Man City decision maintains football’s uneasy balance of power

The decision to throw out Manchester City’s two-year European ban has wider implications for all of football, writes Miguel Delaney

Man City will play in the Champions League next season (Getty)

As Manchester City celebrated, and some figures in Uefa raged, there were others within the governing body who were just relieved to see the back of this case.

That’s what a weight it had been. And it could have got even heavier, even had CAS upheld the two-year ban.

This result has prevented what might have been the most consequential legal case in sporting history, given City’s reported intention to go to the Swiss courts, and thereby might have preserved a very delicate balance of power in European football.