Simon Jordan sends Man City warning over Premier League decision to deduct points from Everton

Former Crystal Palace chief believes Manchester City will be looking on nervously at Everton's points deduction.

The Toffees were docked 10 points by the Premier League over breaches of Profitability and Sustainability rules, the Premier League's version of Financial Fair Play.

The points deduction sees Everton drop to level on points with bottom club Burnley, eroding their positive performances over recent weeks, but the decision is subject to appeal. According to former Palace chief Jordan, Everton might have a good chance of getting the deduction reduced, but he also says City have been put on notice.

That's because the Premier League are currently investigating alleged breaches from City, and in the meantime, they have set the precedent of deducting points for such breaches, even if the nature of City's case is different. City deny their charges with the case ongoing.

"I didn't think they would get there. I thought they would get Three to six, and that may well be the outcome after an appeal," Jordan said on TalkSPORT. "But the fact of the matter is the Premier League, they are a product of timing, despite the fact I think they have been slightly artistic in their accountancy. The Premier League's attitude now that they have an independent regulator coming in, is that that want to show they can clean house, and cleaning house is forcing things like FFP and the disciplines behind it.

"I wonder if this would have been the same a few years ago, but 10 points is a significant penalty, and I'm not surprised they are appealing it. They will probably appeal it down, but they are not going to argue it away. The whole fabric of this is much different to that of Man City, because people will be asking.

"I thought there would be an element of the Premier League bottling this, because the next one is Man City, and once you set a precedent of points, then you have got that in your armoury and you are going to use it again. City will be looking at this with interest. But Everton's is a lot more binary."

Speaking about the nature of Everton's case, Jordan added: "City's is a complex set of cases, whereas Everton's is about losses after adjustments, and they went over the £250million circa and putting in a whole load of Covid losses. Every club did it, but the scale of what Everton did was much bigger than other clubs.

"It does feel like 10 points is heavy duty. Auditors would have gone through and signed off that the valuations (in question) could stand up. It becomes an argument about whose accountancy point of view is right. It does feel to me, that if that is the argument this turns on, 10 points is a heavy penalty."