Richard Masters: Process Over Speed in Man City Case
Richard Masters insists process must come before speed in Man City case
Richard Masters knows the Premier League is under fire over Manchester City’s unresolved financial charges. He also knows the clock has been ticking for a long time.
Speaking at a launch event on Tuesday and later with talkSPORT, the Premier League chief executive acknowledged the sheer length of the wait for a verdict but refused to apologise for the pace of the process.
“As every day elapses, we must be a day nearer,” he said of the case, which has hung over the league since City were charged back in February 2023. An independent commission completed its hearing in December 2024, yet the outcome remains unseen.
“I obviously can't comment on it. I do understand the frustration. It has taken longer than expected, but we have to follow the process.”
That line is at the heart of Masters’ stance. The Premier League, he stressed, has one overriding duty: hand serious allegations to an independent commission and let it get to the bottom of them, however long that takes.
“In the end, the Premier League's responsibility is to ask the Independent Commission to look at serious allegations and to establish the truth,” he said. “That shouldn't be qualified by it taking too long, for example.”
The message is clear. Public pressure, rival clubs’ anger, and constant noise around the champions cannot be allowed to dictate the timetable.
Chelsea comparison lays bare City contrast
Masters also addressed the obvious comparison: Chelsea’s punishment versus City’s ongoing limbo.
Chelsea were hit with a £10 million fine and a suspended transfer ban for historical breaches, a case that moved swiftly once the club’s new ownership handed over information. City, by contrast, remain under intense scrutiny with no resolution in sight.
Masters underlined why the league treated the two situations differently.
“In the situation with Chelsea, obviously it's historic. It's very different to PSR cases,” he said. “In the case of Chelsea, the new owners came forward with all the information, and we decided to enter a sanction agreement.”
That cooperation opened a shorter, more direct route. With City and other complex historical investigations, Masters suggested, the Premier League simply does not have that luxury.
He pointed to missing evidence, unavailable key witnesses and the sheer scale of some cases as reasons why a fully contested commission is sometimes the only realistic path, even if it drags on and fuels frustration.
The impatience around City will not ease until a verdict lands. For Masters, though, the line is drawn: the league wants speed, but not at the expense of a judgment it can stand behind when the storm inevitably hits.
