Ever feel you’ve been cheated? Consequences could be profound after Manchester City guilty verdict

So it turns out none of that was real. Nothing that happened in English football between 2009‑10 and 2017-18 that involved Manchester City actually happened. City beating Manchester United 6-1 at Old Trafford? Fake. Sergio Agüero’s 94th‑minute winner to clinch the title in 2012? A figment of the imagination. That season City reached 100 points? Bobby Ewing dreamed it in the shower.

Without those successes, City wouldn’t have been in the position they were for the past eight seasons (and 35 of the charges relate to a failure to cooperate with Premier League investigations between 2018 and 2023). The 14 successive wins that took them to the league title in 2018-19 would not have happened without what went before. Neither would the Treble of 2023 or the record four league titles in a row.