Enzo Maresca defended Manchester City’s ownership on Friday despite the club being found guilty of breaking Premier League financial rules in the biggest scandal in the competition’s history.
Manager Maresca said he had full faith in City’s hierarchy and rejected suggestions the club’s unprecedented dominance of English football had been tarnished by the bombshell verdict that it had artificially inflated its revenue by more than $1bn to help sign some of football’s biggest stars.
“I fully trust the club at this moment, in the future, always,” Maresca said in his first press conference since the independent panel’s findings were released last week.
“The reason why I joined this club is because I have 100% trust in the owner, the executive director, the sporting director, the whole organization, so I have no doubts about that.”
Enzo Maresca, the manager of Manchester City, spoke publicly about Man City’s guilty verdict on Friday. (Photo by Tom Flathers/Manchester City FC via Getty Images)
Maresca was speaking ahead of City’s Premier League clash with Liverpool at Anfield on Sunday.
Unsurprisingly, the focus was on the verdict, which found the UAE-backed side committed almost all of the 115-plus offenses it was charged with during a period in which City changed the landscape of the world’s most popular football league.
City has always denied the allegations and has filed an appeal.
“I would like to talk about this situation when we win the appeal,” Maresca said.
Asked if the verdict tarnishes City’s success of more than a decade of dominance, Maresca replied: “Absolutely not.”
Maresca was hired at the end of last season when former manager Pep Guardiola resigned after a trophy-laden 10-year tenure.
He previously worked as Guardiola’s assistant during the 2023 treble-winning season.
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Asked if he would still have taken the job if the decision had been made before he became manager, Maresca replied: “100%.”
“I know the organization from years ago and I know how serious they are. I know they do the right things,” he said.
“I trust the club because I trust the people, and that’s also why I joined the club. And then there’s no other club in the world where I’d rather be, so I’m very happy to be here.”
Maresca’s immediate task is to focus the players’ minds ahead of the trip to Anfield.
“We fully understand the seriousness of the situation. I’m not saying we don’t understand it. We understand it, the players understand it. But it’s our job, our job, to try to control the noise,” he said. “
“For me and for the players, we can only control the side of the pitch, the side of the pitch. So we’re focused on that, and that’s what we can do and we can control.”
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Bayern Munich manager Vincent Kompany, who played for City from 2012-19, has offered cautious support for the club’s achievements in that time, while also distancing himself from the controversy.
Kompany said on Friday that he was “100% focused” on Bayern and that left him no time “to dwell on other things”.
“But for me, it’s actually quite simple – I played there for 11 years and I stand completely behind what we achieved on the pitch and the feeling we shared as a group of players during that time.” he said. “Everything else, I have to be honest, feels a bit out of my reality at the moment.”
Reporting by the Associated Press.
