Man City and Chelsea should be shaking in their boots after Everton punishment
The six clubs that plotted a breakaway that could have destroyed the Premier League - and the very fabric of English football - were punished with a combined fine of £22million.
One club that has admitted breaches of the competition's financial regulations - but asked for mitigating circumstances to be taken into consideration - has had TEN POINTS deducted and its top-flight future put in serious jeopardy. When contemplating the scale of the punishment handed out to Everton Football Club, consider that comparison. Quite simply, it is warped.
Scared of the Big Six - big and brave when dealing with harmless, old Everton. It is believed other clubs lobbied the Premier League to take harsh action against Everton. They are probably the same clubs who kowtow to the Big Six because they are frightened they will cut their share of television deals.
Yep, the rap given on the knuckles of Manchester City, Manchester United, Spurs, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool was £22million. City have just announced annual revenue in excess of £700million.
Their share of the fine for the Super League plot was the sort of amount they might leave as a decent meal tip. This is the same City, of course, who have 115 Premier League charges against them, many of which allege non-compliance with Premier League investigations.
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Everton have transgressed - and admitted the transgression - but they have played ball with the Premier League and its investigators every step of the way. They have worked closely with the Premier League, pleaded various elements of mitigation … and been hammered.
Let’s wait and see what happens to City. Perhaps Everton should have shelled out £5,000 an hour for Lord Pannick to kick the charges into the long grass. The details of the breaches of the profit and sustainability rules are complex but one of the main areas of contention is whether interest charges on loans financing the building of Everton’s next home were admissible.
Sean Dyche's Everton have been handed a 10-point deduction by the Premier League (Getty Images)And the broad point on that issue is that the new stadium at Bramley Moore Dock will be a magnificent enhancement to English football. That is why it will host Euro 2028 matches. Shouldn’t clubs be encouraged to develop these types of arenas, rather than hindered?
Everton’s losses over a three-year period were, at £372million, glaringly excessive - £250million over Premier League guidelines. But the club’s financial predicament has not been helped by losing sponsorship money because of sanctions against Russia, by cancelling a valuable player’s contract, by Covid.
Quite rightly, the club will point out that they have, over the past four transfer windows, tried to redress the balance and have a net spend of -£28million in that period. Co-operating with investigations clearly gets you nowhere - that is probably why others don’t bother.
The Premier League will, of course, point out it is the verdict of an independent commission but who, ultimately, has responsibility for appointing this independent commission?
There is no independent regulator yet. Everton deserved punishment and a financial penalty and a small points deduction or a suspended sporting sanction would have been wholly appropriate (just as the Big Six have been told they will be deducted 30 points if they do it again). But this punishment is shocking in its severity. If they are not, Manchester City and Chelsea should be shaking in their boots.
But as part of that self-styled Big Six, they are probably not.
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