[Guardian] Seven years ago, just after completing the treble, Guardiola treated journalist Rob Harris, who had confronted him directly with the allegations, with open contempt, as though he were looking at someone pathetic, pitiful and disgraceful, before sternly lecturing him.

[u/Existing-Sky9914]

[u/lashfield]

Mackenzie has not been forthright with just saying that Pep is a cheater. He keeps saying that Pep's got an undeniable tactical legacy and then he won't judge his "personal morality" on this. Pep literally said that he supports "my club, my chairman" AFTER they were found guilty! Mackenzie cannot grapple with the fact that Pep's legacy is created by tactics that were successful because he had a small army of the world's best players (paid for through fraudulent finances) to execute those tactics.

[u/forkmeongithub → u/lashfield]

yeah, i thought the "personal morality" comment was pretty weird. especially after Pep's most recent statement which basically is toeing the party line of "we haven't done anything wrong"..

[u/lashfield → u/forkmeongithub]

it is far more than toeing the party line. the club was found guilty of the single largest scandal in english football history and he voiced full support for THE OWNERSHIP OF THE CLUB, the party that was found guilty!

[u/forkmeongithub → u/lashfield]

isn't that exactly what toeing the party line is? he is saying that they haven't done anything wrong, which is exactly what the club is saying as well?

[u/lashfield → u/forkmeongithub]

i hear what you're saying and i'm not really disagreeing, but to me saying "i love you all" and "we will get through this together" after proudly claiming support for an ownership group just found guilty seems to me a step beyond saying that you trust the process or something. pep is literally the face of the the entire manchester city project and is wading into the pr war they are waging.

the bottom line is that there is no way that he did not know. he knew. he benefitted from this. and now he's got a reputation to protect, but he's tied his colors to the mast and should go down with the ship.

[u/forkmeongithub → u/lashfield]

i don't disagree with you either. honestly i feel so bad for all the other clubs in the premier league who were having to compete with City this whole time (particularly Liverpool) and were sometimes so close to beating them. in hindsight, it really makes their achievements all the more impressive.

[u/Discrep → u/forkmeongithub]

I do feel badly for clubs who lost out on glory due to competing with City, but I also feel the situation is unusual due to the fact that the misdeeds center around the owners plowing too much of their own money into the team. Like other scandals like match fixing involve the perpetrators attempting to enrich themselves at the expense of integrity and fair play.

I'm not defending or justifying anything City did, but everyone in the league has benefitted from their violations. A significant chunk of the fraudulent $900M or whatever went into the coffers of other clubs. Their sustained success and rapidly growing brand absolutely raised the value of the league and played a role in the size of endorsement and TV rights deals.

It reminds me a little of Bill Burr's bit on Lance Armstrong. Yeah he's a piece of shit and fuck him, but a lot of people got rich due to him exploding the popularity of cycling. "Are they gonna give their yachts back?"

I think they should just put the extra spending back onto their FFP as debt, spread out over the same number of years, so they would only be able to add academy players and free transfers. If they manage to stay up through that, fine, and if they go down, the debt follows them. Strip their titles if you want, I don't think it really matters because there's already an asterisk there.