Donate to a worthy cause today!

The folks here at The Short Fuse are inundated daily with neat offers, emails from princes asking us to give them our credit card information in exchange for precious metals futures, pleas for marriage, etc., and in our email box today sat the following request.  We figured we'd pass it on to you, dear readers, since it appears to be a worthy cause for all of us to support.

Fellow soccer fans, lovers of sport, competition and free markets,

My name is Mansour bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, but many of you know me as Sheikh Mansour, owner of Manchester City FC.  I have owned the club since August 2008, when I bought the club from some guy.  When I took over the club, I made it my number one priority in life to see the club become one of the strongest in the world, a club full of international superstars that could take on the world's best.  Expenses would not be spared and no potential transfer target declared unattainable.  In the face of looming UEFA measures to limit spending, I decided the club should forge ahead and continue the goal I set, which was total world domination.

We knew the 2013-14 season was the first real enforcement of UEFA's Financial Fair Play, but we sat around the boardroom playing Pin the Tail on the Third-Party Owned Transfer Player last May and decided to test UEFA's resolve out by spending approximately a berbillion dollars on such global icons like Fernandinho and Alrego Nalvaro, or whatever his name is, in last summer's transfer window.  We made it a mission to buy players we had absolutely no intention on playing, like Stevan Jovetic, for large sums of money because why not?  We're a billion levels of wealthy, and we can afford to buy really good players at inflated prices with no plans on playing him just so he doesn't go to our rivals and play against us in the league.  We spent over £100 million last summer while only seeing £10 million leave the club - mostly youth academy players because they're not expensive players on large wage packets.  We knew UEFA were looking at our 2012-13 accounts, and that our sponsorship agreement during this time with a company owned by Yours Truly was farcical and worth nothing, but we went full steam ahead with reckless spending.

Thinking UEFA would turn the other cheek come FFP enforcement time last month, mainly due to our mutual business interests, they instead decided to fine us £50 million, cap our wages eligible for Champions League and force us to field eight locally-trained players in our CL squad.  This makes the Sheikh very sad, and this is where you can come help!

You see, even though I could afford to give UEFA this fine many times over, it will prevent our club from spending like a flock of dumbasses this summer on fun transfer targets that Txiki Begiristain found playing Football Manager.  I'm committed on giving Michel Platini the Heisman stiff-arm this time next year, because this silly cat-and-mouse game is fun to me and I don't believe he'd ever ban us from Champions League play.  This is where you, the fan and lover of this sport, come in.

We've started a Kickstarter campaign titled "Help Pay Manchester City's £50 million FFP Fine So That Sheikh Mansour Can Continue Spending Money On Super Great Players This Summer".  We've done the estimates, and considering we have roughly a few billion bandwagoning fans around the world that we've attained over the past six years, all we need is for fans to chip in a few of their hard-earned currency towards our fine.  Consider it a toll for being associated with winners.  By relieving the pressure of this fine, we can instead turn our attention towards dropping £50 million on overrated players like Luke Shaw, or giving Tottenham that money for Christian Eriksen and seeing how badly they can spend our money on new arrivals.

Many will scoff at this white-collar, cup-in-hand charity case, considering I could fund an entire defense budget for the next 30 years, but this seems like the cool thing to do these days.  So here I am, asking you to put on your compassion hat one more time for an upstanding Citizen like myself.  If anything, your club depends on my money to get the players they want, so consider it a gift to the club of your choice.

Here's to a great summer, a great 2014-15 season, and don't be afraid to give money to me.  With your financial gift, you will make all of my our dreams come true.

Your Friend,
Sheikh Mansour