This will be a major relief for the Premier League.
Today’s vote was seen as a landmark test of its ability to uphold rules that it claims are crucial in maintaining competitive balance and fairness, by ensuring commercial deals that clubs agree with companies linked to their owners represent fair market value and are not artificially inflated.
Had seven or more clubs voted against the league’s proposed changes and vetoed the amendments, the fear was that state-connected clubs such as Manchester City and Newcastle United could have full scope to secure ever more lucrative sponsorship deals, fuelling wage inflation.
After all, the changes the league was proposing – after a tribunal panel found elements of the APTs were unlawful – will weaken the rules. Clearly 16 clubs were loathe to loosen them even more.
The Premier League may also have been concerned that defeat today could have had an adverse impact on the ongoing case that has seen City face more than 100 charges of alleged financial rule breaches. City deny wrongdoing in a saga that could prove seismic for the club’s future.
However, today’s vote also risks deepening the unprecedented division that is now coming to define a league once known for its unity.
City made clear they felt the amendments are unlawful and insisted no vote should take place before the panel issued a further determination. We now know three clubs agreed with them.
Losing today’s vote may mean City now take the further litigation they were threatening, adding to the league’s already spiralling legal bills and exacerbating the power struggle that the league is having to navigate.