Liverpool hit after losing replay, Man Utd punished for Antony

Everton and Nottingham Forest are in the docks over FFP breaches, but one reason for a points deduction has come to light for every Premier League club.

ARSENAL – Over-celebrating

They’ve been asking for trouble all season, Arsenal. Constantly at loggerheads with The Authorities, those delinquent Gunners. If they aren’t receiving FA charges for failing to control their players, they’re passive-aggressively laying into ‘the standard of officiating’ through proper club channels, being too emotional or shunning the concept of technical areas.

But the most heinous of all Arsenal crimes committed this season has comfortably been – and parental guidance is recommended at this juncture – Mikel Arteta celebrating a stoppage-time winner too hard. And that was against Luton. Imagine the depraved things he would do after a dramatic north London derby win. An absolute desgracia, to be sure.

ASTON VILLA – Something Emi Martinez does

The specifics are a little vague, but when an individual’s lawless behaviour ranges from fairly standard time-wasting at one end of the scale to using the World Cup Golden Glove to mimic an actual penis in front of thoroughly unimpressed hosts at the other, with Neal Maupay handbags sitting somewhere in the middle, it is safe to say the options are innumerable.

BOURNEMOUTH – The Dominic Solanke experiments

Let this not be construed as an accusation of any sort; our lawyers have been very particular on that and the Martin O’Neill flashbacks are still strong.

No, this is more a reflection on Dominic Solanke suddenly deciding he’s an elite centre-forward who can provide the Premier League title answer to Arsenal while sitting out of the financial reaches of unthinkably rich Newcastle. He had 10 top-flight career goals prior to this season in which he has already scored 12, including a hat-trick.

After some rigorous research it is plainly clear that Bournemouth changed absolutely nothing over the summer to encourage such a transformation so they have some awkward questions to navigate soon.

BRENTFORD – Ivan Toney forgets to publicly tease leaving

There are a few irrefutable truths in the Ivan Toney case, not least how uncomfortably Black Mirror it is to ban a gambling addict for betting charges while ‘HOLLYWOOD bets’ is given unceremonious pride and place, front and centre of the shirt he’d rather not be wearing.

Two more incontrovertible Toney facts are that a) he is incredibly grateful for the support Brentford have provided during this most difficult period in his life, both personal and professional, and b) he wants to leave at the earliest available opportunity.

It requires some reading between the lines but if you carefully examine anything the striker has said over the past few years, it is possible to decipher his most intricate messages about the futility of man and how he wants to play for a bigger club. Try watching his next interview closely and see if you spot it.

BRIGHTON – Being too profitable and sustainable

The rules are in place for good reason – to punish Newcastle’s ambition and Protect The Big Six Cabal. Fine foresight from Michel Platini and the UEFA lads well over a decade ago; good on them for always prioritising what’s best for the sport when others have exploited their positions of power solely for personal gain.

But at this point Brighton are just making a mockery of the whole thing, testing the foundational structure of that imposing ceiling by making too much profit and being too sustainable. There will have to be a clampdown on such flagrantly sensible accounting soon, with a ban on asking Todd Boehly to examine their wares another possible sanction.

BURNLEY – Giving Sam Allardyce his record 10th Premier League job

It was thought the Sam Allardyce Button had been put out of commission, allowed to gather dust after his Premier League relegation hex finally wore off with West Brom. But then for four mad games last season, Leeds handed him the keys in an effort to just feel something during their latest existential crisis.

That represented former England manager Allardyce’s ninth Premier League post and it remains a wonder to think how many more jobs he would have landed if British coaches were afforded proper opportunities. He is, apropos of nothing, three ahead of the managers with the second-most teams in Mark Hughes and Roy Hodgson, with Harry Redknapp, Steve Bruce and Alan Pardew on five each.

Anyway, it would be an immense shame if Allardyce bowed out having not quite reached a round 10 of Premier League teams. Fortunately it has already been decreed that Burnley will appoint him after sacking Vincent Kompany in a panic. And sufficient punishment beyond the Clarets’ inevitable relegation will be subsequently meted out.

CHELSEA – Running out of homegrown players to flog

Those Brazilian teenage forwards are not going to pay for themselves and Chelsea have stumbled on a neat, if slightly unsound, financial plan: selling the prodigious talents produced by their world-class academy to afford the prodigious talents produced by other world-class academies.

It is all about pure profit, but at some point they will actually run out of homegrown players and when Conor Gallagher, Reece James, Levi Colwill and Armando Broja have been shipped out, it will look a little conspicuous when Al-Hilal are signing Alfie Gilchrist for £427m.

CRYSTAL PALACE – Roy Hodgson fighting someone

It is to the 76-year-old’s immense credit that his public reaction to Crystal Palace supporters booing the decision to take off Eberechi Eze after an hour of their FA Cup third-round replay defeat to Everton was measured and dignified. But at least a little bit of damage might have been done this season alone when Hodgson called the fans “spoiled” after being beaten at home to Bournemouth and scapegoated the club’s young players for defeat to Spurs.

Harry the Hornet, VAR and that BBC Sport interviewer that one time might well disagree, but this has been an all-timer season for Hodgson snark and it seems to be headed only one way as he finally embraces retirement with a path of destruction left behind him.

EVERTON – Making the local skyline more beautiful

What is the charge? Signing James Rodriguez? A succulent Colombian James Rodriguez? Get your hands off my beautiful local skyline!

Everton referred to an independent commission – again – for another breach of @premierleague PSR. Everton mounting a strong defence. They argue they’ve already been punished for 75% of the period covered by the new referral. They believe this is double jeopardy and have told the…

— Henry Winter (@henrywinter) January 15, 2024

FULHAM – Spending about £25m on Ivan Cavaleiro and Anthony Knockaert

Seeing as we’re drudging up the regrettable 2019/20 season again, that makes Fulham’s business in and around their Scott Parker Championship promotion season fair game.

Ivan Cavaleiro and Anthony Knockaert both joined on loan within a July week of each other, their deals made permanent in January and the summer respectively. The former at least scored three goals in 36 games back in the top flight; the latter was sent straight back down to the second tier with Nottingham Forest and did not play for Fulham again until they were relegated. The man loves the Championship.

Both Cavaleiro and Knockaert left Fulham for nothing this past summer. Stunning work.

LIVERPOOL – Asking for their Spurs replay to be replayed

With the very idea of relegation now slightly undermined by the Premier League setting the FFP charge appeal backstop date as five days after the actual season finishes, there is a chance to double down and throw the top end into an equal amount of flux.

Grant Jurgen Klopp and Liverpool their replay for that uncontroversial September game, with one caveat to ensure fairness across the entire league season: the exact same team of officials preside over it. Even that replay operator. And especially Oli.

When Liverpool then lose that game and ask for the replay to be replayed, dock them points for good measure. Maybe just enough so they miss out on the title to Manchester City by a single point. Well done boys, good process.

LUTON – That away end

Everyone had their fun when Luton earned promotion to the Premier League. Look at plucky old Luton, they said. Credit to them for finally separating Liverpool and Manchester City in alphabetical tables and nonsensical one-per-club features produced by websites which used to be exponentially better, they opined.

But enough’s enough. Luton’s away end belongs in the sphere of Football Twitter alongside Will Still, the Boxing Day 1963 results and Peter Lovrenkrands’ dog. They are making a mockery of Our League.

MANCHESTER CITY – N/A

Nothing comes to mind as to what Manchester City might have done over the past decade and a half to face any sort of punishment for impropriety.

MANCHESTER UNITED – Signing Antony

His performances since have been punishment enough, some might suggest. But it needs to be reiterated just how disastrous a signing it was.

Antony has been in poor form this season.

NEWCASTLE – Sacrificing Allan Saint-Maximin for this

Look how they massacred our boy. Look why they massacred our boy. Four years of him being just the best fun, chucked away for Harvey Barnes to be lost in their injury crisis vortex, a classic mid-table languish, an early Champions League exit and Jose Mourinho? Was it worth it?

Newcastle have slowly accepted the fate of having to sell their best players if they wish to sign any more, but Allan Saint-Maximin was unnecessary collateral damage. Eddie Howe openly declared his sale to be FFP-compliant, calling it a “difficult moment” and saying “it’s early to speak of Maxi in the past tense” as if he was coming to terms with a bereavement. It was weird.

Saint-Maximin has three goals and eight assists for Al-Ahli this season anyway. Newcastle ended the marriage but can only watch as he thrives in the relationship they forced him into.

READ MORE: The specifics of Saint-Maximin’s Newcastle exit are strange, and Howe sob story doesn’t help

NOTTINGHAM FOREST – Signing all of the players

That’ll certainly do it.

SHEFFIELD UNITED – Fielding ineligible players

Not for one second is anyone going to be tricked into thinking *checks notes* Sydie Peck is a Premier League footballer. And Ryan One is a quite blatant AI construct.

Jordan Amissah, Jili Buyabu, Ismaila Cheick Coulibaly, Adam Davies, Louie Marsh and Femi Seriki have been named in matchday squads this season without yet making a Premier League appearance. They’re all made up.

TOTTENHAM – Lord Pannick

Oh yes. “It is the Premier League,” Pep Guardiola said last February when asked who he thought might have been the driving force behind Manchester City’s many financial breach charges. “I don’t know why. You have to ask the CEOs, Daniel Levy, these kinds of people.”

Pointed remark, that. The manager even went on to warn: “What they have done to us, be careful with that. Be careful in the future.”

That was the Bat-Signal for Lord Pannick to swoop in and turn the tables. Spurs were said at the time to have been “surprised and bemused” but they won’t know what’s hit them when Levy is in court being asked about cheese rooms and Tanguy Ndombele.

WEST HAM – Causing a rift in the space-time continuum

It is almost impressive just how little grey area or middle ground there is in the West Ham fanbase. Supporters have taken up refuge in the Moyes In or Moyes Out camps and they are ensconced in those positions forevermore.

West Ham are sixth and have not conceded in their last four Premier League games, a run which takes in wins over Manchester United and Arsenal. But immediately preceding that came a 5-0 thrashing by Fulham. They finished top of their European group again and are in the knockout stage of a continental tournament for the third season running, but domestic cups have been surrendered unnecessarily.

They are a riddle of a football club and the longer it goes on, the more damage it does to the very fabric of reality as everything and everyone is caught in the middle of a perennial West Ham-based tug-of-war.

WOLVES – Making VAR look silly

We all love a laugh but Wolves had to take the joke too far. The Andre Onana thing was absolute gold, the perfect way to start the season. The Joao Gomes handball against Luton was a little stale by that point but the delivery could not be faulted. The effect was wearing off by the time those silly penalties were given away against Newcastle and Sheffield United, and the shark was entirely jumped in those matches with Fulham and Brentford.

Wolves have done the most of any club in making the otherwise unimpeachable VAR look foolish. Time to make an example of them.