Chris Orme

The latest Everton case and some of the responses and analyses have made this challenge clear. Once City 115 comes out, it will be a mess. Everybody will be scrambling for headlines and explainers and nobody will have actually read the decision for days (if at all). People will lie and claim they have. People will use Ai and get the wrong answer but won't know. People will then comment on the false answer and won't know that they are also wrong. Anonymous posters on social media and non-lawyers will make proclamations and ex footballers will stomp their feet (one way or the other). A wholly false position will emerge. The parties (or at very least City) will be out pushing their version of what is said and decided - it is bound to be harder for the PL in a PR sense. Whatever is decided, the analysis will be wrong for quite a while until experienced lawyers and specialists have read the decision in full. But how many are going to have the time to read it all if not engaged to do so? How many people have done it even with the much simpler Burnley v Everton case. Not many. I wonder how many news outlets (The Athletic, The Times, The Telegraph, The FT, BBC, Sky etc) intend to put their hands in their pockets and engage KCs or specialist lawyers to read and digest the decision before writing their opinion and explainer pieces? I bet none. If it goes against City, many clubs will engage lawyers to read, digest and advise on next steps and some will use that to brief their trusted media channels. But it will be understandably partial and tendentious. Whatever the decision says, be it in City's or the PL's favour, an abundance of caution will be required.