City face €60m Uefa sanctions over FFP
City, who are still strongly challenging the settlement offer from Uefa, are also facing a freeze on their Champions League A squad’s wage bill.
The reduction in the size of the Champions League squad to 21 would potentially hit the club hardest, and City would also have to ensure that there are still eight locally-trained players in that A squad.
At least four of those would have to be trained by the club itself and four others at other English clubs. For the current season, City only named seven locally-trained players and so could only have a 24-man A squad.
If they were only able to name seven next season then their squad would be down to 20 if the proposed sanction applies.
It is understood the sanctions are very similar to those being handed to Paris St-Germain — the two clubs are among nine European sides being dealt with by Uefa’s club financial control board (CFCB) for financial fair play breaches.
City racked up losses of €182.8m over the last two years, with Uefa only permitting a €45m deficit.
Although some of those losses can be written off, for example any money spent on facilities or youth development, the club was still judged to be well in breach of the limit.
City have until the end of the week to reach an agreement with Uefa over the sanctions — but it is understood they are the club furthest away from reaching any final settlement.
If no agreement is reached, the club have until the end of the week to agree to the sanctions or face the case being handed to a panel for a non-negotiable decision.
The risk, however, is that if City are unable to agree a deal with Uefa then they could face even stiffer sanctions from the CFCB’s adjudicatory panel.
Both City and Paris St-Germain are believed to have fallen foul of the FFP rules with sponsorship deals related to each clubs’ owners.
Qatar-owned PSG have a back-dated deal with the Qatar Tourist Authority which is worth up to €200m a year.
French newspaper L’Equipe has reported that Uefa has ruled the QTA deal should only be valued at half that sum.
Abu Dhabi-owned City’s related deal with Etihad is significantly smaller at a €48.7m a year deal, but the club’s accounts also revealed a number of other related party transactions.
Uefa has said it is still to be decided what will happen with any money raised from fines for FFP breaches.
