Football is not really about money. Not at its core. It is about trust.
Every supporter who buys a season ticket, every sponsor who writes a cheque, every broadcaster who pays millions, does so on the assumption that the competition is honest. Not perfect, but honest. That is why the Manchester City story matters.
The independent commission’s findings, as reported, paint a devastating and familiar picture. “Sham contracts”, disguised funding, misstated accounts and years of financial manoeuvring designed to present a reality that differed from the truth. The details are shocking enough. What is perhaps more remarkable is something else entirely.
The Premier League actually pursued the case.
For years.
Against one of its flagship clubs.
Against a club backed by vast wealth and equipped with the finest legal resources money can buy.
The English game has many faults, but nobody can accuse it of lacking the courage to ask difficult questions.
Whether you agree with Financial Fair Play regulations or not is largely irrelevant. Manchester City signed up to the rules and the commission’s reported conclusion is that those rules were systematically breached.
The authorities investigated. Evidence was gathered. Arguments were heard. Independent judges reached conclusions. That is how regulation is supposed to work.
Compare that with Scotland.
Many Celtic supporters will be looking south and wondering what might have happened if Scottish football had possessed even a fraction of that determination during Rangers’ use of Employee Benefit Trusts.
For more than a decade, questions were asked. Questions about player registration. Questions about undisclosed contacts. Questions about sporting advantage. Questions about governance.
Those questions generated reports, commissions, reviews and carefully worded statements. What they rarely generated was accountability.
Scottish football appeared more interested in managing the consequences than investigating the causes.
The contrast with England could scarcely be greater.
Nobody can accuse the Premier League of trying to protect Manchester City from embarrassment. If anything, the league has endured criticism for taking so long.
In Scotland, there was often an overwhelming sense that the priority was protecting the authorities themselves. The result was predictable, trust suffered.
Not simply trust in one club, but trust in the governance of the entire game. That is the real lesson here.
The Manchester City story is not a triumph. It is an embarrassment for English football. A reminder that rule-breaking on a vast scale can occur under the noses of regulators.
But there is a crucial difference, the regulators eventually acted.
Supporters can at least point to a process and say the allegations were examined. Scottish football still struggles with that test.
Years later, many supporters remain convinced that important questions were never fully addressed. The SFA refused to participate in an independent inquiry.
Transparency was sacrificed in favour of expediency, in favour of ‘Rangers’ and the people who destroyed their club.
Today, Manchester City’s owners are reportedly preparing appeals and legal challenges. That is their right. What they cannot reasonably expect is immunity from scrutiny.
And perhaps that is where English football has finally arrived ahead of Scotland. No club should be too big to investigate. No owner should be too wealthy to challenge. No institution should be too powerful to question.
The health of a sporting competition depends on that principle. Without it, trophies lose value. League tables lose legitimacy. And supporters lose faith.
Football can survive scandal. It cannot survive a belief that the rules apply differently depending on who breaks them.
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Favourite Uncle
Who was the guy that got the jail for drug dealing? Deported from Spain.
I’ve got no doubt my own personal biases affected my perception of what happened at the time
I don’t think that at my time of life 14 years have made my memory sharper or made me more open to a different perspective
If I was a bit more enlightened and a bit less lazy I’d work a bit harder at it but sometimes I can’t be bothered
Maybe tomorrow?
celtic40me on 1st October 2026 12:12 am
AULDHEID on 30TH SEPTEMBER 2026 11:37 PM
“Later events often change perceptions from previous ones.”
Not just later events. History tells us that time always brings a different perspective.
Certainty is for fools.
=========
The idea we humans know enough to be certain of anything to make an accurate judgement is the theme in a book I’m working on.
Auldheid on 1st October 2026 12:29 am
BRIAN DORAN a year above us .
they ignored the warnings from uae 10 days before and then…
https://substack.com/@ahmedeldin/note/c-349610629?r=bc5xc&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=notes-share-action
Auldheid – “ The idea we humans know enough to be certain of anything to make an accurate judgement is the theme in a book I’m working on”.
Indeed.
Have you read ‘Thinking Fast and Slow’ and/or ‘ Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment’, both by Daniel Kahneman?
Highly recommended if you haven’t.
I started in a job almost 30 years ago thinking I knew everything, but have had the dispiriting experience of realising I know nothing with each passing year.
However, that realisation has made me better at what I do.
That’s why the emphatic certainty of some of the stuff posted on here irks and amuses me in equal measure.
It’s an opinion blog nothing else, and how can anyone using your reasoning have faith in doctors surgeons lawyers etc things that really matter in life
Surreal but true
Minty souness and the blonde Heidi guy
https://youtu.be/vOUSwn5XSvQ?is=faSviIzRuU0_xaMw
HH
Good morning CQN
Another fine day to be a Celt.
Link below unrelated to Celtic.
The guy is just embarrassing himself now.
Lost in show business stuff.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/cm9dw7ddwgzwo
dropping ed sheerin and then dropping in on the garvaghy road
https://x.com/Newrygal1/status/2105403747258257788?s=48
Dessybhoy
You really have faith in doctors and lawyers ?
Seriously ?
I picked the wrong week to give up snowboarding in Montego Bay.
I see Paul John over on ACSOM has announced they are hosting an evening with Brendan Rodgers at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall on 14th June.
Could be an explosive evening . . .
Roll Up…..Roll Up
Deniabhoy @ 10.29
Maybe Brendan is coming back 🤫
https://x.com/pauljohndykes/status/2105586210056057114?s=48&t=vq9I4v70pSapfIO6LwXMxg
Brendan’s coming back
People going to see this will be expecting to hear his side of the story on the board, on transfers and on the DD love letter.
Would hardly be worth organising if he says those topics are off the table.
” celtic40me on 1st October 2026 12:12 am
Certainty is for fools”
Are you sure about that ?
Will he be wearing his pristine white thobe and his colourful shemagh when he comes on stage perched on the back of a camel or an equally pristine white Arabian steed?
An Tearmann on 1st October 2026 9:00 am
Surreal but true
Minty souness and the blonde Heidi guy
https://youtu.be/vOUSwn5XSvQ?is=faSviIzRuU0_xaMw
HH
———————-
that was surreal. mintys its the auditors fault argument.
sourfaces praise of him, the greatest chairman in football history.
it is actually draw jopping.
Cove Rangers are “considering all available options” after having a season-long registration ban imposed upon them by the SPFL following rule breaches.
The league body say the Scottish League 1 club admitted “failing to make a historic contractual payment to a player when due and then failed to notify the SPFL that it had been in default of that rule”.
“The club was also found to have provided incorrect information to the SPFL when it certified that it had no overdue payables to current or former players as at 31 January 2026,” the SPFL said.
“Following these rule breaches by the club, the tribunal imposed a registration embargo which will remain in place until 31 May 2027 and a fine of £5,000 (£2,000 of which is suspended).
Hot Smoked
Certainty is for fools.
Is that the motto of the Flat Earth Society?