Matt Lawton on reports that Man City's appeal is already 'undermined'
The Times' chief sports correspondent spoke to Cathy Newman, and his short clip left the paper's own long podcast on the scandal far behind.
Times RadioStory of Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 213,579 views a day, 26 times a normal first day on this channel (8,128).
Man City Appeal ‘Undermined’, Reports Suggest | Matt Lawton
"Man City Appeal ‘Undermined’, Reports Suggest | Matt Lawton" is a radio clip on Times Radio, the YouTube home of The Times and The Sunday Times. In it, the paper's chief sports correspondent tells Cathy Newman that Manchester City's appeal against the Premier League's guilty verdict may already be in trouble. As the description quotes him: "No sooner had this appeal gone in than there are reports suggesting that there are flaws in this case." The clip also has the veteran Sunday Times sports writer David Walsh in conversation with the former culture minister Ed Vaizey.
Ten hours after it went up, the clip had passed 120,000 views. A new video here usually finishes its entire first day near 8,000.
The Times is not short of City material. The same day the channel posted "Inside the Man City Cheating Scandal," a full podcast episode with Manveen Rana as host and the chief sports reporter Martyn Ziegler as guest. Its description says the club was found guilty this week on all charges of serious breaches of the league's financial rules, and the episode sets out how it got there. That longer explainer has done respectably. The short clip about the appeal has drawn many times more people.
The comment section moves just as fast, with nearly 300 replies in those first ten hours. Some viewers predict the appeal will be over sooner than expected. Others ask how the club's owners pass the league's owners' test, or argue that the 2018 cut-off in the charges was only a line drawn to make the case manageable. A few stop to praise Walsh.
The channel also had a former ambassador on the oil crisis that day, and Ruth Davidson on the Conservatives and net zero. The football clip is the one people came for.
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What viewers say
This appeal might be over a bit quicker than anticipated.
@georgethompson453See it on YouTubeDavid Walsh is a brilliant journalist.
@davidcooney3100See it on YouTube
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- Channel
- Times Radio
- Subscribers
- 1,300,000 ▲ 10,000 this week
- Channel views, last 7 days
- 6,298,257
- Channel views, pace per day
- 1,863,157 (on a normal day: 785,865)
- Video published
- October 2, 2026
- Video views so far
- 123,143 (less than a day online)
- Video views, pace per day
- 213,579
The numbers
Here are the figures behind a clip that far outran the channel's usual first day, along with the busy week around it.
💡 Test your knowledge
Before Times Radio, Cathy Newman spent many years presenting which British news program?
Cathy Newman was a long-serving presenter of Channel 4 News.
