Man City set to experience Newton Third Law Of Motion for Financial Fair Play breaches

A lot of attention has been unsurprisingly drawn following the announcement that UEFA are conducting an investigation into Manchester City's alleged breaching of financial fair play rules.

In a report released by The Times, at least 12 top-flight clubs are set to write to the Premier League to ask what action will be taken against the Citizens if they are found guilty, with clubs eager to find out the practices at the Abu Dhabi-owned reigning champions.

"The Investigatory Chamber of the independent UEFA Club Financial Control Body has opened a formal investigation into Manchester City FC for potential breaches of Financial Fair Play (FFP) regulations," said UEFA.

"The investigation will focus on several alleged violations of FFP that were recently made public in various media outlets.”

“UEFA will make no further comments on the matter while the investigation is ongoing. German magazine Der Speigel have published a series of claims against City based on leaked documents, which the club deny.”

A statement from the club said: "The accusation of financial irregularities is entirely false."

"Manchester City welcomes the opening of a formal UEFA investigation as an opportunity to bring to an end the speculation resulting from the illegal hacking and out of context publication of City emails.”

"The club's published accounts are full and complete and a matter of legal and regulatory record." 

However, if City are found guilty, what could their punishment be?

UEFA demand clubs to at least break even before imposing financial fair play rules, and City have fallen foul of them before.

In 2014 after they were found guilty of breaching FFP rules, the club were fined £49million (£32million suspended), while they were also forced to trim their Champions League squad for the 2014/15 campaign.

Upon this recent developments, If City are found guilty, then the fact that it is a second offence would surely count against them, with a further fine, Champions League squad reduction, points deduction or expulsion from European competition all a possibility.

But such a harsh punishment is unlikely in terms of the Premier League because the English top-flight allow for clubs to make losses of up to £105million, meaning that they will term any alleged breaches much more sympathetically.

For this current campaign, the prospect of any league points deduction would be highly unlikely, but the Premier League could be forced to act if UEFA ask them to do so.