Leicester City are facing more points deduction uncertainty after the Premier League appears to have appealed against the latest decision in their profit and sustainability (PSR) case, sources have told Football Insider.
Leicester were charged in March with a breach of the Premier League’s PSR rules for 2022-23 after reporting losses of £89.7million for that year alone, with top-flight sides only permitted to lose £105million over a rolling three-year period.
But they argued they were no longer a Premier League club when they submitted their accounts on 30 June last year following their relegation to the Championship.
An independent commission dismissed those claims in July and ruled they could be charged by the Premier League.
But Leicester confirmed in a statement on 3 September their appeal against that ruling had been successful, handing them a significant boost in their bid to avoid a points deduction.
In its ruling, the independent panel said the PSR rules “are, in relevant parts, far from well drafted”, while the Premier League admitted it was “surprised and disappointed” by the decision.
Premier League facing ‘enormous’ hurdle in Leicester case
Under the arbitration rules in the Premier League handbook, there are few ways in which an appeal board’s decision can be challenged.
Those include the panel reaching out of the jurisdiction of the body that made the decision, the verdict being reached as a result of fraud or bad faith, procedural errors, a perverse interpretation of the law or the ruling could not reasonably have been reached by any panel that had applied its mind properly to the facts of the case.
Sources have told Football Insider the Premier League likely submitted its appeal with the belief no reasonable panel would have reached that decision after hearing the facts.
But that is understood to be an “enormously difficult” point to prove given that two of the three panel members in question were former Court of Appeal judges.
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