West Ham United were fined a record 5.5 million pounds ($10.97 million) by a Premier League panel on Friday for breaching ownership rules over the signings of Argentines Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano last August. West Ham admitted the charges and avoided a points deduction that would have almost certainly condemned them to relegation from the Premier League.
The fine is the biggest in English soccer history, dwarfing the old record of 1.5 million pounds imposed on Tottenham Hotspur in 1994 for financial irregularities, and reflected the club's "dishonesty and deceit" in the affair.
The case centred on the third-party ownership of the players, who were signed from Brazilian club Corinthians but with contracts that involved giving rights to outside companies. The transfers effectively breached Premier League rule U18 that no club should enter into a contract enabling another party to influence its policies or performances.
West Ham were also charged with failing to disclose details of the deals, thereby breaking rule B13, which obliges clubs to deal with each other and with the league in "utmost good faith."
In its judgement, the independent commission said: "It is clear to us, and by their acceptance of the charge also to West Ham, that these contracts constitute a breach of Rule U18 and that those third parties acquired the ability materially to influence the club's policies or performance of the team."
The panel added: "These are exceedingly serious allegations because they amount to not only an obvious and deliberate breach of the Rules, but a grave breach of trust as to the FAPL (Premier League) and its constituent members, because in our finding the club has been responsible for dishonesty and deceit."
The latter refers to a conversation in September between Premier League chief executive Richard Scudamore and then West Ham chief executive Paul Aldridge. Wanting to know how West Ham had managed to get two member of Argentina's World Cup squad without a fee, Scudamore asked Aldridge if there was any paperwork the FAPL had not seen - only to be assured there was none, the commission said.
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