Exclusive: LeicestershireLive speak to football finance expert Kieran Maguire for his take on what happened to and what next for Leicester City
11:52, 06 Feb 2026
Leicester City have been deducted six points(Image: PA Wire)
Leicester City have been deducted six points having been found to have breached financial rules for the three year period to 2023/24.
The reduction applies this season and sees the Foxes slide down the Championship table to hover just above the bottom three, on goal difference alone.
Defeat at Birmingham City tomorrow – and draws for Blackburn and West Brom – would see them slip into the relegation zone with 15 game remaining.
While some spinning the deduction as an opportunity for a clean start, others are viewing it as the latest chapter in a downward spiral that has seen the club relegated twice in three seasons, currently without a manager and hamstrung in the transfer market.
There remains the potential for an appeal from City and a concern they could breach the rules again in the period including the 2024/25 season – although LeicestershireLive has reported ‘ it seems they are not going to be in trouble’.
We spoke to football finance expert and host of the The Price of Football podcast Kieran Maguire for his take on the situation and what might happen next.
What’s your general reaction?
KM: I think a points deduction, if found guilty, was the only sanction given the historic reactions to what we’ve seen at Derby County, Birmingham City, Everton, Nottingham Forest. If there’s a financial breach, then a points deduction is going to be the sanction.
I think Leicester initially said ‘Why not a fine?’ But they didn’t succeed on that and I think that was always a long shot as far as the club was concerned.
As for the six points, it’s never good, but it’s broadly in line with expectations.
They were £20million over the limit, it was initially seven [points] and then they were given one back for sort of good behaviour. It’s in line with expectations if you compare to what we saw with Nottingham Forest and Everton.
I think the Premier League were certainly looking for a higher points deduction because the EFL tariff tends to be higher. But if I was Leicester, you wouldn’t ever be happy with this, but it could have been a lot worse. I think the club was fearing a double points deduction.
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We have to remember this isn’t an insolvency action worth 12 points
KM: I suspect they’ll also – and it’s always easy to do these things with hindsight – perhaps Leicester will look back and reflect and say ‘We knew we were going to get relegated last season’. Instead of, I think they delayed sending in the accounts to the Premier League and then they objected to whether the charges could be levelled at them because they applied to a period when the club was in the Championship.
If they’d sent in the accounts early last season when we all knew they were going down, as was the case with other two clubs, it could have been heard in season 24/25.
They could have had a six point deduction, it wouldn’t have made a blind bit of difference, yeah they might have finished 19th instead of 18th and then this season they would have been in a much stronger position.
A – not being the mess they’re in the present. B – potentially this could have scuppered a playoff charge as well had the club played better on the pitch.
Is there a risk of double jeopardy – breaches reappearing in rolling three-year rolling cycle?
KM: There is still a danger that they could be up on a charge for the three years ended 2025 and we saw that with Everton, so there is precedence for what does appear to be double jeopardy.
Now, clubs were supposed to have submitted their accounts to the EFL by December 31st.
We don’t know whether Leicester have done that, we don’t know whether the EFL have reviewed them and are asking for further information – and I think the silence doesn’t help.
Social media loves to fill a vacuum and I’ve asked questions to people in football administration and I just get nothing really, I don’t even get a ‘no comment’ back.
At the end of the day, I’m just a gobby teacher from Liverpool but I can add up. Leicester will not have been in a great position from a PSR position in 24/25 unless they really managed to get the wage bill down last season.
I think the EFL were very quick to put out a statement that they have agreed to adopt the points deduction because there was an alternative to the points deduction, which was if the EFL didn’t accept the points deduction, then the commission recommended a fine.
But it looks like the EFL have been very quick to say ‘Yes we will take the points deduction’.
I think they could put the minds of everybody at rest if they just, even it wasn’t specific to Leicester City, to say we have reviewed all of the accounts submitted by clubs at December 31st and we will not be taking any action – not Leicester specific – it just stops fans from panicking.
Grounds for an appeal?
KM: I think the one area where there is a possible appeal, but again having read the judgment I’m not sure whether this has really got legs, is that the EFL and the Premier League changed their constitutions in 2025 to allow a points deduction set by one of them to be applied by the other, but historically they weren’t able to do that.
Now given that Leicester’s ‘offense’ took place in the three years to 2024, can you apply a judgment retrospectively?
Timescale-wise surely an appeal would have to be done by the end of this season?
KM: You would expect so. Again if we look for precedents here, that was the case with Everton and Forest. They both appealed during the season and I think Everton’s was reduced from ten to six. So yes, otherwise it makes a mockery of relegation this season.
What’s your best guess as to what happens now?
KM: I think that given the chaos at the club in the sense that they’ve got no chief executive, they’ve got an interim managing director, they’ve not got a manager at present, who is going to make that decision as to whether to appeal or not?
Yes they will have taken appropriate counsel from their legal advisors, but it’s a big decision and can they afford it?
We saw the strange behaviour in December with staff wages being paid late and so on, all those things tend to fail the smell test for me. It all makes you feel slightly uncertain. It wouldn’t be cheap but it would be cheaper than relegation.
Could an appeal result in a bigger penalty?
KM: It’s possible but not probable, they don’t, they don’t tend to increase, it’s not like the frivolous appeal against a yellow card rule which they introduced.