It was the day Benjamin Mendy faced Manchester City in an employment tribunal and we heard the extraordinary details of his multi-million pound battle with the Premier League champions.
On one side, there was the France international footballer who was cleared in two separate trials of multiple rape allegations and other sex offences while living a wild lifestyle of hard partying with a number of City team-mates.
On the other side, stood City, who had paid him a fortune and increasingly seem just as reliant on lawyers and barristers as they are on Pep Guardiola and their array of star footballers.
In a series of explosive revelations, it emerged:
- Mendy is claiming City owe him £11million ($14.3m) in unpaid wages and bonuses and says the club “took the view I was guilty from the outset”.
- City’s left-back was caught hiding in the cupboard of a house in Salford after police launched a manhunt for him.
- Mendy’s infamous parties were attended, according to his evidence, by first-team players including Jack Grealish, Riyad Mahrez, Raheem Sterling, Kyle Walker and John Stones.
- The player cited the case of Mason Greenwood, then at Manchester United, as evidence that other players had been treated more favourably by their clubs and the FA.
- Mendy went through “several bankruptcy hearings” after running into serious financial issues because, he says, of City’s refusal to pay him.
Mendy’s case against City is, in short, that his employers assumed he was heading to prison and unlawfully withdrew his salary for almost two years before his contract expired in June 2023.
In a statement included as part of a 1,420-page bundle of documents presented to the tribunal, the 30-year-old says: “Despite the support that I received from a number of the players, I felt that Manchester City as a club took the view that I was guilty from the outset and decided not to support me at all, or be seen to have anything to do with me.”
(Photo: Oli Scarff/AFP via Getty Images)
Mendy, who now plays for French club Lorient, was cleared in 2023 of seven charges of rape and another of sexual assault. In his own words, he was “falsely arrested for crimes I did not commit” and his “life was turned upside down forever.”
But City’s argument is that Mendy engaged in “reckless behaviour” and continued to act unprofessionally even after he was arrested by the police and suspended by the FA.
This involved holding a number of sex parties in which he invited all sorts of women, many of whom he had never met before, to his mansion in Cheshire, wilfully ignoring his bail conditions as well as Covid-19 lockdown rules.
The tribunal was reminded that Mendy had been asked in police interviews about how easy it was for him, as a footballer with fame and wealth, to meet women and get sex. “When I see (women), so easy,” he replied.
Asked whether that had changed since he joined City, the former Monaco player said: “It become, like, 10 times more.”
While the rest of the country was in lockdown, Mendy continued to hold parties in which he would regularly get drunk and stay up into the early hours. This got back to City and on January 6, 2021, he was fined a week’s wages. Mendy’s response, according to documents, was to hold another party the following night.
Another party had been held on December 31 and another on New Year’s Day, which lasted until 4am even though the team had a game two days later at Chelsea. City won 3-1, with Mendy among the substitutes.
Mendy’s statement contains details of his six-year contract, including that he earned a flat salary of £6m a year as well as some eye-watering bonuses. He was paid a minimum £1.2m in image rights every year, on top of a £900,000 appearance bonus if he played in 60 per cent of games and a one-off payment for £1m if City qualified for the Champions League – an achievement, for a club with City’s ambitions, that is regarded as the bare minimum.
Other bonuses meant Mendy would have banked £700,000 from winning the Champions League, £350,000 for the Premier League, £100,000 for the FA Cup and £50,000 for the EFL Cup, the Super Cup or the FIFA Club World Cup.
However, the player claims City’s refusal to pay his salary “very nearly made me bankrupt” and that three of his former team-mates lent him money “to pay my legal fees and support my family.” His documents also included transcripts of his texts to Khaldoon Al Mubarak, the City chairman, pleading with him to “sort out the situation” of his unpaid wages. No reply from Khaldoon is recorded.
Mendy asked Manchester City chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak to help resolve the issue with his wages (Oli Scarff/AFP)
“I would just like to stress that at the time in question I was doing nothing different than several of Manchester City’s first-team players,” Mendy said in a statement to the tribunal. “Several players … were all present at the parties that I attended and hosted.
“This does not excuse my behaviour but I feel it is unfair for Manchester City to single me out in the way that they have. The difference between me and my Manchester City team-mates is that I was the one that was false accused of rape and publicly humiliated.”
Mendy went on to highlight an article in The Athletic from January 2023 in which Mahrez, Grealish, Walker, Sterling and Stones were named as being with Mendy on the nights of the alleged sex attacks. “I can confirm this is true,” Mendy wrote in the documents. “All those players attended the parties which led to the charges.”
Kyle Walker and Benjamin Mendy attended parties together during their time at City (Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)
He added: “I was just as ready, willing and able to perform my duties as the other Manchester City players that (the club) knew attended the parties and, in City’s account, acted recklessly. I am not, however, aware of Manchester City deducting or suspending the pay of any of the other players when it was public knowledge (they) had attended the parties.
“I do, therefore, feel it incredibly unjust that Manchester City effectively singled me out from the team when I was doing nothing different from the rest of the team.”
Mendy appeared at the tribunal via video link, wearing a grey shirt and tie, and was cross-examined by Sean Jones, a KC representing the Premier League club. The player accepted that City had paid him extraordinarily well.
City’s argument is that it was “impossible” to involve Mendy because of the FA’s suspension as well as his bail conditions and the time he spent in prison on remand. The player was obliged to observe a 6pm curfew. He could not travel into Manchester within the boundaries of the M60 motorway and had to surrender his passport, having flown to Paris while under investigation.
“The Covid regulations – you knew about them but they were not stopping you having your parties, are we agreed?” Jones asked him.
“Unfortunately, yes,” Mendy replied, accepting it was not professional “in the sense I know I could have had better behaviour, sleeping early, resting, to be at 100 per cent on the pitch.”
“You were being paid an extremely large amount of money,” Jones continued, “and, shortly before going off to play at Chelsea, you were partying, yes?”
“Yes,” Mendy said.
Mendy now plays for Lorient in Ligue 1 (Loic Venance/AFP via Getty Images)
“Did you think to yourself that it was a terrible idea to keep on partying? And you say, ‘No’. That is because you didn’t care, did you? You just didn’t care that you were doing wrong. The truth is, you couldn’t care less whether or not what you were doing was in breach of regulations, police bail or exposed you to risk.”
Mendy replied: “At the time, yes.”
His refusal to adhere to his bail led to him being remanded into prison and, in September 2021, he received a letter from the Premier League champions.
“I am writing to confirm that the club has, after careful and anxious consideration, suspended the payment of salary to you,” it informed him. “Nor will you receive any further payment until you are ready and able to perform your obligations under your contract of employment.
“You are not presently ready and able to perform your duties, of course, because you have been remanded in custody and separately because the FA has suspended you from engaging in any football-related activity.”
Omar Berrada, formerly City’s chief football operations officer, was among the witnesses who gave evidence and said he could recall a number of players, including Mendy, breaching the Covid regulations.
In a series of tense exchanges with Mendy’s KC, Nick de Marco, Berrada said no disciplinary action was taken against any of the five players who had attended the party at Mendy’s house that led to the police investigation.
Berrada, now the chief executive of Manchester United, repeatedly avoided answering De Marco’s questions, saying, “That’s a question for the club’s (City’s) lawyers,” and was told by the judge at one point that it was not an acceptable response.
On the first morning of the hearing, Mendy’s agent claimed he had an agreement in place with Berrada that, in the event of a not-guilty verdict, the player would receive the money that was owed to him. Berrada said that was not true.
The tribunal continues on Tuesday.
Additional reporting: Dan Sheldon
(Top photo: Oli Scarff/AFP via Getty Images)
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