Financial scandal at Manchester City: allegations of accounting fraud and doping

When the top game in the English Premier League between Liverpool and Manchester City takes place the weekend after next, no one knows what the result will be worth. An independent investigative commission accuses Man City of falsifying its balance sheets for almost ten years and of engaging in financial doping worth around one billion euros in 115 cases.

It is the biggest financial scandal in the history of European football - with unforeseeable consequences for the club, the sport, the business model of professional football and geopolitics.

The damage to the image of the Premier League, one of Great Britain's most successful exports, is immense. The current league leaders ManCity, which has won the championship eight times and the Champions League once in the past 15 years, are threatened with a massive point deduction, high claims for damages, forced relegation or even a forced sale by its previous owner, Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed, a member of the royal family from Abu Dhabi.

British Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who as the former mayor of Manchester himself benefited from money from investors from Abu Dhabi, is already warning of collateral damage to relations with the important economic partner in the Persian Gulf.