A dramatic Red Bull upgrade has reshaped the competitive order of Formula 1 just as the series returned to Sepang for the first time since 2017, with Max Verstappen seizing his first pole position of the season and sending a clear warning to his rivals ahead of Sunday’s Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia.

Verstappen’s lap was not merely quick, it was commanding. Even Lewis Hamilton, who will start alongside him on the front row in what felt like a throwback to their fierce title battle five years ago, admitted he expects to spend Sunday simply trying to survive the Dutchman’s pace rather than challenge for the win outright. Nearly three tenths of a second separated the pair in qualifying, a gap that speaks less to a lucky lap and more to a genuine shift in Red Bull’s competitiveness.

How the Red Bull upgrade turned the season around

It has been a long road back. Red Bull began 2026 trailing Mercedes by more than half a second a lap on average, a deficit significant enough to spark speculation that Verstappen himself might walk away from the team before his contract expired. McLaren reportedly came calling during the summer break, yet Verstappen chose to re-sign for two more years, insisting he still believed in the project even if it meant grinding through a difficult rebuild.

That faith is now being rewarded. A string of incremental developments, capped by a new floor introduced in Baku last weekend that brought Red Bull within two tenths of victory, has transformed the car’s balance. In Malaysia’s brutal heat, on a track surface widely regarded as the roughest on the calendar, that improved balance proved decisive.

“It’s been an incredible result for us,” Verstappen said after qualifying. “Looking at the season, how it started for us and the progression that we have made… we have been adding bits to the car and they have worked. It’s as simple as that. When they work, you gain lap time, you have a better overall balance in the car.”

He pointed specifically to how that stability translates on tyres that are unusually sensitive to balance changes, a crucial factor at a circuit where heat and surface roughness are expected to make degradation the defining story of the race. “On a track probably where it’s all very hot and you want a stable, connected balance, that’s very important,” he added. “That’s what we have found a little bit more over the last weekends.”

Hadjar notices the difference immediately

The scale of the transformation was perhaps best illustrated by team-mate Isack Hadjar, who missed three races after breaking his wrist boxing during a training session and only returned in Baku last weekend. Hadjar qualified an impressive third in Malaysia, though he will start eighth after picking up a grid penalty for exceeding his allocation of engine parts.

“I jumped in a car that’s way better than when I left it in Budapest,” Hadjar said. “When you step out for three races and come back, you actually notice a bigger difference. The last two weekends have been surprising.” His comments add weight to the sense that the Red Bull upgrade is not a one-off fluke but a genuine step forward that both drivers can feel through the car.

Mercedes left searching for answers

While Red Bull celebrates, Mercedes face uncertainty of their own. Championship leader Kimi Antonelli starts third on the grid after Hadjar’s penalty, having been hampered in qualifying by an unconventional tyre strategy and a mistake on an early run. His team-mate George Russell, who trails Antonelli by 66 points after a stalled run of form since his Baku win, starts four places further back and admits he is struggling to understand his lack of pace.

Mercedes brought a significant aerodynamic update to Malaysia, their first major package since the Canadian Grand Prix in June, but it has not yet delivered the leap forward the team had hoped for. Whether that stems from the parts themselves or simply the extreme conditions of the weekend remains unclear, with the heat and abrasive track surface limiting how much useful set-up work teams can actually complete.

“With this new package, obviously the window of the way the car operates is different,” Antonelli explained. “We’re trying to understand in which window the car performance is best, in the high-speed and low-speed corners.”

With tyre wear expected to dictate strategy in Sunday’s heat, and Red Bull’s newfound balance playing directly into that equation, the race looks set to test whether the Red Bull upgrade can convert a stunning qualifying performance into a result that reshapes the wider championship picture.

England delivered a statement performance in Rijeka, thrashing Croatia 7-0 in a Nations League clash that will be remembered as one of the Three Lions’ most emphatic away displays in years. Harry Kane, Jude Bellingham, Anthony Gordon and Bukayo Saka all got on the scoresheet, and the scale of the victory has inevitably sparked fresh discussion around England player ratings, with fans and pundits alike scrambling to work out who stole the show.

Thomas Tuchel’s side were ruthless from the opening whistle. Kane broke the deadlock before Bellingham, Gordon and Saka all added further goals ahead of half-time, effectively settling the contest before the break. Kane added a fifth shortly after the restart, Saka completed his brace from close range, and substitute Morgan Rogers rounded off the rout late on with a composed finish after being played through on goal.

England Player Ratings: Bellingham the Standout

Among the crop of England player ratings compiled after the match, one name towered above the rest: Jude Bellingham. The Real Madrid midfielder was directly involved in three of England’s seven goals, threading a lovely pass to send Kane clear for the opener, scoring the second himself, and teeing up Saka for the fourth. BBC Sport’s reporting on the game awarded him a 9, with fan voting pushing his average rating close to a perfect score, reflecting just how dominant his all-round display was against a Croatia side that simply had no answer for him.

Behind Bellingham, Anthony Gordon and Harry Kane were not far off in the eyes of those tallying up the night’s England player ratings. Gordon continued an outstanding run of form, scoring in a fourth consecutive England appearance while also setting up Bellingham’s goal with real confidence. Kane, meanwhile, looked sharp and energetic throughout, pressing from the front, showcasing his passing range, and adding his customary clinical edge in front of goal with two strikes of his own.

Defensive Surprises and Fresh Faces

Tuchel’s selection decisions also shaped much of the post-match analysis. Jarell Quansah was a surprise pick at right-back ahead of Trent Alexander-Arnold, but the Bayer Leverkusen defender repaid the faith with a composed, powerful display capped by a quality assist for Gordon’s goal. Elsewhere in defence, Marc Guehi and Ezri Konsa dealt calmly with what limited defensive work came their way, given how comprehensively England dominated possession and territory for long spells.

Further forward, Alex Scott impressed on his first England start, looking comfortable on the ball and unafraid to drive the team forward rather than simply playing it safe. Elliot Anderson, continuing a strong run throughout this international break, was another name to feature prominently in the night’s England player ratings, with his assist for Kane’s fifth goal underlining his growing importance to this midfield.

Saka’s double means he now looks to be building a productive partnership down the right with Quansah, and he might well have had a hat-trick had he converted a presentable second-half chance. Off the bench, Morgan Rogers made an instant impact, rounding the goalkeeper to make it seven, while Eberechi Eze, James Garner, Morgan Gibbs-White and Myles Lewis-Skelly all saw minutes as Tuchel rotated his resources with the scoreline well and truly settled.

What the Numbers Say

When the dust settled on the various England player ratings published and crowdsourced after the final whistle, Bellingham topped the charts with an average close to 9, followed closely by Gordon and Kane, both hovering in the high 8s. Saka, Anderson, Hall and Scott all posted solid figures above 7.5, underlining just how many players contributed to a genuinely collective demolition job rather than a one-man show.

For Croatia, by contrast, there was little to celebrate. No outfield player’s rating climbed much above the middle of the scale, a reflection of a team that was pressed, outpaced and outclassed for the vast majority of the match. Goalkeeper Dominik Livakovic was kept busiest and still finished with one of the higher marks on his side simply by virtue of limiting further damage.

For England, the result and the accompanying England player ratings paint a picture of a squad brimming with confidence heading into the autumn international fixtures. With Bellingham dictating play, Kane leading the line with typical composure, and younger talents like Gordon, Quansah and Rogers all making strong cases for regular involvement, Tuchel appears to have options and momentum in equal measure as his side look to build on one of their most convincing performances in recent memory.

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Franz Reindl came from behind to narrowly beat Petr Briza of the Czech Republic in a run-off vote to become the International Ice Hockey Federation’s new president on Friday.

Reindl had trailed Briza 48-36 in the first round of voting but picked up crucial votes after Aivaz Omorkanov of Kyrgyzstan was eliminated. He then beat Briza 60-57 in the runoff held on the Spanish island of Tenerife. Six of a total of nine candidates had withdrawn prior to the election.

The 71-year-old German, who had been a member of the IIHF Council since 2016, succeeds Canadian-born Frenchman Luc Tardif, who had announced in March that he would not seek a further term in office. Reindl’s election comes 5 years after he had finished as runner-up to Tardif. His term runs until 2030. 

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Wealth of experience

Reindl has done it all in German ice hockey, having been a player and coach, as well as serving as the first CEO of the top-flight professional league, the Deutsche Eishockey Liga (DEL), from 1994 to 19<96. He also headed the organizing committees for three World Championships — in 2001, 2010 and 2017. From 2014 to 2022 he served as president of the German Ice Hockey Association (DEB), overseeing an upturn in the fortunes of the men’s national team, which won the silver medal at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics in 2018.

“Franz Reindl has shaped German ice hockey for decades—as a player, but above all through the various key roles he has held within our federation,” the current DEB chairman, Frank Lutz, said.

“The fact that the international ice hockey family is now entrusting him with the leadership of the IIHF is a great tribute to his work.”

Successful playing career

Like Briza, who was a goalie for the Czechoslovakia team that won bronze in Albertville in 1992, Reindl was also an Olympic bronze medalist, having been a member of the 1976 West Germany team who beat the United States and Finland to finish third in Lake Placid.

Domestically, Reindl played 669 games and scored 423 goals for SC Riessersee and SB Rosenheim over 16 seasons in the Eishockey-Bundesliga, the predecessor to the DEL.

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Tardif’s years as IIHF president were marked by two major events: the return of National Hockey League players to the Olympic tournament in Milan Cortina this year, and the exclusion from international play of Russia in 2022 over the country’s full-scale war on neighboring Ukraine.

Reindl is the second German to be elected IIHF president after Günter Sabetzki, who held the post from 1975 to 1994.

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Novak Djokovic’s body may be protesting, but his competitive instincts remain as sharp as ever. The Serbian star survived a second-round scare against Chinese wildcard Yunchaokete Bu at the China Open on Friday, battling through visible fitness issues to post a 4-6, 7-6(7-2), 6-2 comeback win that stretched his extraordinary unbeaten run at the Beijing tournament to 31 matches.

It was far from vintage Djokovic. The world No. 104 Bu, ranked more than a hundred places below his illustrious opponent, pushed the 24-time Grand Slam champion to the brink, forcing break points early and matching him blow for blow deep into the second set. At one stage Djokovic required on-court medical treatment, visibly fatigued as the match wore on, continuing a worrying pattern after he admitted struggling physically during his opening-round victory over Nuno Borges.

Djokovic had disclosed in August that he was managing an ongoing health condition, though he insisted before the tournament that he was “feeling good.” The evidence on court this week has told a more complicated story. Yet whatever discomfort he is carrying, it has not dented his ability to find a way through when it matters most.

“I had to play very well and serve well in the right moments,” Djokovic said afterwards. “He was so solid and I struggled to really find holes in his game. He was hitting his spots incredibly well with the serve and was mixing things up really well in the rallies from the back of the court.”

Trailing after dropping the opener, Djokovic clawed his way back by winning the second-set tiebreak comfortably, then found another level entirely in the decider, surging to a 4-0 lead before closing out the match. He now faces the winner of Alexander Zverev’s clash with Juncheng Shang in the quarter-finals, where sterner physical tests surely await if his body does not settle.

Elsewhere in Beijing, the men’s draw continued to take shape as Daniil Medvedev eased past Pablo Carreno-Busta 6-4, 6-2 to set up a second-round meeting with Jan-Lennard Struff, while Karen Khachanov dispatched Alex Molcan 7-5, 6-3. Over at the Japan Open in Tokyo, Artur Fils impressed with a 6-3, 7-5 win over Frances Tiafoe to reach the quarter-finals.

On the women’s side, the top seeds made their presence felt. Aryna Sabalenka was in ruthless form against Renata Zarazua, overpowering the Mexican 6-1, 6-3 in just over an hour with a barrage of heavy groundstrokes that left little room for resistance. The world No. 2 will next face Nikola Bartunkova for a place in the last 16.

Naomi Osaka had a tougher afternoon, needing three sets to see off Maria Timofeeva in her first match since the US Open. The four-time major champion cruised through the opener before inexplicably losing her rhythm, dropping five straight games as Timofeeva stormed back to level the contest. Osaka regrouped impressively in the decider, reeling off five consecutive games of her own to close out a 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 victory.

“It was really tough,” Osaka admitted. “It was my first match since New York, so it was a little difficult getting my bearings. She’s a great player, and I think it was a great match.” Osaka now moves on to face 20th seed Sara Bejlek.

There was disappointment for British hopes, however, as Katie Boulter was shown the exit by Karolina Muchova for the third time this season. The world No. 8 Czech won 7-6(7-3), 6-1, extending her perfect record against Boulter in 2025 following an earlier meeting at the US Open. “It was a very close match; we’ve played a few times this year,” Muchova reflected after the win.

With both Asian swing tournaments now moving deeper into their draws, attention will turn to whether Djokovic’s body can hold up against tougher opposition, and whether Sabalenka and Osaka can maintain the momentum that has carried them comfortably into the second week.

  By Dane Miller, SuperWest Sports

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Every game is a fresh opportunity.

Perceptions always matter.

To get an at-large bid to the Playoff, Big 12 teams must maintain strong margins of victory in Conference play. That’s just the way it is. Close results aren’t respected.

Utah, as a program generally, has always understood those concepts. But the Utes are off this week, and now I can check my obligatory mention off my list.

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The rest of the teams in the West are in action, and I preview each of their games below. The featured team this week is none other than the Central Florida Knights.

Here’s my Big 12 Column for Week 5.

Featured Team: UCF

UCF at No. 20 Houston

Saturday, October 3
9:00 AM PT, ESPN2

Scott Frost is cooking on his old stomping grounds.

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Is anyone paying attention?

We are.

The 3-1 start has turned heads. Beating TCU in Orlando last week signaled the program’s elevation. This isn’t your normal doorstep UCF team.

The 12-point spread is disrespectful. Houston is good. But not that good.

A Noon ET kickoff is no big deal for a Florida team. The heat and humidity aren’t going to bother them, either.

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Most of Houston’s natural home field advantages don’t work on Central Florida.

The Cougars should win and may very well end up covering the spread with a late-game score. But this matchup will be closer than some expect.

No. 10 BYU at TCU

Saturday, October 3
4:00 PM PT, ESPN

The bye week for BYU gave the team extra time to prepare for TCU.

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The Horned Frogs do not have a good quarterback. The signal-caller is an Ivy League transfer. That means you can blitz him all day.

This game will be won in the trenches. The Cougars’ defensive line should shine. The result should be plenty of third-and-longs for TCU and a poor third-down conversion rate.

The Horned Frogs’ defense is nothing to fear, either. But the Vegas oddsmakers are predicting a one-score game.

Translation: This is a great opportunity for BYU to gain respect. Beat these guys by 21 and then see the reactions.

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No. 12 Texas Tech at Colorado

Saturday, October 3
4:30 PM PT, FOX

The coaching dynamic in Boulder is fascinating. It’s Brennan Marion’s offense with Deion Sanders’ players.

Any read-based spread-option system is highly dependent on player decision-making and chemistry. Most teams running that type of scheme take a full year of practice to get it right.

It’s usually in Year Two where the offensive efficiency pops. That makes the change to Isaac Wilson even more compelling. Marion must win now. Or there is no next season for him.

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Wilson ran the offense better and isn’t afraid to get hit like Julian Lewis. The decision to make a change makes sense. You just gotta keep it respectable against Texas Tech.

The longer the game stays close, the more momentum CU and its crowd will have. If it gets to the fourth quarter and it’s a one-score game, you never know.

Baylor at Arizona State

Saturday, October 3
7:30 PM PT, ESPN

Prove it. If ASU deserves more respect, show us why. Because right now, there’s a lot of talk and no resume. Get a convincing win, that’s how you earn it.

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Surely, a team like Baylor isn’t going to waltz into Tempe and leave with a win. Right? Cutter Boley better have his shit together.

People still remember how he looked in London. And nobody has forgotten about the final score of the Texas A&M game.

If the Sun Devils are worthy of more recognition, they will handle the Bears. If it’s a close game, then the current perception of ASU is spot on.

And if they lose, then the talk will only get louder.

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Cincinnati at Arizona

Saturday, October 3
8:00 PM PT, FOX

Arizona is battle tested. The Wildcats gained valuable experience in Provo and Pullman. The coaching staff and players know what it takes to beat good teams.

Facing undefeated Cincinnati in Tucson, the spotlight is on. The national television broadcast is a moment to seize.

The only reason that Arizona wins games is because of Noah Fifita. Without him, the Cats are nothing.

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It’s his redshirt senior season, and it’s a whiteout. To beat Cincy, Noah has to shine.

And the defense needs to get stops. Buckle up, it’s going to be a nail-biter at The Sol.

Noteworthy Game

West Virginia at Iowa State

Saturday, October 3
9:00 AM PT, TNT

Rich Rodriguez and the Mountaineers look to bounce back after their disappointing loss to Oklahoma State.

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The defense wasn’t good enough to win a Conference game. That side of the ball has always been an issue for Rich Rod’s teams.

Don’t sugarcoat it. 609 yards allowed is pure incompetence.

To beat ISU on the road this week, the WVU defense needs to create multiple turnovers. If that happens, West Virginia’s offense could be just efficient enough to pull off the upset.

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Straight-Up Staff Picks for Selected Games

 

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Miller covers College Basketball and College Football as well as Formula 1 racing as a Senior Writer and Assistant Editor for SuperWest Sports.

Latest posts by Dane Miller (see all)

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Manchester City has formally lodged an appeal against the independent commission’s finding that the club broke Premier League financial rules on a sweeping scale, setting up a protracted legal battle whose outcome could reshape English football’s competitive landscape for years to come.

The club was found guilty on Tuesday of all charges relating to breaches of Premier League financial regulations spanning the 2009-10 to 2017-18 seasons. In a brief statement issued Thursday evening, City said the ruling contained “clear material errors, of law, principle and fact” and was “unsafe,” insisting it had submitted “a comprehensive body of irrefutable evidence” supporting its innocence. The appeal was confirmed publicly on Friday.

The commission concluded that City used “sham contracts” with commercial partners to disguise more than £830m in secret funding, and that the club “utilised devices” to mask the true extent of its liabilities. The Premier League has not minced words, stating City “systematically broke Premier League rules for nearly a decade.”

Central to the dispute is where the money behind City’s blockbuster sponsorship deals actually originated. Sources suggest City intends to argue, as part of its appeal, that additional funding behind agreements with commercial partners came from the Abu Dhabi government rather than from the club’s owners, the Abu Dhabi United Group. That defence, however, may run straight into the club’s own history. In 2015, Etihad Airways — City’s principal sponsor and the name on its stadium — told the US Departments of Commerce, Transportation and State in no uncertain terms that “the assertion that the Abu Dhabi government paid for Etihad’s sponsorship of English Premier League football club Manchester City is false,” adding that the airline funded the ten-year naming-rights deal “from its own liquidity” and had “never” received Abu Dhabi government subsidies. Any attempt to now argue the opposite could prove awkward, to say the least, for lawyers trying to rehabilitate the club’s case.

The ripples from the verdict have travelled well beyond football. The Football Association said the decision carried “significant implications for the integrity of the game” and confirmed it was weighing whether to launch its own investigation and pursue further sanctions, though it stressed it would not comment in detail while proceedings between the Premier League and City remain live.

Westminster has also taken notice. The Treasury Committee, chaired by Dame Meg Hillier, has written to HM Revenue and Customs asking whether the tax authority has requested access to redacted material contained in the commission’s report, saying she would “welcome reassurance” that officials grasp “the public interest in this case.” That intervention follows a report from Tax Policy Associates alleging City may have failed to pay as much as £12m in tax linked to a “sham” contract involving former manager Roberto Mancini — a liability that, with penalties, could reportedly swell to £24m.

Separately, the Business, Innovation, Science and Trade Committee has written to the government and the Financial Reporting Council calling for tougher corporate accounting enforcement. Its chair, Liam Byrne, described the findings as pointing to a “serious failure” in oversight, arguing that clubs playing by the rules “need confidence that those rules are enforced fairly.”

Adding a further layer of intrigue, City chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak met business secretary Jonathan Reynolds in the days before the verdict was announced. Government sources insist the club was not discussed and that Al Mubarak attended in his separate role as chief executive of the Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund, with talks focused on UK-UAE cooperation on defence, security, intelligence and trade. The timing, nonetheless, has fuelled speculation about the politics swirling around the case, not least after Downing Street was forced to insist City are not “above the rules” following backlash over comments from Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham.

Amid the legal and political noise, there is a more immediate human dimension: what happens to the players. With City sitting top of the Premier League table after five straight wins this season, the squad is stocked with international talent whose personal brands and sponsorship deals are tightly bound to competing at the top level of English football. BBC Sport reports that sources close to the dressing room describe “significant concern” among players about the club’s prospects on appeal, tempered by others who retain faith in the public assurances of innocence given by Al Mubarak and chief executive Ferran Soriano.

Any demotion would complicate matters further. Most City players are believed to lack relegation clauses in their contracts, and their deals are reportedly fully guaranteed, meaning no automatic pay cuts if the club drops divisions. That leaves City holding considerable leverage: as one agent put it, “some players want medals, all players want money,” and the club is under no obligation to sell cheaply even if stars seek the exit. Parachute payments could cushion any blow, though there is no certainty City would qualify for them given the unusual circumstances of the case.

For now, City’s Premier League status, and the status of everyone connected to it, hangs on an appeal process that could take months to resolve. What is already clear is that the consequences of this case have moved well beyond the pitch, touching tax policy, corporate governance standards and diplomatic optics — and the football world is bracing for whatever comes next.

Manchester City’s attempt to overturn football’s most damning financial verdict is running headlong into an inconvenient paper trail — one written not by prosecutors or rival clubs, but by the club’s own shirt sponsor.

As City formally lodged its appeal this week against an independent commission’s finding of guilt on more than 100 charges of breaching Premier League financial rules, fresh scrutiny has fallen on a decade-old submission by Etihad Airways to the United States government that appears to flatly contradict the defence City is now mounting.

At the heart of City’s case is the claim that lucrative sponsorship deals — which the commission concluded were secretly topped up by owner Sheikh Mansour’s Abu Dhabi United Group — were in fact genuinely funded by the Abu Dhabi government itself, not disguised payments from the club’s own ownership structure. It is a fine distinction, but a crucial one for City’s legal strategy.

The trouble is that Etihad, the state-owned airline that has adorned City’s shirts since 2009 and whose name has been on the club’s stadium since 2011, told U.S. authorities in 2015 something rather different. Responding to an investigation into state-owned carriers, Etihad described as “false” any suggestion that the Abu Dhabi government paid for its sponsorship of Manchester City. The airline insisted the £400m naming-rights and sponsorship arrangement was funded “from its own liquidity,” and that government equity and loans to Etihad were not subsidies but ordinary, “sensible” investment in a successful commercial enterprise.

That account sits awkwardly beside the version City is now presenting to overturn the commission’s findings — and it is also hard to square with the club’s own argument six years ago at the Court of Arbitration for Sport, when it successfully fought off UEFA’s financial fair play charges by insisting all its sponsorship income came purely from its commercial partners, not from government or ownership sources at all.

The independent commission was unsparing in its assessment of City’s shifting explanations. In its 40-page core judgment, published this week, it dismissed the club’s account as something “concocted well after the event in an attempt to obscure and conceal the realities of the Disguised Funding Scheme.” City, for its part, says it possesses “a body of irrefutable evidence” that will overturn the ruling, and has accused the commission of errors of law, principle and fact that render the decision “unsafe.”

The Football Association, meanwhile, has made clear it is not simply a bystander. In a statement this week, the governing body said the commission’s verdict carried “significant implications for the integrity of the game” and confirmed it retains the power to pursue disciplinary action — not only against the club itself but against individuals found to have acted dishonestly, a category the commission says applies in this case. The FA is expected to hold off until City’s appeal concludes, a process likely to run until the end of January under Premier League procedure, before deciding whether to pursue its own case. Notably, the names of individuals implicated were redacted from the published judgment, though the FA could request an unredacted version from the Premier League.

The fallout has not stayed confined to football’s governing bodies. Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s successor, Andy Burnham, has found himself at the centre of a political row after saying he would be “really concerned” if City’s Abu Dhabi owners sold the club, and praising them as “a huge partner in the building of modern Manchester” in the immediate aftermath of the guilty verdict. Downing Street was forced into two separate clarifications within a day, with a spokesperson stressing that “the initial judgement is serious” and that “there can’t be any suggestion that anyone is above the rules.”

The Liberal Democrats have seized on the episode, with the party’s culture, media and sport spokesperson Anna Sabine drafting a pointed letter demanding Burnham publish every meeting and piece of hospitality he has received from City Football Group, the Abu Dhabi United Group or UAE government representatives — going back to his years as Greater Manchester’s mayor. “Football fans up and down the country deserve to know that the rules apply to everyone, however rich and powerful they are,” Sabine said, adding that Burnham’s rapid defence of the club’s owners invited legitimate questions about his relationship with them.

Former Manchester City and FA chairman David Bernstein has echoed those concerns, warning that political interference in an independent regulatory process was corrosive. “It is absolutely vital that this independent regulator can perform independently and without political interference,” he told the BBC, adding that scrutiny may yet need to extend to City’s board and ownership more broadly.

What began as a football governance dispute has thus widened into a story touching sponsorship law, state investment, and the propriety of political figures’ ties to one of the Premier League’s wealthiest and most powerful clubs. With City’s appeal now formally underway and the FA keeping its options open, the next few months promise further scrutiny of a case that, thanks to Etihad’s own words, already looks far harder for City to win than the club’s defiant public statements suggest.

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