Rob Manfred should take notes because this is how you punish a team that cheats.
UEFA has banned English powerhouse Manchester City from European competition for the next two years and fined it $43 million for repeated violations of FIFA’s Financial Fair Play laws.
That is simply stunning, especially coming from a organization that rarely bares its teeth when meting out punishments. There have been transfer bans in the past, sure, but this is next level.
The fine itself is pretty hefty, but you also shouldn’t underestimate how much money City gets from playing in Champions League – upwards of $100 million per season. Even with an oil sheikh owner who has no shortage of cash, that’s a lot of it to be missing out on.
Also, to make matters worse, this might not be it in terms of punishment. Now, that UEFA has found that City has broken the rules, FA can come in with its own measures.
How bad could it get? Well, reports are that it could range from simply docking the Sky Blues points in the table – which is pretty pointless considering how far back they are from Liverpool and there’s no sense competing for a top-four spot now – to sending the club all the way to League Two – the fourth-tier of English football.
An appeal from City will surely be heard, but even reducing the European exclusion to one season is still a pretty devastating hit.
This leaves us with two big questions: What happens now and what happens this summer?
With City sitting in second place and well on its way to secure a presumptive spot in next season’s Champions League, we’ll now see the team finishing in fifth place take that highly lucrative place. Sitting there now is Tottenham, but there are now four teams separated by three points competing for two Champions League places – including fourth-place Chelsea, Sheffield United and Manchester United. This should make for an even wilder race down the stretch and any true sports fan should be rooting for the up-and-coming Blades to steal a spot for the high-priced clubs.
There’s also Champions League itself to talk about. Manchester City faces Real Madrid in a round-of-16 barnburner and you know it’ll have all hands on deck for that tie.
With the Premier League race no longer really mattering to Pep Guardiola and Co., it’s easy to imagine the manager resting his players in the Premier League and going all-out to win the Champions League before being sidelined for two years.
But, win or lose, will there be a mass exodus from the Etihad this summer? Guardiola is one of the best managers in the game and could work anywhere he chooses. Without the biggest prize in club football available to him at City, will he stay?
The players of the Citizens’ star-studded roster won’t be thrilled about missing out on potential millions from playing under the brightest lights, either. Could we see Kevin de Bruyne or Raheem Sterling make their exits? Key winger Bernardo Silva has already expressed his desire to return to Portugal one day. What about all-time leading scorer Sergio Aguero, who has been in Manchester since 2011?
What is for certain is that this ban will make recruiting star players much harder. Without the carrot of Champions League and the bonuses – both financially and exposure-wise – that it provides, players won’t exactly be lining up to join the cause.
The final interesting report involving this mess is that City might still have a move to make: Turn snitch.
According to The Athletic, City has been keeping an eye on the finances of their biggest rivals in Europe and surely wouldn’t balk at trying to take down anyone that they could with them. There are a few clubs that are surely biting their nails after seeing the Sky Blues get nailed.
PLAYER OF THE WEEK(S)
Last season, while playing in Ligue 1, Nicolas Pepe was putting up numbers that rivaled Lionel Messi. This season at Arsenal, he hasn’t lived up to the weight of expectations.
But for one week at least, Pepe shined, scoring a goal and picking up two assists against Newcastle.
The French winger’s production has been spotty at best, registering just three goals and three assists this season coming into the game. He has dealt with some injuries but has yet to really justify his lofty price tag.
Whether or not he can perform like this with some consistency will go a long way towards the Gunners’ success in the near future.
AROUND THE LEAGUE
From the file of interesting stats that are ultimately meaningless: Trent Alexander-Arnold had conceded possession 736 times heading into Saturday’s game, which is 237 more than any player in Europe’s top five leagues. Of course, this counts every corner, free kick and cross that is headed away, and TAA is quite prolific in sending balls into the box … Sadio Mane wasted no time in his return from injury, scoring as a substitute against Norwich. Good to see the winger return after costing fantasy owners dearly during Liverpool’s double-gameweek two weeks ago … Norwich’s 18 points heading into its game with Liverpool were the same amount that the Reds had after the first six games of the season. But the Canaries didn’t back down despite the incredible mismatch … I understand the need for this “Winter break” in the Premier League but my God is it brutal for fans. With just one game in every timeslot and no games in the usually jam-packed 10 a.m. ET Saturday slot, it made from some frustrating times for soccer junkies the past two weeks. Of course, the players and coaches do deserve their “bye” week, but this needs to be organized much better and the postponement of WestHam-Man City last week didn’t help … It’s mid-February and Liverpool has already clinched its Champions League spot for next season. That’s pretty ironic when you consider its closest rival was just eliminated from next year’s competition … Odion Ighalo became the 200th player to feature for Manchester United in a Premier League game and the first Nigerian. We’re still questioning whether bringing him back from China is a good idea though, especially if a reported deal for Bournemouth’s Josh King was on the table … The Premier League will go back to the same transfer window deadline day as the rest of Europe this summer. The experiment of closing it and setting rosters before the season-opener was a nice idea, but ultimately failed because the other major leagues didn’t go along with it. This put PL clubs at a disadvantage where they could lose a player to a European club and not be able to replace them with an incoming transfer … Spurs took yet another hit to their attack this week, losing Heung-Min Son after the South Korean underwent surgery on a broken arm. That leaves Jose Mourinho without Son, Harry Kane and Christian Eriksen, who was sold to Inter Milan. The north London club is going to have to rely a lot on Dele Alli, Lucas Moura and newcomer Steven Bergwijn going forward.
THE LAST WORD
For all the complaints that we have about VAR, one of them is rarely that it misses something big. In fact, most of the time it catches too many things – a toe offside, a push off a defender that rules out a goal, a ticky-tacky foul in the buildup of play.
But in the case of Harry Maguire in Manchester United’s win over Chelsea, it was a clear-as-day foul that should’ve had the Red Devils captain seeing a red card.
Frankly, Maguire’s kick to Michy Batshuayi’s groin should have probably been caught live, without need for VAR, but even with the aid of video review, it went unpunished in-game.
We’ve seen kick-outs like this punished by VAR, with Tottenham’s Son seeing red on a review. But it’s jaw-dropping to see a major call like this missed.
Sure, Maguire could see a retroactive ban, but a 2-0 result in United’s favour will sting for the Blues in this tight race for Champions League places.