We weren’t expecting the Manchester City news, which made our job all the more exciting

When the club won their court battle with Uefa, our writers had to think on the fly, says Ben Burrows

The side are free to compete in Europe next season (Getty)

To give you a peek behind the journalistic curtain, in the world of breaking news not all news is actually breaking.

In many cases journalists, experts in their field with contacts at the heart of their subject areas, very often know what’s coming long before the brightly coloured banner flashes up on TV.

Yesterday, however, presented a rarity for sports writers – a breaking news story that we didn’t know was coming.

Manchester City’s Champions League ban being overturned was one of at least three possible outcomes following the club’s appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

For background, Uefa had claimed City had breached Financial Fair Play regulations and subsequently banned them back in February from all European competition for the next two seasons.

City immediately signalled their intention to appeal, and, after hearing evidence from both sides of the argument, CAS has now cleared the club to play in Europe next season and reduced the initial €30m fine to €10m.

It is a tremendous victory for City, one to rival any on the pitch in recent years.

CAS found they had not disguised equity funding as sponsorship, but did say they had failed to cooperate with Uefa’s investigation, hence the fine.

CAS found that most of the alleged breaches were either not established or were time-barred.

Exoneration rather than a one or two-year suspension was seen as the least likely result beforehand, meaning, as journalists, we had to think on the fly.

That’s a rare but exciting feeling. We can obviously prepare and plan – and we did – but there really is nothing quite like the thrill of a fully live, breaking news story.

We covered it from every angle, from City’s vindication and where this leaves Uefa and its FFP regulations to how the rest of the Premier League will be affected.

There will be more to come no doubt.

Yours,

Ben Burrows

Sports editor