Manchester City have been ordered to pay the majority of Benjamin Mendy’s unpaid wages after their former player won an employment tribunal.
Mendy had claimed the Premier League champions owed him £11million ($14.1m) when they stopped paying his salary after he was charged with multiple rape allegations and one of sexual assault in August 2021.
Mendy argued City decided he was “guilty from the outset”, cut ties with him from that point and unlawfully withdrew his salary for almost two years until his contract expired in June 2023.
The France World Cup winner was later cleared of six rapes at a trial in January 2023 and found not guilty of raping one woman and attempting to rape another in July last year.
He now plays for French club Lorient, who were relegated from Ligue 1 last season.
A summary of the tribunal verdict from employment judge Joanne Dunlop read: “The result of this decision is that Mr Mendy will be entitled to receive the majority of his unpaid salary, although not all of it.”
City had argued Mendy continued to behave in an unprofessional manner even after he was arrested by the police and suspended by the Football Association (FA), wilfully ignoring Covid rules and hosting sex parties. They also said it was impossible to involve him because of the five-month period he’d spent in police custody and because of his strict bail conditions.
Judge Dunlop found that the club was entitled to withhold Mendy’s salary for the time he was remanded in custody and was satisfied that Mendy found himself in custody and unable to perform his employment contract “in part due to his own actions in breaching the bail conditions he had previously been placed under.” “This was a culpable conduct which could be separated from the underlying criminal allegations,” the summary of the judgement read.
“His behaviour fell little short of demanding to be locked up,” Manchester City’s lawyer, Sean Jones KC, had said during the hearing. However, judge Dunlop ruled City were not entitled to withhold his salary during the 17 months when he was not in custody. She concluded Mendy was “ready and willing” to work during those periods, and was prevented from doing so by impediments (the FA suspension and bail conditions) which were “unavoidable or involuntary on his part.”
The fact that Mendy’s contract contained no provision permitting the club to withhold wages in the event of an FA suspension or bail conditions was also “an important part of the reason for this decision”.
Mendy, who was represented by sports lawyer Nick De Marco KC, believed he had been unfairly singled out when other City players had attended the parties, citing an article published by The Athletic that named players such as Jack Grealish, Riyah Mahrez, Raheem Sterling, Kyle Walker and John Stones. He also claimed City’s refusal to pay him “very nearly” bankrupted him.
The hearing heard how Mendy was paid a £6m a year salary but then received various bonuses, including a minimum £1.2m in image rights every year, a further £900,000 appearance bonus if he featured in 60 per cent of matches and a one-off payment for £1m if City reached the Champions League.
He would have been entitled to a futher £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.
Manchester City and Mendy’s lawyers have been approached for comment.
(Top photo: Lindsey Parnaby/AFP/Getty Images)
