Football club networks. Who’s behind them?
Roland Duchâtelet got me thinking about other serial owners of professional football clubs.
Back at the end of the 1990’s the private investment trust, the English National Investment Company (ENIC) led the way in football club ownership with large stakes in Tottenham Hotspur, Rangers, SK Slavia Prague, AEK Athens, Vicenza Calcio and FC Basel. However UEFA were never happy with this arrangement and by 2007 once Daniel Levy and Joe Lewis had bought the majority of shares in Spurs, they divested themselves from the other clubs.
Major domestic leagues adopted practices where it was impossible to own more than one club, but UEFA or FIFA has never prevented a multi-national investment approach such as Duchâtelet’s.
The most high profile serial owner is Giampaolo Pozzo (photo) and his family. They own three European clubs – Udinese in Italy, Granada in Spain and Watford.
It was Watford’s burgeoning youth academy that attracted 72-year old Pozzo and his son Gino to Watford and the potential riches of Sky’s new Premier League TV deal. Pozzo has encouraged youth development at Granada and back in his native Friuli Venezia region of northern Italy, Udinese have actively recruited young talent from across Europe and regularly sold them on for big profits such as Alexis Sánchez who moved to Barcelona for €26m.
Pozzo has owned Udinese since 1986 and bought Granada CF in 2009. They were almost defunct when Pozzo offered them a partnership and a network and in just a few years Pozzo has taken Granada from the regional third tier to La Liga for the first time in 35 years.
Players move frequently between Pozzo’s clubs. Udinese incidentally have 30 players out on loan! Six of whom are at Granada. Watford benefited last season before the FA changed the rules. Instead, in the summer transfer window the Hornets ‘bought’ 8 players from Udinese and 3 from Granada.
The world’s richest man Carlos Slim’s omnipresent empire includes three clubs from his homeland, Mexico. Club Pachuca and Club Leon are two long established top fight sides and he also owns 2nd Division team Estudiantes Tecos. With rumours that Slim wanted to expand his stranglehold on Mexican football, in May of this year club’s owners voted against multiple team ownership.
Slim may now look abroad to get his fix and has already an interest in struggling Spanish team Real Oviedo.
The inventor of Red Bull, Dietrich Mateschitz, who is worth $7.1 billion gives Roland Duchâtelet a run for his money owning 5 football clubs in 4 countries. In his homeland he owns Red Bull Salzburg and in the United States Bradley Wright Phillips’ New York Red Bulls. Lesser known are lower league clubs Red Bull Brasil based in São Paulo, RB Leipzig, who pipped Carl Zeiss Jena to the Regionalliga Nordost title last season in Germany, and top Ghanaian league team Red Bull Ghana.
Philip Anschutz, owner of entertainment conglomerate AEG has shareholdings in Los Angeles Galaxy, Houston Dynamo and Swedish club Hammarby. Everyone knows Stan Kroenke as the largest shareholder in Arsenal but the American also owns Colorado Rapids of the MLS.
Finally, from my quick look around the World Wide Web, I saw that a certain Mr Vincent Tan has his grubby fingers in more than one pie. In December Tan took over control of Bosnia’s Premier League football club Sarajevo. Under the deal, Cardiff will co-operate with Sarajevo, exchanging players and taking part in a football academy. The Malaysian billionaire has pledged to invest $1.8m.
Afterwards Tan said: “fans don’t need to worry. I won’t change the club’s name, its maroon colours or coat of arms.” Just what he said to Cardiff fans I believe.
