The decision to hand Everton the largest points deduction in Premier League history has sent shockwaves through football.
The 10 point penalty pushed the Blues into the bottom three and reduced the reward from a battling, improving start to the season from 14 points to four, leaving the club joint bottom with Burnley. The club now faces a tougher battle to avoid the drop but after three consecutive wins in London Sean Dyche’s side has the appearance of one that is on the up and even with the sanction is a single win from safety.
Everton is now set for fights in other arenas too, however, after an independent commission hit it with an unprecedented punishment. The club plans to challenge the points deduction through an appeals process. The club will also be watching nervously as several rivals consider whether to seek compensation after a court verdict ruled they should have the opportunity to pursue complaints.
READ MORE: Inside the Premier League's case against Everton and angry club's response to 'double standards'
Amid the reaction and speculation that has greeted the punishment, this is what we currently know.
Everton will appeal the 10 points deduction
Everton immediately announced plans to challenge the decision to hit the club with a 10 point sanction. There was shock and dismay at the nature and size of the punishment when it was announced on Friday. One frustration was that what was perceived as a technical breach that saw the club cross the threshold for losses by £19.5m led to the hit of an extreme sporting penalty - and one that hampers the club’s efforts to get out of the situation it is being penalised for entering. The anger was clear in the statement it released shortly after the ruling of the commission was made public, in which it said: “The club believes that the commission has imposed a wholly disproportionate and unjust sporting sanction. The club has already communicated its intention to appeal the decision to the Premier League. The appeal process will now commence and the club’s case will be heard by an Appeal Board appointed pursuant to the Premier League’s rules in due course.”
The nature of Everton’s appeal
Everton will enter the appeals process with the ambition of reducing the penalty the club has received - it will not argue that it should not be punished at all. Following the conclusion of this process last month, the club had been braced for a penalty. While it protested innocence when the charge was announced in March, by October and after deliberations with the Premier League had led to greater insight into its calculations, Everton acknowledged it was guilty of the breach. The club still disputes how much it crossed the £105m limit by, but it does accept that even in the best case scenario, it is guilty. This means the appeal will be focused on the severity of the punishment and the extent to which the mitigating factors Everton put forward were taken into account by the commission. The commission did not go into detail over how it landed on a 10 point deduction within the judgement and so the most realistic ambition for Everton will be to challenge that process in a bid to have the number of points deducted reduced.
The timescale of the appeal
There is an understanding within Everton that the appeals process will be concluded during the current season. Indeed, with the 10 point punishment having immediate effect, any redress would have to be considered within the timeframe of this campaign for it to be effective. This means the appointment of a panel to hear the claims, those arguments and the judgement that flows from them is expected before the end of May and likely before then.
Compensation claims
Published alongside the commission’s judgement on Friday was a separate legal ruling that was made in May of this year. Leeds United, Burnley, Leicester City, Nottingham Forest and Southampton were among the interested parties with each club exploring the possibility of seeking compensation should Everton be found guilty of breaching the profit and sustainability rules. The High Court ruling handed down by David Phillips, KC, made clear those clubs could not be an active part of the hearing that was to decide whether or not Everton had committed a breach. He did rule that should Everton be guilty, those clubs could try to seek compensation, finding: “I am satisfied that the applicant clubs have potential claims for compensation.”
What happens next?
Those clubs have 28 days from the day on which they received a copy of the commission’s ruling in which to notify the Premier League whether they plan to make a claim for compensation. That clock would have begun ticking on Friday.
What those claims will consider
Amid speculation of Everton potentially having to pay out huge sums in compensation as a result of the breach, there are two important points to note. Firstly, the May ruling states the listed clubs have the right to argue they are due compensation - it does not say they are automatically entitled to it. Secondly, should they succeed in any battle to get compensation, the amount will come down to a host of factors. Mr Phillips found their claims will “depend on factual circumstances concerning the causation of any loss and they depend on other factual issues”. What those issues could be is not specified but of the clubs listed, had Everton been deducted 10 points last season or for the season before then only Leicester would have remained in the Premier League. Burnley would still have been relegated in 2021/22 and Leeds and Southampton would still have gone down had the penalty been implemented last season.
How much *could* any compensation payment be
The application for compensation comes under rule W51.5 in the Premier League handbook and it states that the potential value of any payment is unlimited. Should any bid for compensation be turned down by the commission that hears the claim, there is an opportunity to appeal. Should the club decide not to appeal, or lose that appeal, it would not be able to bring any further claim against Everton over these matters.
