Jonathan Wilson: Manchester City’s trophies should be left blank – ‘there was no honour there’

Manchester City’s honours won during their years of rule-breaking should be struck from the record books and left as blank spaces rather than reassigned to the clubs they defeated, Guardian columnist Jonathan Wilson argued on Saturday. The intervention comes after an independent commission found City guilty of prolonged financial breaches.

A casual clip that masked a deeper deceit

Wilson rooted his case in the 2014 League Cup final, where Sunderland led 1-0 at half-time before Yaya Touré equalised with what he described as “a casually brilliant 30-yard clip 10 minutes after the break”. City went on to win 3-1. “City, we now know from the independent commission, were at the time involved in a prolonged and calculated act of cheating,” Wilson wrote, noting that leaks in Der Spiegel had suggested Touré “was being paid via a dual contract to disguise exactly how much City were spending”.

The commission’s report, he added, refers to payments “not recorded in an employment contract … but instead recorded in a consultancy agreement”. Had Sunderland won, Wilson noted, they would have ended a 41-year wait for a trophy and qualified for the following season’s Europa League.

‘Should Sunderland feel cheated? Of course they should’

Wilson insisted the sense of injustice extends far beyond Wearside. “Should Sunderland feel cheated? Of course they should, just as those who came second behind Lance Armstrong should feel cheated; just as Liverpool and Arsenal should feel cheated over the League Cup finals of 2016 and 2018; just as Stoke should feel cheated over the 2011 FA Cup final; just as Manchester United should feel cheated over the Premier League titles in 2012 and 2018 and Liverpool should in 2014; just as every club who played in the same competitions as City between 2009 and 2018 should feel cheated.”

But Wilson drew a sharp distinction between stripping City of silverware and handing it to rivals. As a Sunderland fan, he said he would not want a trophy awarded retrospectively: “I want it to be pure. I want images that will be remembered down the generations, like the highlights of 1973 – Ian Porterfield’s goal, Jim Montgomery’s save and Bob Stokoe’s celebratory skip across the pitch in mac and trilby.” He compared the hollowness of retroactive awards to the 2017-18 Premier League season, where City’s 100-point tally left Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea and Tottenham with little incentive to chase: “To award United, who finished second, the title, would seem not just empty but arbitrary.”

Vacant, not reassigned

That, however, does not mean City should keep what they won. “They won them unfairly; why on earth should they be allowed to keep them?” Wilson asked. He proposed that there be “no Premier League champion in 2012, 2014 or 2018, no FA Cup winner in 2011 and no League Cup winner in 2014, 2016 or 2018”.

“If there are blanks on the roll of honour, let them be; there was no honour there,” he concluded. “Let the spaces stand as testimony to what those seasons were. Let them stand as a memorial to the years when a foreign entity tried to subvert English football … Let the years without a champion stand for ever vacant, both as a rebuke and as a tribute. Sometimes, emptiness can be the most eloquent statement of all.”

Echoes from the punditry and the dugout

Wilson’s stance chimes with earlier reactions to the commission’s verdict. On 30 September 2026, Sky Sports pundit Jamie Carragher said: “I do think Manchester City's titles they've won in this time, or trophies, should be taken off their list,” while expressing doubt over whether honours should pass to runners-up. And on 27 September 2026, former Stoke boss Tony Pulis told BBC Sport: “I feel cheated,” demanding “FA Cup justice” after his side’s 2011 final loss to City.

The column also touched on the human faces of the era – from Gus Poyet and Dick Advocaat at Sunderland to Sergio Agüero’s 94th-minute title winner in 2012 – emphasising that while City fans cannot be stripped of their memories, “the rest of the world knows what it was based on”.