Uefa has pledged to defend legal challenges it expects some major football clubs to make if sanctions are imposed on them for breaches of the financial fair play rules. Clubs in European competition are required to limit their financial losses to €45m in total over 2011-12 and 2012-13 and this limit will be enforced for the first time before the beginning of next season. Clubs in breach of the rules, introduced to encourage European clubs to be more financially responsible, face sanctions ranging from a fine to exclusion from European competition in the most serious cases.

Uefa's general secretary, Gianni Infantino, revealed that 76 clubs, almost a third of the total 237 involved in European competition, were being investigated for possible breaches of the rules, including making substantial losses, based on their 2011-12 accounts. Manchester City, who lost £98m in that year, bankrolled by Sheikh Mansour of Abu Dhabi, are thought to be included in the 76, as well as Paris Saint-Germain, who are now making significant losses bankrolled by the club's owners, a division of the state of Qatar.

Clubs' accounts for 2012-13 have mostly been submitted to Uefa now, and are being investigated. Minor cases will be decided by late April, Infantino said, and final decisions in all cases by mid-June. Alasdair Bell, Uefa's legal affairs director, said he expects legal challenges to be made by clubs on whom sanctions are imposed and maintained that Uefa will fight them. "We are not afraid of [Uefa decisions] being contested," Bell said. "We fully anticipate there will be challenges – it would be strange if there weren't. July and August could be a busy time."