Manchester City celebrated their latest coronation as Premier League champions for the third time in three years, and fifth time in six seasons. They are becoming an annual occurrence under Pep Guardiola’s team. However, their latest success has been met with apathy and suspicion in equal measure away from this blue corner of Manchester. The team’s dominance has been taken with a grain of salt, as they are under the cloud of more than 100 Premier League charges for allegedly breaching financial regulations. If found guilty, City faces punishments ranging from fines and points deductions to expulsion from the league. Therefore, the stakes are incredibly high.
On the one hand, Guardiola’s team is arguably the best the Premier League has ever seen. They decimate opponents with ruthless consistency, playing a brand of football that makes them unbeatable on their day. Just ask Real Madrid, the reigning European champions, who were destroyed in a 4-0 Champions League semifinal second leg last Wednesday.
City are accused of 50 breaches of providing inaccurate financial information, eight breaches in relation to manager remuneration from 2009 to 2013, 12 breaches in relation to player remuneration from 2010 to 2015, five breaches linked to UEFA financial regulations, 25 profitability and sustainability breaches, and 30 breaches of assisting the Premier League investigation, which dates back to March 2019. Until they clear their name, the risk of being bracketed alongside Lance Armstrong remains.
Their Dominance
The investigation against the club is a matter of fact, but there is also no question of jealousy from rival clubs and supporters towards City’s success. They are now dominating as Manchester United did in the 1990s and 2000s and Liverpool in the 1970s and 1980s. They are playing the best football in the world, employing the best manager, and their team is stocked with superstars, including Erling Haaland and Kevin De Bruyne.
Guardiola made nine changes to the side that beat Real Madrid in the match against Chelsea. He rested virtually all of his best players to the extent that he had £475 million of talent on the bench. The presence of three homegrown local boys on the pitch is a testament to the club also developing the best talent who cost nothing in transfer fees.
City has won the Premier League for a third year in a row, and they have done the same at Under-21 and Under-18 level, dominating at every level. Money obviously helps, but City has also hired the best coaches and administrators, and that depth of talent is as big a factor in their success as the quality of players on the pitch.
Their rivals might cast doubt on how City has funded their era of dominance, but they simply have to find a way to overcome them on and off the pitch where, for two years running, City has topped the Deloitte Football Money League as the club with the biggest commercial revenue in the game. They now have the opportunity next season to become the first team in English football history to win four successive titles.
If they go on to win the FA Cup and Champions League this season, completing the treble, Guardiola’s team will earn their place in the history books while hoping that an asterisk is not applied to them in the years to come. From a purely football perspective, this team is in a different league to the rest, and they look like they’re only getting better.
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