Hypothetically Speaking...

I just simply can't go into this whole thing with Sheffield United, I think the whole thing is a shambles, do they need money because Uri Geller made a surprise appearance in their town?
Who knows but here's a few points I feel that I have to make...

1) We were fined a record 5.5m for Tevezgate - we paid.

2) We were asked to negate the original contract with MSI and draw up new terms to ensure that there would be no possibility of 3rd party influence - we complied.

3) The recent ruling is based on a hypothetical situation that only takes Tevez's goals/performances of the end of the season into consideration. It doesn't acknowledge Green's excellent goalkeeping, Neil's excellent defending, Zamora's goals (who finished our top goal scorer that year, and every other player that stepped out in our colours that season. Furthermore it doesn't acknowledge that Tevez didn't score for us for 19 games (and when he finally did we still lost!) - if we're ruling using hypotheticals then surely we can argue that his start of season was a hindrance to West Ham thus negating his end of season performances.

4) Sheffield United are guilty of the same infraction with Kabba - except third party influence in their case was actually acted upon when Kabba was dropped for the Watford vs Sheff Utd. game. Although there was a clause in Tevez's contract allowing him to be sold at MSI's will, the clause was never enacted. Surely, Sheffield United owe the Premier League 5.5 million in back payments? (As do Man Utd. for not allowing Howard to play in the Everton vs Man Utd. Game.)

5) This whole thing has gotten completely out of hand, and if Sheffield United want to sue anyone it should be the Premier League. We complied with their rulings, and we managed to stay up legitimately. The paperwork to bring Tevez over may have been botched, but that should have been picked up by the PL staff in the first place on deadline day. I know 5.5m may not be harsh enough for fans of other clubs, but that's not a figure that we came up with (neither is it not substantial though considering it was record breaking). And we didn't come out with the recommendations to bring Tevez back in to compliance...that again was the PL. So as far as I can see we were guilty of botched paperwork and a bad deal, but from that point on we have honoured every request that has been sent our way - including to nominate a member to the panel that just reached this last decision.


There's a good article in the Times today that makes some very good points...have a butcher's