Manchester City have been found guilty on all but one of the Premier League’s financial charges against them. The Premier League confirmed that close to £900m was inserted into City’s accounts between 2009 and 2018 to get around its own rules.
Jamie Carragher gave his verdict on Sky Sports, and the Jamie Carragher Man City medals debate now centres on one point. Stripping City’s titles is fair, in his view, but handing the medals to Liverpool or any other runner-up would mean nothing to the players who already missed their moment.
City financial breach verdict: how it happened
The case against City centred on allegations that the club artificially inflated commercial income across nine years between 2009 and 2018. Investigators found that sponsorship and other commercial deals were made to look far bigger than they really were. That let City spend more than the Premier League’s financial rules should have allowed.
That mechanism sat at the centre of one of the Premier League’s longest-running and most consequential investigations. It is what prompted Carragher’s intervention on Sky Sports.
Carragher’s comments followed widespread debate about what should happen to City’s trophies, a subject he had already touched on in our earlier report. Speaking in an interview carried by reporting by the Liverpool Echo, he set out exactly where he stands.
Why reallocating medals is a meaningless gesture
Speaking to Sky Sports, he said “The thing about medals, I do think Man City’s medals or trophies they have won it this time should be taken off their list, I do believe that.” He added that “whether other clubs should get them, I think, is slightly different.”
He added: “But what Manchester City have done is, they have not just hurt their own players in terms of no-one looking at their trophies and medals now in the same way and they never will.”
Carragher explained that City’s players would not feel any loss, and that opponents handed a medal later would not feel any win.
He put it plainly: “I don’t think any player will care if you go and give him a medal and they put it in their medal collection, in their trophy room. He’ll never look at it. He won’t get that feeling, that memory.”
He added: “And when you win things as a footballer, nobody remembers the medals, it’s what it felt like; going for a night out with your mates after it, what you did, where you went, the people you bumped into.”
For him, football is about the feeling inside the stadium, not what eventually sits in a cabinet. He summed it up plainly:
“It’s not about medals, it’s about feelings and that is what Manchester City have robbed.”
Carragher extended that same point to supporters. He said Liverpool and Manchester United fans alike lost moments they will never get back, regardless of what the Premier League eventually decides about City’s honours.
What happens next
Manchester City’s next fixture is away at Anfield on 11 October. It’s their first match since the Premier League delivered this guilty verdict.
Carragher expects it to be a flashpoint. He told Sky Sports:
“I don’t think Liverpool supporters will be shy in letting their counterparts from Manchester know how they all feel. We’ll all be watching.”
The Premier League has not said whether City’s titles will be stripped, or whether any medals will be reissued to other clubs. Carragher already rates the fixture among the biggest in the competition. He describes City against Liverpool as “the game for the Premier League” over recent seasons.
Supporters can follow the build-up in our Liverpool vs Man City team news preview.
