john68 wrote:TED,
your point is not off topic mate...it is in fact the whole point.
The temporary and deliberate failure was necessary to allow us to earn the money to get into the position where we commercially complied with the conditions.
Job Sorted. (bar the unknown of the appeals process)
Fuckinell he's back !!
Nice to have you back matey.
My thoughts regarding this have always been that we would 'get round' it by sponsorship. I have always thought that the problem, if there is to be one, will come if Platini invokes his mysterious panel to try & tell us we are not allowed to use our sponsorship money as we see fit or that it is in some way a 'related party'.
If international standards do not see anything wrong with our deals then I don't believe we will accept Platini & a bunch of people with dodgy motives, telling us they have invented their own standard by which they can interfere with the running of our business.
I just don't see how they can have the authority or expertise to decide they are correct, compared to the rest of the world, who see nothing wrong in it. Basically they would be penalising us, because people such as the owners of Liverpool & Utd have asked them to, not because we are doing anything wrong.
I don't think we should accept any sanctions they give us in any case though, because there is a challenge taking place which, according to plenty of sports lawyers etc, has a decent chance of succeeding. UEFA are talking very confidently about the outcome of this but if you read around the net, well I can't find one single 'expert' who predicts UEFA winning the case. Basically they don't know.
The view appears to be that Striani and Dupont have a decent chance of winning the case, because they make fair & reasonable argument that the rules go unnecessarily far, to acheive their objective & are affecting people's livelihood, & trade between member states, when there is no need to. It's not a challenge to ffp at all, it's a challenge to the bit about people being able to invest money in clubs, which they also argue is counter productive to the actual objective & helps the established clubs stop competition.
Surely If we reserve the right to take action regarding sanctions in light of this challenge, UEFA could find themselves in a very dodgy position should we bomb out of the Champs League with a restricted squad , then find that their sanctions were actually illegal ? Might make them suspend the penalty in lieu of future good behaviour ?
Or perhaps they have already agreed to a suspended sanction, thus avoiding the whole thing ?