Everton’s appeal hearing following their 10-point deduction for breaching the Premier League’s Profitability and Sustainability Rules (PSR) will be heard over the next three days.
The appeal hearing will begin on Wednesday and end Friday with a final decision expected to be announced by the middle of February.
Everton were sanctioned by an independent commission on November 17 for a breach of the rules and had 14 days to lodge an appeal.
Everton said they were “shocked and disappointed” by the ruling and vowed to appeal after being plunged into the relegation zone with immediate effect.
“Both the harshness and severity of the sanction imposed are neither a fair nor a reasonable reflection of the evidence submitted,” said the club.
According to the Premier League, Everton admitted during a five-day hearing they were in breach of the rules.
The commission determined “Everton’s PSR calculation for the relevant period resulted in a loss of £124.5m, as contended by the Premier League, which exceeded the threshold of £105m permitted under the PSRs”.
After narrowly avoiding relegation to the Championship last season, Everton were – prior to their points loss – 14th in this season’s league table, eight points above the bottom three. They are now 17th in the table, one point above Luton in 18th.
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Everton are facing another possible points deduction after they were charged with breaching rules for a second time earlier this month along with Nottingham Forest.
Only three other clubs have previously been docked points in Premier League history. Middlesbrough were deducted three for failing to fulfil a fixture against Blackburn in 1996/97 and Portsmouth were stripped of nine after entering administration in March 2010.
Tottenham were handed a 12-point deduction before the 1994/95 season for financial irregularities committed several seasons earlier, but that punishment was eventually revoked.
PSR explained: What limits clubs spending more?
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In the simplest terms, when every Premier League team tots up their annual accounts, they can have made a loss no greater than £105m across the previous three seasons.
Clubs can only lose £15m of their own money across those three years. So that’s no more than £15m extra on outgoings like transfer fees, player wages and, in a lot of clubs’ cases, paying off former managers compared to their income from TV payments, season tickets, selling players and so on.
The other £90m of any £105m must be guaranteed by their owners buying up shares, known as ‘secure funding’, and essentially means bankrolling the club.
Source : Sky Sports
