Pep Guardiola said he was “looking forward” to the outcome of the hearing into allegations against Manchester City over 115 alleged breaches of Premier League financial rules, which begins on Monday.

The hearing concerns charges of alleged rule violations between 2009 and 2018.

A decision by the independent commission is expected early next year and Guardiola expressed his joy that a process that began with the announcement of the charges in February 2023 is finally coming to an end.

“It starts soon and hopefully ends soon,” Guardiola said at a press conference on Friday.

“An independent panel will decide. I’m looking forward to the decision. I’m glad it starts on Monday and I know there will be more rumors about the verdicts, then we’ll see.”

If City are found guilty, the punishment imposed by the independent commission could range from a fine and points deduction to exclusion from the Premier League.

But despite the severity of some of the sanctions under discussion, Guardiola insists the case is not a topic of conversation among players in the dressing room.

“We are not lawyers,” he said.

“Erling (Haaland) is not a lawyer, so we have not discussed it. What will happen is before the independent panel and we will accept the verdict.”

The allegations against City come at a time when the company is the dominant force in English football, having won a record four Premier League titles in a row.

And Guardiola suggested he believed the rest of the Premier League would place great value on the club being found guilty.

“I know what people are looking for, I know what they expect,” he added.

“I know because I’ve been reading it for many years, but I said everyone is innocent until proven guilty. So we’ll see.”

The charges cover a period of 14 seasons from 2009/10 and include 54 counts of failure to provide information, 14 counts of failure to provide details of player and manager payments, seven counts of breaching the Premier League’s Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR), five counts of non-compliance with UEFA regulations including Financial Fair Play (FFP) and 35 counts of failure to cooperate with Premier League investigations from 2018 onwards.

City strongly denies all allegations and claimed in a statement on the first allegations that it had “irrefutable evidence” to support its position and “hoped that this matter would be resolved once and for all”.