Mourinho Jokes Man City Case May Outlast Him; Appeal Decision Expected by Mid-January

Since the Premier League's independent commission found Manchester City guilty last week on 114 of 115 charges, the club has appealed, and the long timeline ahead is now the main talking point. Real Madrid manager Jose Mourinho added to it on Thursday, Oct. 8.

Asked about the verdict in an interview with Italy's Corriere dello Sport, Mourinho chose humor. "I would rather laugh about it," he said.

"I think we will eventually get an ending, but we are both in our 60s, and we'll need to be lucky enough to still be around when the final verdict arrives. There will be a verdict, then appeals, then more appeals."

Mourinho has a personal stake in the story. He managed Manchester United from 2016 to 2018 and finished second to City in 2017-18, a season inside the period the commission examined.

What the commission found and what happens next

The commission found City in breach of Premier League financial rules covering the 2009-10 through 2017-18 seasons. It also found the club guilty on three of four charges of failing to cooperate with the investigation.

The Premier League says City used "sham" commercial agreements to inflate revenue and understate costs by more than £900 million over nearly a decade. That produced inaccurate financial reporting and breaches of spending rules, the league says.

City says it is innocent. The club lodged its appeal at 7pm on Thursday, Oct. 1, and said in a statement that the commission's opinion "contains clear material errors, of law, principle and fact and is unsafe."

The club also said "a comprehensive body of irrefutable evidence exists in support of all of its positions." It added that it will "continue to respect due process" and is restricted in what it can say until proceedings finish.

None of that has been tested publicly. The appeal will be heard in private, so outsiders will not see City's evidence or the Premier League's response in real time.

The timeline

A new three-person independent panel will oversee the appeal. The process is expected to run until later this year, with a final decision expected by mid-January, according to the Mirror.

No sanction has been announced. It is also unclear whether any penalty would be imposed before the appeal is heard, or whether a punishment would take effect immediately.

The Mirror reports the possible outcomes range from a fine and a points deduction to stripped titles or expulsion from the Premier League. Those are possibilities, not decisions.

That gap is the practical problem for everyone else. If titles were ever removed, rivals would argue over who should be awarded them. Al Jazeera reports there is a growing feeling that stripped titles should go to the nearest rivals or beaten finalists from the period investigated.

Anfield on Sunday

The nearest test is on the pitch. City are top of the Premier League with 15 points from five matches and are chasing a sixth successive league win. They travel to Liverpool on Sunday, Oct. 11, their first league match since the verdict.

Liverpool's grievance has a wrinkle. Al Jazeera notes that the club's two closest title races with City came after 2018, the last season covered by the charges. Whether any outcome would touch those seasons is not established.

None of that is expected to soften the welcome. Former Manchester United captain Gary Neville told The Overlap podcast, "If they want an understanding of how angry the game is going to be, then Anfield will tell them like you would never believe."

He added: "I suspect there may be banners, there will certainly be chanting... it will be a brutal day."

City manager Enzo Maresca is preparing a squad that has to play through the noise while the legal case stays unresolved.

What is still open

The core dispute is simple. The Premier League says the commission's findings are backed by evidence of sham deals. City says the opinion is legally and factually flawed and that its own evidence clears it.

The appeal panel is the next place that dispute gets decided. Until it rules, expected by mid-January, City keep playing, and no sanction exists to enforce. Whether any penalty applies in the meantime is the open question.