Paris (AFP)

The decision of the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) to annul the ban on Manchester City from participating in the European Cups for the next two years is the latest development in the short and tumultuous history of Financial Fair Play ( FPF), regulations implemented in 2011 by UEFA to limit the deficits of European clubs.

- Malaga: forever the first -

Excluded at the end of 2012 for four years (2013-2017) from the European competitions for which it would qualify, Malaga was the first club to receive the highest penalty, due to large arrears of payment.

The Andalusian team, bought in 2010 by Qatari Sheikh Abdullah al-Thani, had shone two seasons, reaching the quarter-finals of the Champions League in 2013, before falling back into the soft stomach of the Spanish championship. Malaga is vegetating today in the second division.

- AC Milan: a great European ousted -

AC Milan was the first major European player to be excluded from European competitions, despite having qualified for the 2019-2020 Europa League. And for good reason, the Lombard club, seven-time winner of the C1, has accumulated more than half a billion losses since 2014, including 146 million in the 2018-2019 financial year alone.

Despite a high payroll and rising costs, its annual turnover has stagnated for several seasons around EUR 250 million, much less than its rivals who regularly play in the Champions League, a competition in which the Rossoneri no longer have tasted for six years. Already excluded from European competitions by UEFA at the end of the 2017-2018 season but saved by the CAS, AC Milan, sold by Silvio Berlusconi in 2017 to the Chinese businessman Li Yonghong then to the American fund Elliott, therefore ended up being caught up by his considerable losses.

- Paris SG: the disputed Qatari contract -

Acquired by the Qatar Sport Investment (QSI) sovereign fund in 2011, the PSG was suspected of "financial doping", due to certain sponsor contracts deemed to be overvalued. His extraordinary transfer window in the summer of 2017, with more than 400 million euros spent on recruiting Neymar and Kylian Mbappé in particular, also earned him the spotlight on UEFA.

PSG is now trying to diversify its sources of income to get out of its dependence on Qatar. In March 2019, the CAS estimated that the PSG file was "closed".

- Red star, Galatasaray: old pinned glories -

Several clubs that have shone in the past in the European Cup have also been excluded from continental competitions. The emblematic Red Star of Belgrade, club champion of Europe in 1991, was deprived of C1 in 2014-2015, despite his title of champion of Serbia.

In 2015, it was Dinamo Moscow's turn, where French players Mathieu Valbuena and William Vainqueur played, to see their qualification for the Europa League canceled. The club dives and descends into the Russian second division the following season. Galatasaray, the only Turkish team to have won a continental competition (the C3 in 2000), also received the same penalty in 2016.

- Marseille: McCourt management in the viewfinder -

Despite the takeover of the Marseille club by American businessman Frank McCourt in 2016, OM's finances have remained in the red, with deficits financed by the shareholder.

At the end of June, a sanction fell: 3 M EUR fine, the abandonment of 15% of UEFA earnings from the body for two seasons and 23 players (instead of 25) registered on the lists to compete in the continental cups until 2022-2023. A lesser evil for OM, whose qualification for the next C1 has not been called into question.

- Portugal, Russia, Turkey: rain of fines -

Several clubs have been subject to various economic obligations: simple fine, retention of revenue from a European competition, limitation of the number of players to register for the European Cup ...

These lighter sanctions have been used against Portuguese (Porto, Sporting, Braga), Russian (Zenit Saint-Petersburg, Rubin Kazan, Anji Makhatchkala ...) and Turkish (Besiktas, Fenerbahçe, Trabzonspor ...) clubs.

© 2020 AFP