Gerrard calls for City to be stripped of titles and hit with multi-year punishment

Steven Gerrard has called for Manchester City to be stripped of every title won during the nine-year period in which an independent commission found them guilty of breaking the Premier League’s financial regulations, urging the league to “make them suffer” with a prolonged multi-year punishment.

City were found guilty of breaching the Premier League’s financial rules between 2009 and 2018, a period in which they won the top flight three times. The club continues to deny the charges and has appealed the ruling, with their formal punishment yet to be announced.

Gerrard, who captained Liverpool during the 2013/14 season when the Reds finished runners-up to City in the title race, told The Overlap that the club must face consequences that go beyond a simple demotion. “The club, they have to be stripped,” he said. “There needs to be an example set — historically, whether that’s an asterisk throughout all the years of their achievements, because then it doesn’t matter whether the titles are stripped or not. As soon as that star is there, everyone knows that success happened because of what we all know happened.”

On the question of relegation, Gerrard said he believed it would be unfair on Championship clubs, given City would almost certainly return to the top flight immediately. Instead, he advocated for a combination of sanctions spread across multiple seasons. “I think it needs to be a transfer ban, a points deduction over a period of time, and make them suffer like they’ve made everyone suffer over the nine, ten years that they’ve done it,” he said.

Gerrard was careful to separate the institution from the individuals who played for City during that era, stressing his position was “not personal” and that it was not an attack on the “outstanding” players who wore the shirt. He also ruled out accepting a Premier League winners’ medal in place of City’s. “It wouldn’t feel the same, it wouldn’t be the same,” he said. “I think I’ve come to terms that I’ve never won the Premier League, that I was short in that department in terms of winning it.”

He urged the Premier League to be “strong” in whatever decision it ultimately reaches, with the governing body’s sanctions against City still to be determined following the commission’s verdict.