London (AFP)

After years of meteoric progress to the top of English football, thanks to the generous financial efforts of Sheikh Mansour bin-Zayed al-Nahyan, Manchester City would face its greatest challenge if it had to cross two seasons without the lucrative League of Champions.

The UEFA financial gendarme announced Friday that Manchester City will be excluded from European competition for two years and will have to pay a fine of 30 million euros.

City's response was quick and in an almost arrogant tone, he announced his intention to appeal and use all legal means to obtain an "impartial judgment" - understand: in his favor - thanks to the "vast body of irrefutable evidence to support (his) position" which he claims to have.

Bravado attitude or justified confidence? The fact remains that a failure of the appeal, or a reduction in the penalty to one year, would already have serious consequences on and off the field.

With four championship titles, two British Cups and four League Cups, City has considerably stocked its trophy cupboard since the arrival of the Emiratis in 2008. But the Champions League, the project's ultimate objective, still eludes them.

- Exodus of Guardiola and players? -

Today, Manchester City is a club that has the financial surface and the resources to comply with the rules of financial fair play, which authorizes losses of 30 million euros over 3 years.

But during the 2012-2016 period, the Club Financial Control Commission (ICFC) estimated that the Citizens had artificially inflated their income from sponsors linked to Sheikh Mansour to stay below this limit.

Accusations that City refutes, which measures the risk of exclusion from the European Cups: the future of coach Pep Guardiola, who has only one year left on contract, would certainly be called into question.

The Catalan made the Sky Blues a part of English football history with the first 100-point season in 2018-2019 and the first domestic treble in history.

But the coach who went through Barcelona and Bayern could not prevent a decompression this season which relegated City to 22 points from Liverpool.

And it is not certain that the prospect of fighting for national distinctions for two years motivates him, while he has been chasing continental glory since his coronations with Barça (2009, 2011).

The same question will obviously apply to players like Kevin de Bruyne, Raheem Sterling or Riyad Mahrez who are at the top of their career and aspire to win the C1.

- Abu Dhabi's commitment in doubt -

The potential destinations for such stars are certainly not legion, but City, forced to reduce the sail without the Champions League, would have less leverage to keep them.

Last year, 93 million euros of television rights were pocketed thanks to the European queen event, not counting the evening income from matches or sponsorship linked to the event.

A windfall impossible to compensate without selling off some assets, while financial fair play will continue to apply.

Especially since sanctions on the national level - in the form of withdrawal of points - are not to be excluded, the Premier League also keeping an eye on these stories of respect for budgetary discipline.

But the biggest unknown will be the attitude of the shareholder.

Former club president Garry Cook said in The Athletic in December that Abu Dhabi's ambition was to make City a sort of brand ambassador for Abu Dhabi.

But what if this brand is tarnished by these sanctions, or if financial fair play become an unavoidable brake on the club's ambitions?

As it stands, the club's accounts, flourishing, remove the specter of a sudden departure of the UAE patron. With 535 million pounds of annual turnover (645 M EUR) and a cumulative profit of 51 M EUR (61.5 M EUR) over the last 5 years, City has reached its breakeven point. That's all he had to do to get there that threatens to cause his loss.

© 2020 AFP