Former Manchester City soccer star Benjamin Mendy has launched a legal claim for over £11million in back pay from the Premier League champions.

The French World Cup winner claims City should pay him the wages it withheld after his arrest for rape and sexual assault against girls invited to parties at his luxury home in Cheshire between 2018 and 2021.

Mendy, 30, was cleared of all charges against him after two trials at Chester Crown Court by July 2023 and subsequently left City to join French club Lorient.

City’s legal team claims Mendy was not “ready and able to fulfill his contract” by being available to train and play because of a period in prison on remand, his subsequent bail conditions awaiting trial and because of an Interim Suspension Order imposed by the Football Association.

An employment tribunal which started in Manchester yesterday heard that Mendy had a £6million a year contract for six years between August 2017 and July 2023.

City stopped paying his wages in September 2021 and did not pay him again. His contract was terminated on June 30, 2023.

Mendy gave evidence to the tribunal via a video link from his lawyer’s office and agreed with City’s lawyer Sean Jones that he had been paid £25 million for playing in 123 games out of 240.

He accepted that he was “incredibly well paid” and that the club had a right to expect him “to conduct himself professionally”.

The player also agreed that he went to night clubs two or three times a week during his time at City and held parties at his mansion The Spinney in Prestbury, Cheshire.

Mr Jones said: “There was a consistent pattern in how you went about meeting women and having sex with them even though you barely knew them. You knew that involved risks?”

Mendy said: “I was not thinking like this at the time.”

He also accepted that he continued to hold parties during Covid and after he had been released on police bail following allegations of sex attacks.

But he claimed that he was acting no differently than other members of City’s first team, many of whom attended parties at his house.

Mr Jones said: “But they were ready and able to perform their duties. They had not been suspended.”

The tribunal heard that Mendy received a letter from City via his agent in September 2021 informing him that he would receive no further payment until he was ready to perform his duties under his contract of employment.

Mendy said he was in prison on remand at the time and accepted that he had been suspended by the Football Association “from all footballing activities”.

Mr Jones said: “Even if City had wanted to play you, they would not be allowed.”

City said in a written outline of their defence of the claim that Mendy broke the terms of his contract because of his behaviour.

The statement said: “It was an express term of the contract that the claimant would not knowingly or recklessly do anything or omit to do anything which is likely to bring the Club or the game of football into disrepute.

“That obligation encompassed behaviour in the claimant’s private life which might lead to scandal and, thus, disrepute.

“Notwithstanding the claimant’s contractual obligation, he behaved with a recklessness and disregard of his obligations that can only sensibly be characterised as extreme.”

Mendy’s lawyer, Nick de Marco KC, in a statement of claim said Mendy was due £11,009,548 in unpaid wages.

He said that under employment law, City had no legal right to stop paying Mendy’s wages.

Mr de Marco argued that if an employee was “ready and willing” to work and his inability to work was the result of a third-party decision or external constraint, any deduction of pay may be unlawful.

He said: “An inability to work due to a lawful suspension imposed by the employer by way of sanction will permit the lawful deduction of pay.

“By contrast, an inability to work due to an ‘unavoidable impediment ‘ or which was ‘involuntary’ may render the deduction of pay unlawful.

“Where the employee is accused of criminal offences, the issue cannot be determined simply by reference to the employee’s ultimate guilt or innocence, nor simply by reference to whether he or she was granted bail or not.

“The approach in some of the cases that if the employee’s actions led to a suspension from work or the bringing of criminal charges then these were ‘avoidable’ or ‘voluntary’ is too close to an assumption of guilt and therefore wrong in principle.”

The tribunal continues.