Manchester City will escape punishment from the 115 charges they face from the Premier League over financial irregularity.
Financial Fair Play regulations and the Premier League's own Profit and Sustainability rules (PSR) have dominated the news this season following Everton's 10-point deduction for failing to comply with the regulations before a further charge hit the Toffees and relegation rivals, Nottingham Forest.
At the Etihad Stadium, however, 115 charges over 10 years hang over the heads of Manchester City – but the champions are yet to be charged over the alleged breaches as the Premier League investigates.
Now, however, football finance expert Stefan Borson has told talkSPORT that while he believes City should be relegated if found guilty of misconduct, he believes it is going to be almost impossible to prove.
“It's hard to see how it can be any other way,” Borson said of the possibility of relegation during an interview with Jim White and Simon Jordan. “I don't think that the Premier League will be able to prove a case of this nature, I think it's a completely inappropriate forum for a case of this nature – but if proven, this is super serious. Nobody can argue with that. City themselves in their submissions, they will say that this is an allegation of the most serious nature.
“I think they'll clear their name because a case of this nature needs to have a level of cogent proof, which seems to me to be impossible to present to an independent commission.”
Borson insisted that given the scale of the allegations, it could be incredibly difficult to find everyone accused of being involved in such corruption.
“Furthermore, it seems to me highly unlikely that the conduct which is alleged has taken place over a 10-year period, with all sorts of individuals that are involved with the club,” Borsen, who advised City between 2001 and 2007, claimed.
“That is their starting point and it'll be a very big call for any quasi-court [or] tribunal to suggest that this number of people have been dishonest and have perjured themselves. That would be a massive call to make not just against Manchester City but against numerous executives, some third-party individuals and, of course, against senior members of foreign states.”
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