Manchester City will play in the Champions League next season after the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) overturned the club’s two-year ban from European football.
City was handed the suspension by UEFA’s club financial control body in February for “serious breaches” of club licensing and financial fair play regulations between 2012 and 2016.
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Manchester City’s fine, however, has been cut from 30m euros (£26.9m) to 10m euros.
In delivering the ruling, Cas said City did “fail to cooperate with Uefa authorities” but overturned the decision by Uefa’s club financial control body (CFCB) to ban them.
Pep Guardiola had earlier said City deserves Champions League return next season, and the new ruling was “validation of the club’s position and the body of evidence that it was able to present” according to City.
“The club wishes to thank the panel members for their diligence and the due process that they administered,” City added.
CAS’ ruling means City, who are guaranteed to finish second in the Premier League this season, will play in the 2020-21 Champions League.
In this year’s competition, Pep Guardiola’s side still has to play Real Madrid in their last-16 second leg at Etihad Stadium on 7 August.
They lead 2-1 from the first leg in Madrid and will face Juventus or Lyon in the quarter-finals, which will be held in Lisbon if they progress.
The Cas statement continues: “The award emphasised that most of the alleged breaches reported by the adjudicatory chamber of the CFCB were either not established or time-barred.
“As the charges with respect to any dishonest concealment of equity funding were clearly more significant violations than obstructing the CFCB’s investigations, it was not appropriate to impose a ban on participating in Uefa’s club competitions for Manchester City’s failure to co-operate with the CFCB’s investigations alone.”
On reducing the fine, CAS says that, while it considered “the importance of the co-operation of clubs in investigations conducted by the CFCB” and Manchester City’s “disregard of such principle and its obstruction of the investigations”, the Cas panel “considered it appropriate to reduce Uefa’s initial fine by two-thirds“.
It adds: “The final award with reasons will be published on the Cas website in a few days.”
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