Burnham 'really concerned' at prospect of Man City owners selling after guilty verdict

Andy Burnham has said he would be “really concerned” if Manchester City’s owners were forced to sell the club.

The prime minister made the comment in interviews on Wednesday, after City were found guilty of more than 100 breaches of Premier League financial rules. His intervention has revived tensions between the league and Downing Street, according to The Guardian.

The case centres on about £900m of alleged financial manipulation. An independent commission — a panel separate from the Premier League that rules on disciplinary cases — found City used “sham contracts” to disguise funding. In one stark passage, paragraph 77 of the judgment, the commission said the club’s explanation was concocted well after the event to hide what it called a Disguised Funding Scheme.

Burnham said he could not “intervene more in the process.” That matters because the case is still subject to appeal. City deny wrongdoing in the wider dispute and the final punishment has not been decided.

Timing has sharpened the row. The Premier League published a redacted 40-page version of the commission’s report on Tuesday, within hours of Burnham’s first keynote speech as Labour leader at the party conference. Government officials were understood to be unhappy they were given no warning the judgment would land that week.

Several Premier League clubs were also unhappy with Burnham’s response. The concern is his closeness to City’s owners. Burnham has called City “a huge partner in building modern Manchester” and compared the allegations against the champions to the plight of Everton. City’s owners are backed by Abu Dhabi.

This is not the first clash. In November 2023, when Burnham was mayor of Greater Manchester, he wrote to league chair Alison Brittain accusing the league of “abuse of process” over Everton. He claimed Everton were being used as a pawn.

Everton had been docked 10 points by an independent commission for breaking financial rules, later reduced to six on appeal. Financial rules here mean the league’s limits on how much clubs can lose. The league was annoyed at the time because Burnham’s office posted his two complaint letters on X but did not publicise Brittain’s replies explaining how the rules are governed.

The Conservatives said Burnham’s latest comments were “completely out of touch” with fans, in remarks reported by the BBC. It was a fast, partisan hit. Labour has not answered with a punishment of its own.

For fans, this means two separate questions. One is football justice: what penalty, if any, City will finally face. That decision sits with the independent commission. The other is ownership: if the verdict stands, the new Independent Football Regulator, a watchdog for the English game, could assess whether the owners pass its suitability test. Neither the Premier League nor the government would decide that step.

So the words are loud. The process is slow. And the next move belongs to the lawyers and the appeal panel, not the touchline.