We've now entered the 2025/26 Premier League campaign and Manchester City's 115 charges – with Pep Guardiola's men accused of breaching north of 100 financial regulations – is still ongoing after being first accused in February 2023. The club, as expected, have vehemently denied any wrongdoing and a huge update regarding the case has now emerged.
City have been accused of 115 alleged breaches of financial regulations between 2009, one year following their Sheikh Mansour-led takeover, and 2018. In that time, they won the Premier League on three separate occasions – 2011/12, 2013/14 and 2017/18 – and many have called for those titles to be stripped if they are found guilty.
With all 20 clubs who ply their trade in the Premier League wanting a conclusion sooner rather than later, The Athletic reporter David Ornstein reported in March that a decision may have been made before the end of the 2024/25 campaign. "The expectation at Man City has been 'spring', and if that's the case, we're into that."
"However, it'd also mean we could be waiting until late June! Plus, as long as we don't have anything firm from the Premier League, City or other parties privy to the matter, it's largely speculation and perhaps subject to change."
Huge Update Regarding City's 115 Charges Emerges
manchester city
As we now know, Ornstein's reporting turned out to be speculative – and, after City went trophyless in the 2024/25 campaign, fans and players alike are still unaware of the repercussions that Guardiola's side could face for allegedly breaking the set-in-stone rules. The 115 charges vary from 54 counts of failing to provide accurate financial information to not providing details of player and manager payments.
The marathon hearing to settle the case began in mid-September last year – and it finished in early December. A verdict, however, after more than two-and-a-half years of fans being kept relatively in the dark, is reportedly imminent. According to a report from i Paper, it could emerge in the forthcoming international break.
The i Paper has claimed that a source with insider knowledge of how arbitration cases work has suggested that November could finally be the month that marks the case coming to a close, north of two years on from when fans first learned of the charges.
"Everyone just wants a verdict now and some certainty over what comes next," one source stated, before pointing out that some important votes on the future of financial fair play may be "totally overshadowed" by the outcome of City's drawn-out case. The source claimed that 'all hell could break loose' when the verdict lands.
"It's gone very quiet and because it's been going on for so long it's almost been forgotten about but all hell could break loose when it lands."
The outlet also claims there are several figures at Premier League clubs who believe that a decision will be made by the relevant parties by the end of 2025 at least.
Reportedly, an eye-catching number of 250,000 documents could be part of the case – and a legal expert, who has worked on a similar arbitration case, said lawyers work on the assumption that for every week a hearing goes on, the panel will take four weeks to deliberate over the evidence and make a decision.
City's 12-week case, therefore, would take an approximate time of 48 weeks to be resolved. That would be accurate given that an explained verdict is now expected to be given in November of this year during the third international hiatus of the season – and the penultimate one before March 2026.
Sheikh Mansour and Khaldoon Al Mubarak
The well-connected Stefan Borson, who is a former City advisor and a legal expert, recently told talkSPORT: "I think the simple reality is that neither party, as of the end of last week, has had the decision of the panel. This is not a case where they've both had the decision and the sort of negotiations and settlement discussions going on in the background. It's very, very simple. They have not had the decision of the panel as of yet.
"I do think now there's no real excuse for a further delay. Even if they were busy on other matters, and they would have been, then I think it would be really quite extraordinary that there's been no timetable set with them and no arrangement set with them in terms of the payment of their time over these last ten months to produce the decision."