LONDON: Manchester City should be expelled from the Premier League (EPL) after being found guilty of breaching financial regulations, the club’s former chairman, David Bernstein, has said.
City were found to have arranged ‘fake’ contracts with several commercial partners to ‘increase the club’s income and reduce costs over a period of nine seasons between 2009 and 2018.
The scheme concealed their true financial position and allowed City to avoid breaching spending limits set by the EPL and UEFA.
The independent commission also found the club guilty of the majority of charges relating to their failure to cooperate with the league’s investigation.
However, no punishment has been imposed so far and City, which has the support of Abu Dhabi, said they would appeal the decision.
But Bernstein, who was City’s chairman from 1998 to 2003, believes the Etihad Stadium-based club deserves the harshest punishment.
“It was completely unexpected. The first thing I thought was, should the board of directors continue to work? Should the individuals involved be suspended immediately?
“It’s very serious. I think it’s really bad. There’s a view among lawyers that the approach is to deny, deny and keep denying, but this is a football club that is part of the league and the whole credibility of the league is now at stake.
“The punishment cannot be just financial, so it has to be much more severe than that. If the appeal fails, Manchester City cannot stay in the league, they must accept the consequences. And I say that as a supporter and a fan,” Bernstein told the BBC.