Premier League: Nottingham Forest lose appeal against four-point deduction over financial fair play rules

Nottingham: Nottingham Forest has been unsuccessful in its appeal against a decision to deduct the team four points for breaching the Premier League’s financial rules. The league said Tuesday that an appeal board has upheld the decision taken by an independent commission in March, which dropped Forest into the relegation zone.

Forest have since climbed back out of the bottom three and are in 17th place in the 20-team league, three points above the relegation zone with two games remaining.

Forest were found to have breached the league’s profitability and sustainability regulations covering the period from 2020-23. The club was only in the Premier League for one of those seasons — 2022-23 — and were permitted losses of up to 61 million pounds ($77 million) that year, its first back in the Premier League since 1999. Forest went above the threshold by 34.5 million pounds ($44 million).

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The club launched an appeal on two grounds — that the commission failed to regard the sale of Brennan Johnson soon after the three-year assessment period ended as a mitigating factor and that some or all of the points deducted should have been suspended.

“Each of these grounds was rejected by the appeal board, which found the independent commission was entitled to immediately impose the sanction it did,” the Premier League said in a statement. “The four-point deduction will therefore remain in place.”