London. Manchester City must be expelled from the Premier League after being found guilty of breaching financial rules, according to the club's former chairman David Bernstein.

City were found to have arranged "sham" contracts with a number of commercial partners to artificially inflate the club's revenues and reduce costs over a nine-season period between 2009 and 2018.

The scheme concealed the true state of their finances and avoided breaches of Premier League and UEFA spending limits as a result.

An independent commission also found the club guilty on the majority of charges in relation to their failure to co-operate with the league's investigation.

City could be relegated, hit with a points deduction or handed a huge fine.

No sanction has yet been imposed, and Abu Dhabi-backed City said they will appeal against the decision.

But Bernstein, who served as City chairman from 1998 to 2003, believes the Etihad Stadium outfit deserves the strongest possible punishment.

"It is damning beyond belief. My immediate thoughts are, should the board continue? Should the people involved be suspended immediately?" Bernstein told the BBC.

"Very, very serious. I think it's really terrible. There's a school of thought with lawyers that is deny, deny, deny, but this is a football club that is part of a league and the whole credibility of the league is at stake here.

"The sanctions cannot just be financial, so it's got to be way beyond that. If the appeal fails, Manchester City cannot stay in the league; they have to suffer. And I say that as a supporter and a fan."

'Incredibly Serious' 
Lisa Nandy, the Culture, Media and Sport secretary, told the BBC that the report was: "Incredibly serious. The Premier League report is incredibly stark."

"Manchester City have the right to appeal. This is causing a lot of concern for City fans and all fans of Premier League football."

City overstated their income by over £830 million ($1.09 billion) using a system they called 'Project Longbow', according to the independent commission.

In a damning 40-page document, the Premier League said it regarded City's conduct as having "extremely serious, significant, sustained and intentional or reckless breaches of rules critical to the proper and fair operation of the Premier League".

The document has detailed the scale of what the commission repeatedly called "sham" commercial deals the club made with a number of its sponsors.

They were part of a disguised funding scheme, whereby those companies were only required to pay a portion of the relevant sponsorship fees.

According to the commission, one company, "Fordham", was "in reality little more than a front" for the Abu Dhabi United Group Investment and Development Ltd (ADUG), which owned the club, to plough in more funds.

The commission said: "In 2012 the club launched what it termed Project Longbow.

"We accept the club's explanation that Project Longbow was a multi-strand project whose purpose was to explore how the club might boost its revenues and reduce its operating losses.

"Many of the strands of Project Longbow were genuine, legitimate attempts to achieve those aims. One was not. That was the Fordham Arrangement."
 

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