaldoon al-Mubarak (who is Pearce’s boss) sees FFP “as a restraint of … freedom to rebuild City by pouring money in”. In other words, if clubs can afford to spend the money, why shouldn’t they be able to do so? 

Appeal to CAS

CFG indicated in a statement early on Saturday morning Australian time that they intend appealing to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in the hope of an “impartial judgement”. 

The final paragraph of their statement makes reference to UEFA being the initiator, prosecutor and judge in the case – a situation that is flawed but common in most sport. 

Football has often beaten its chest in pride about its judicial processes, and FIFA’s and UEFA’s statutes include a requirement for organisations to defer to, and comply with, non-independent, internal judicial processes. 

It is precisely this situation, for example, why a process such as the ‘Garcia Inquiry’ into the 2018/2022 World Cup bidding contests that ran from 2012 to 2014 was also a “busted flush” of a process (to quote myself from my book): there is simply no independence when a body (FIFA) pays money to an individual (Garcia) who chairs a committee created and populated by FIFA to investigate itself (FIFA). 

Whether CAS will deliver the independence CFG seeks is another matter also, as its members are also mostly comprised of nominees from the various international sporting organisations which have a vested interest in ensuring the judicial system works for the benefit of the sport that put them there. The fact that the CFG statement refers to the CAS appeal “in the first instance” suggests they may well take the matter even further if they can.

Independence of UEFA and the role of Nasser Al-Khelaifi

However, CFG’s claims about independence of UEFA also goes to its executive committee which includes the mega-wealthy Nasser Al-Khelaifi of Qatar, owner of PSG and BeIN Sports.

Al-Khelaifi was the person behind the $100 million ‘production contribution’ promised by BeIN Sports to FIFA in October 2010 if Qatar won the 2022 World Cup, which I first revealed exclusively in my book. 

In November 2010, then French President Nicolas Sarkozy hosted a meal at the Elysee Palace, attended by the man who is now the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim, a close friend of Al-Khelaifi, and then UEFA President Michel Platini. This meeting is said to have been crucial in Platini moving his vote (and the other voters in his bloc) from the USA to Qatar for the 2022 tournament. This matter remains the subject of Swiss investigations.

Al-Khelaifi purchased PSG, the club of Sarkozy and Platini, in October 2011. 

Al-Khelaifi has been indicted by the French in respect of Doha’s staging of the 2017 and 2019 World Athletics Championships. 

Al-Khelaifi is also on the executive committee of UEFA and BeIN Sports is the biggest purchase of UEFA TV rights. 

He was nominated to that position by the German FA which itself has been the subject of a number of investigations into bidding and other alleged financial malfeasance going back as far as 1999 related to the 2006 World Cup. 

Hacked material

The other point made repeatedly by CFG is that the material was obtained illegally by Rui Pinto of Portugal. 

Pinto is the man behind the ‘Football Leaks’ website – a collection of large stash of 3.4 terabytes of data that he allegedly obtained from hacking the websites of player agents, clubs, players and others. This is estimated to be equivalent to 70 million individual documents. 

He is currently in a Portuguese prison facing 147 charges related to “attempted qualified extortion, violation of secrecy and illegally accessing information”. 

I take a long look at Pinto and the claims about his status for another publication that will be available soon, but suffice to say a lone wolf hacker does not have the capacity or know-how to hack 3.4 terabytes of material. 

It is what it is

None of this is to deny the CFG emails or the evidence that UEFA is relying upon to show that Manchester City broke UEFA’s rules. 

What it does is highlight a possible context to CFG's reaction and its position - as well as the continuing murky subterranean machinations of world football. 

What it means for Australian football remains to be seen. 

Categories: Analysis | Football Business | Australian Football | World Football

Tags: city football group, simon pearce, nasser al-khelaifi, uefa, manchester city

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