Who would buy a football club in 2024?

Well, here for this one we have Adam Crafton from Athletics, let's not forget the newly crowned sports writer of the year, Adam Crafton, and also Matt, I don't think I've forgotten about the silver sports news reporter category, we're not going to do it. Forget about you too sir, congratulations to both of you right? Let's talk about this series. Well, men who want to buy English

football

club

s and it's been circulating around the sporting world all this week. You've both contributed to it, so Matt, let's start with you on this. one, um, what has this series told us about the characters who want to get involved in the ownership of English

football

club

s in particular?

Well, look, I mean, there are a lot of clubs out there, there are a lot of buyers, good, bad and indifferent, um, people get involved. for a whole host of reasons, there's no one type of buyer, um, and I'm afraid there's no one type of dishonest buyer, you know, they're motivated by different things, um, you know what we learn well. Look, owning a football club is great, isn't it? It's very exciting. You know, if you weren't good enough to play, you know it's nice, it's the closest thing, right? It's competition, it's exciting, it makes you famous.

Well, that's good if that's what you like. Can you tell what a platform gives you if you have something else to sell? Maybe football clubs often come with stadiums and properties, so maybe you don't like it. football club a lot, but you quite like the property. football clubs are cash businesses, cash businesses, light nightclubs and taxi ranks and all that sort of stuff is quite good for laundering cash, that might be attractive to a certain type of person. another type of whitewashing, um something related to the type of getting famous, maybe it can distract from something that you don't want us to talk about, um, so yes, there are a variety of reasons and I think the people that you we've focused, uh, on this week, um, almost like checking most of those boxes, not all, but you know, there are quite a few boxes checked this week, so look, there's not just one type of owner, there's not one type discussion, there is no one. motivation, there's not just one type of rogue, um, there's a variety of reasons for us football clubs, yeah, Adam, who you spoke to, uh, Thomas Zakus, um, you know, and I think there's a line in it that really tickled us, you know, suddenly a nobody in football. terms at least he became somebody, is there an element where you know these kind of guys want to be somebody to be associated with big clubs like Manchester United or Milan for example?

In this case, yes, I mean this guy, I mean even after something like that. working on him for the last week or so, he's still a bit of a mystery, even having spoken to him for quite a while and received some very long email responses, also, he, he, he, it came out of nowhere. in a footballing sense, you know, I'm not really sure anyone before, certainly, in English football, before March last year, was aware of Thomas Zaris from a footballing sense, you know, if you had said to Matt, give us a list of the 20 people most likely to come in and buy a football club in the next five years - he

would

n't have been on the list of 200, to be honest - and suddenly he issues this press release to say I've contributed a little bit to buy Manchester United, my company can put in half the money or my partners can put in half the money and then the fans will put in the rest of the money and in a way, what I was saying. when you look at that press release, it

would

have appealed to a lot of football fans, you know, in the sense that when he later explained it, he said not really, we will buy the club and then we will give the fans the opportunity to buy some actions and having a say in the strategic direction of the club, a lot of the things you've known for a long time that says things like no more shake-ups, no more oligarchs, give power back to the fans.

Pretty good communications, um, but there were kind of red flags from the beginning. I mean, he put his cell phone number in the press release. This is not something that normally happens. We complain about the lack of access we have in sports journalism to the owners and principles. and all this kind of stuff, but someone with access to billions put up his cell phone and put an email address in a press release? I'm not sure, so he did it, but he got a lot of publicity out of it. The BBC interviewed him, uh, some notable fans.

I interviewed him, they hadn't done anything wrong, they were talking about someone who had said they had an offer for Manchester United, but within 3 weeks he was out of the running, right? And I think from the conversations that follow, some of the conversations that Matt had and and I've done it too, you know, I don't think that offer was taken particularly seriously, he says it was because it came so late in the day, so you You ask, why did you come so late and do such a thing? a public display of it when it was never really likely, but even now you know he continues to flirt with the idea of ​​buying Milan shares, he says he made an offer in July and November, the biggest problem he has is that, um, and it's a nice big problem is a man wanted in Singapore has an Interpol red notice against him and was accused of fraud in a civil lawsuit in New York in the United States that he settled says it was to reduce legal costs um you know, I spoke to the lawyer who represented the two brothers who were at SU doing um and they have a very different view of that, you know, they say you know what's happening now in Singapore justifies the action that was being taken at that time because, You know, alleged fraud is a very, very fascinating situation, but I couldn't tell you that yet because I guess it's still a living thing, right?

He could be, you know, his argument is you. I've come across Singapore, New York, these two unfortunate things that have happened in my respectable 40 years in the business and you're going all out for it and K and killing me, but they're pretty big things if you want to have a football club, ​​and I suppose the advantage of owning a football club could be partnering with these big brands that give the companies that you are trying to raise capital from the perception that you are very successful and credible. The downside is that that association Particularly with Manchester United, everything becomes a story with Manchester United, so if there is something shady happening in Singapore or in New York five years ago, that will come to light at some point and I think That's what we've seen. the kind of risk and reward from last week, when you look at some of these stories that Matt is going to talk about, you know that everything fell apart and you wonder how public he was about trying to get involved. a Premier League football club likely accelerated that demand.

Hold on, I'll come talk to you about Doy in just a second and before we continue, we should also say that Thomas Zilis has strongly denied any allegations against him very quickly. In terms of social media, I don't know. I look at these men and wonder if they remind me of those guys you see on social media standing in front of her with a Ferrari saying they will make us rich in quick steps. Do you know what role social media plays in what these guys are trying to do when it comes to football clubs? I think it depends on the guy, so you know, we worked on a story last year about this guy, um, Henry Maurice, who sounds ridiculous now, but he was rivaling the Saudi public investment fund to try to buy Newcastle United.

He got into the room with Mike Ash's advisors. You know Fanel was in Mike Ashley's offices in London. He convinced reporters that it was really him. believable it turns out that he is in prison, you know, when we were doing a story about him. Broad, but he was never someone who was all over social media, so not everyone uses him that way. I think zel arus has used social media. in the media in a pretty interesting way, he's CLI, he's used some kind of paid news wire to spread a certain perception of himself, um, and on social media, you know, he started.

I think he realized that with a fan base like Manchester United, you know if. you use two or three words from friends, you know the main one is that the frosters are bad, um, let's get into a Twitter space and talk about how bad this sales process is and these are the things we could do to change the club , by the way. You know shake Jim and S Jim Ratliff. I will do business with both. You know if you need a partner, I'm here. You know if they need a front man, I'm nearby. You know I'm not going to call. they, I'm, I'm here, you know we can do this together, so I think some of them use it that way, but also a lot of them don't use social media at all and almost hide from social media. because they know, actually, with a bit of scrutiny because there are some pretty good fan journalists on Twitter now, you know, every club has, every football fan listening to this will know that one follower of their club that you can trust in the kind of football business, right, Everton fans have it, right, there are others that are those that I think every fan will know or this fan knows what he's talking about and if he's investigating this guy, so there will be I think the social media side can be a risk as well as a risk and reward for them, Matt, come on, roll up your sleeves, let's talk about Doy MOSI, the Nigerian businessman who wanted to buy Sheffield United and I was fascinated by this because if he followed through on that deal, he would have been the first black owner in English football, so history could be made, but not everything is as it seemed, no, it should probably just be you.

I know just correct something in the story that everything would have been the first black owner of an English football team. I think it was actually more of what he was trying to bring to the table and, most particularly, black Africa. Africa Nigeria, this was very much part of his speech which would in some ways be a sign of how open and tolerant we are, you know, good news for the UK, but also, you know, the rise of Africa, already You know, Nigeria is a major player on the global stage, blah blah blah, you know, it's changing the narrative around Nigerian entrepreneurs, however, I wouldn't have been the first black owner of English.

Ben Robinson owns a load, he owns 98% of Burden, so you know, respect Ben, um, him. he does a fantastic job uh right a lot of all the things I said in my first response is probably the most complicated scam and I really feel like I've only told kind of a fraction of the story. You know, it's a football medium and I. Focus on Doy and his attempt to buy Sheard United, but it's a big scam and I think you know some people. I know there are some people who have already written about it. You know, the most notable one was Hindenberg's research, who really knocked it down.

Now they are short sellers. they take bets on companies that don't qualify, they look for fraud and bet against the stock price and they absolutely took down Doy and his company Tingo, others were already on this, a guy called Tom Winff who writes, you know he's the same guy of things you write, uh, for a c called stock profit, so it was one of the first, um, fell asleep quickly, um, now, um, it's simple, although for our purposes, I think it's a good, It hasn't been. He hasn't been convicted yet, but the Justice Department's success rate is remarkable and the SEC has filed a civil suit and there's a 72-page indictment, there's a nine-page indictment from the Justice Department.

I've spoken to at least a dozen. people who, um, um, were unlucky enough to work for them, they're all owed money, it's at least a four- and five-year scam, the American part, but he's been a scammer his whole life and, ya you know, me. I'm pretty sure to say that what he was trying to do, I think it was a stock trading scam and he was using football and I have to be honest here, football journalists who may be a bit like we know we're all in a hurry, everyone we're trying to, you know, spread stories and sometimes we don't have time to do background checks if it's a news story and there's a little bit of a habit. to simply say well, there is a billionaire who wants to buy the boom of his football club, that's the story, right? oh, he's a Nigerian billionaire, oh, he's a tech billionaire, oh, he has, he has a company that's on NASDAQ that's worth seven billion and it's his personal property.

Fortune Pays Suddenly, it's like an arms race to give importance to your story because that's what people want to hear. Oh, my troubled football club is going to be bought by a billionaire, not just a billionaire who has this guy. five billion, of course, there was a little bit of that and every time someone wrote that it was a positive story abouthe, it was a free ad for his company that he had just done a reverse merger with another garbage company and they are in ndaq so he will sell stock properly so he is in sales mode so the amount of times he gets people to say he is a multi-millionaire is just a win and it was a notable number that started before the connection with Sheffield United to To be fair, he managed to get photographed in GQ Africa.this Foundation threw a ball in Dorchester, got Namami Campbell, there he got famous Nigerian politicians, there he got Aon, you know he's a Charmer, he's right in a coma and he convinced a lot of people.

He started bidding on things chasing things. SheffieldUnited. It was just part of this to kind of go to Adam's answer earlier. I think it might have been a tactical mistake, although I think the grift that was hitting that was talking out loud to Tingo, this magical African conglomerate that makes everything from cell phones to food to healthcare and was going to expand all over Africa and getting to Asia, that was the ripoff right and he had co-conspirators in that um and the football part really attracted attention so it got that burst of publicity you know? CNN the BBC did it Ria Ferdinand did it a lot of people did it a lot of people told his story but it shined a big light on him and it attracted people like me and not just me quite a few people got well wait a minute.

I've never heard of Tingo. I'm going to direct it with my Nigerian partner. Have you heard of a company called Tingo that apparently has 9 million customers? No, I've never heard of them. Apparently he's opening a hospital and he has a foundation and a business school. No, I've never really heard of this guy who goes around telling people he's a Nigerian billionaire who's there for C A Forbes, who you know isn't perfect. but it's pretty good with the billionaires there. There are four Nigerian billionaires and he was not one of them. It wasn't that hard to start getting drowsy.

I'm just not sure about these claims and then you start looking at Tingo and every number he had was an estimate or forecast you think none of these numbers have been audited these are huge red flags how many red flags so look that's him and I think his story in terms of what we're trying to do this week is relatively simple, he used football as a vehicle for his other scan Matt, I want to ask you why you think, because if you know, if you look at us, sports, this doesn't happen. in American sports in the same way as English soccer, why?

I think English football is exceptionally vulnerable and attractive to some of these characters. Well, I'm actually trying to write a story about this right now, so first thing I have to say, yes. The first thing I must say is that you are right. It looks like football in general, but we'll stick with English because we have a lot of clubs and a lot of high profile and there's a lot of money going around, so it seems like it's unique, but particularly, especially if I eat vulnerable I would just say there's been one very famous case. in the New Irish USA and a guy named Spano I think was a 30 for 30, you know, massive fraud and he actually got away with it for a while. it was rumored eventually, but it happens and can happen, not that often of course, and there are other famous scammers, M Sports, Alan Stanford Springs, mine and cricket, and interestingly, as I was digging through my bug list, there are quite a bit of crossover with F1, so one of our guys in our series, William's story of course was connected to h um and um oh, the KN county guy Russell King was one of the previous scams I reported on when I was at the BBC he also I think I put a bit in for saber and there's a couple more I mean QPR briori and the Benetton team so that's interesting so there's another sport there , their European teams, you usually buy a team, there's a lot of cash, what do you know? they have in common I think they are just cash deals, the profile is high, the checks and balances done by who is in charge, who is in charge, who is in charge of F1, well they are just a collection of F1 owners , so there is nothing.

There really is no body that is investigating everyone what football is. Well, the leagues are just the shareholders of the clubs. They don't want to create this high bar for people to get in because at some point they have to. they sell the clubs themselves so they don't want to scare people, that's something that comes up a lot when I talk to the owners or I talk to the leaders and I say why, why, why does this keep happening, you know why you do it so much . It's harder for people to buy clubs and they're like, "Oh my God, you can't do that." Good buyers would be discriminated against.

Well, maybe, but two, you know, we talk to the owners and they say, "Well, where's my exit?" If we start insisting on bonuses and people put large amounts of money into escrow accounts or, you know, having six-month vetting processes, how do I sell my club? How do I get out of trouble? So I think it's a common theme through this and I think the other thing is maybe kind of the bigger picture, well the other thing I'm supposed to add is that, broadly speaking, there is English football and I remember interviewing Richard Scoore about this a few years ago where he said To me, I think the whole piece revolves around the owners and director test, which they used to call the fit and proper person test and he didn't like that.

He didn't like the name of the fit and proper person, but he said it sounds like a cut from your jib test, it sounds like you're trying to join a country club and he wanted what we have here in the UK to be based on a more objective, black and white law and drew the distinction with us, sport. where it's a cut of your jib test for the NFL to try to buy an NFL club is very difficult, the other NFL owners look at you like you're trying to join a gang, trying to join a country club and you could be excluded now, he says no We don't want to do that, we want to have a test that is based on British law and generally speaking, if you can own a British company, you can probably also own a team of British football and I think that's it, if you want, it's kind of like that.

It's admirable from a legal and commercial point of view, since it is based on a law that you can't have, so I don't like how you look, well, let's have something a little more black and white, pleas a little more objective, but it does, it's almost by design a low bar, now what they've done maybe we get into this and I think one of the key takeaways from our series, most of these guys didn't really succeed, you know, they them. that we've written actually failed and you know I have a list of 15 or 20 others that eventually got attacked, or got caught, or had the club for a while and then lost it, not many people made it.

Now that means football must be doing something right and particularly in Kersner and Doy, uh, in William's story, they did a pretty good job, not taking these guys seriously, scrutinizing them, holding him down and demanding proof of funds, they demanded source and sufficiency of funds and this is where I think football is doing a better job, it's like saying, well, look, we have our black and white test, either you fail or you don't show me the money to show me you can being a good owner, that's where people are falling now falling falling now yeah, I was just thinking that this actually leads us pretty nicely into sort of the ongoing proposed acquisition of everon, you know, Triple 7 Partners Matt, um , is that so? this scrutiny is delaying that from happening right now, but generally speaking, yeah, there's not really a black and white issue, uh, owners and directors with 777, do you remember right at the beginning people were talking about the fact that Josh Wander, who is he he's basically the majority owner of Triple 7 um he had kind of a Conan conviction um from his student days that that was a worn out conviction and it wouldn't really be a problem, that was kind of a red herring. for Triple 7, that's all.

About show me the money what is your business plan can you finance and manage this complicated club? this big and complicated club with problems for two three years, yes or no, can you do it? I mean the fact that it hasn't happened yet, I think it's revealing my expectations all the time. This whole thing is it wouldn't happen because it hasn't happened yet, um, in the sense that you know this club is this club, this club really needs to be taken quickly and the Premier League knows that and the closer you get. the end of the season where Everton can have another points deduction, you know, that too hasn't been delivered yet, no, it's not going crazy, no, no, Cas, not in case two, you know Everton could be relegated in a matter of two months. and if Everton are relegated and you have the burden of Stadium B on them and the owner Maseri obviously has this loan to MSP as well that could POS that could potentially default, you know there's a lot of trouble on the railroad tracks. for both Everton and the Premier League and I understand why some Everton fans will just think we'll just move on and we'll deal with whatever comes once they're in the building, but really if the Premier League did that and then everything went wrong we would kill them well we would kill them for not doing the right due diligence for not doing the right checks for not doing the right process you know this is a famous football club it is a historic football club it is a founding member of the Premier League , knows? people with some merit who will say things like okay but you know you gave Newcastle control in the end and you haven't dealt with Man City and you haven't done this you haven't done this and you know Look what happened with Chelsea and all that type of thing and I guess that makes the argument for doing it now even stronger because you don't want another one of those types of things to happen in the future when you say Yeah, we'll just move on and find a way to get through it.

So my instinct is still if it took that long. I wonder why it didn't happen. It's a bit like a V decision, right? If they're taking that long. Also there is probably something not right, on the other hand you would also think about the things that happened with Barry mfield, you know Derby County and you have a chairman who has basically had enough and is doing well. I'm done, I mean, what. You can also protect the clubs from that, you know, they wash their hands of it, well, we're in liquidation, sorry, the next one yeah, it's really very, very difficult, and you know there's a big list there.

I mean, you know Barry is a good example of what I think Adam means by Triple 7. I'm not suggesting that Triple 7 is even going to fall apart. I'm just saying this is a potential thought. Um bar was already in trouble. Um, the previous one, I think his name was Stuart Day. They had been running too long, they had gone up, he lost control of the finances, he lost control of his own personal business and a guy called Steve Dale came along. Now Steve Dale should never have been allowed to buy that club, but at that time. there was a football light approach to investigating the owners was particularly light and there was a classic case of, you know, frying pan fire there a year after Steve Dale owned Barry, they were out The League was effectively bankrupt, actually now they declare bankruptcy and you We know what happened to Barry, they basically disappeared and there, thank God, the Phenix team started, but why did we go through that?

Why was Dale allowed to do that? What was his plan? What was it really about? You guys talk about it now and you know what he was, what he was, what he was trying to do, it was a scan of the property, it was about the parking, who knows, it's a short time and I can give you another 10. 15 clubs where it's happened. the same thing, where they have been trapped almost in a vicious cycle of bad owners, the club is permanently a distressed asset, so the good owners stay away and you just get it wrong or people who have what they just are.

They simply can't afford it and what does football do about it? Do you say no, no, no, no, well, okay, if you keep doing that, the club will go bankrupt, at the end of the day they are just businesses? I know fans don't want to hear that, but that's how they're set up, that's how they're structured, and companies fail all the time. Think about your favorite nightclubs when you were young, they are all gone, they don't last. Restaurants change. all this time footsy 100 go back 25 years 50 years 75 years we see how much it has changed this is the nature of business football clubs are weird because they are incredibly sticky they almost always find a way they rarely go they fail but when they do it's horrible, local suppliers, fans, generations of people, traditions, the impact on the community, it's huge, that's what keeps them alive too, so trying to control all that is difficult, you know, and me and I, you know.

I have been writing aboutthese things for a long time and I and I have increased my sympathy levels for the administrators and for the people and for the intermediaries of the banks who have to check these things. I mean, one thing, one thing that people often understand. I'm upset because I tried the funds test. It has been explained to me very clearly now that showing proof of funds is actually not that difficult. You know there is proof of funds and there are about 18 different varieties of proof of funds. It can be a screenshot you can get people to lend you money for fractions of a second you can pay for that privilege oh look I had 10 billion in my account for three seconds and here's the screenshot you know you can make that People double down all the time we talk about Chris Kirchner, who's the guy who almost bought the Derby and you know.

He also kicked the tires on um Preston, the basis of his wealth was a startup, right, athletic was a startup, once he went through rounds of venture capital funding, he had an interesting idea, especially at the time it was a logistics company. um and it was, you know, he got people like Goldman Sachs to give him money, they liked the idea, that's the nature of startups, you know, you get people to invest in you because you have a good story to tell, so he had money, he had an idea that people had serious, credible people who had given money to his company, now he misappropriated and used that money and misused it and he's headed to prison, but for a while was legit and with that money he hired really good lawyers, he actually had one of the best football acquisitions lawyers working for him, you know, when he comes to the EFL and they see him sitting next to a really good lawyer and they look at his company and They can see an auditor they got. good auditor, you know, they can see the fact that Golden Sachs has given them money, well, they have employees starting out, they have income, as far as they are concerned, it was like Chris, you can keep the club, you can just send the money . you know show actually make the deal we've said you can do it you know the deal is done as far as we're concerned and this happens quite often it's like yeah, you pass our test, we can see you're not a convicted fraud You don't have two bankruptcies No you got it You don't know you're not in trouble with another governing body No gambling convictions Okay, okay, all things black and white You're okay, yeah, yeah, yeah.

We like your lawyer We like your plan Can you send the money now please? And that's where a lot of these deals fail, but it's difficult if you have a good lawyer and you have some that you know, a decent bank. behind you, but people like this all the time, it's not just football, trust me, there are scams, there are scams, turn on Netflix, there are quite a few scammers out there, no, but this, this is something that You know, there are scams that people play on vulnerable older people and in a way I see Adam, this kind of humble club is that kind of vulnerable state, you've lost everything, your club has practically gone into liquidation of some kind, you're desperate for someone bail them out and then these guys come along and say, well, yeah, we have, we have the lawyers, we have the funds, what do you say?

It's your grandmother getting, you know, a cold call saying you know I can get you a free vacation. right, and there's an element of that in it, um, I think it must be like that, you know, we criticize the Premier League and the EFL so often. I mean, now I'm wondering how big those departments have to be or how big those costs have to be when when you're talking about this level of due diligence, because when they get it wrong, the cost is very large from a reputation standpoint. and emotionally, and you know, and sometimes, even when they get revenge when a landlord is right from a legal perspective, everything can go wrong, well, it can go wrong once you're in the building, even if you're a legitimate owner, that It's the other part of this right, you can be a legitimate owner and become hated and unpopular and seen as someone destroying football from within and all that. that kind of thing, so even when the efl do their job well, some people will still say how they let them in properly, how they let them into the building, um, so that's another one of those challenges and you're wondering too, you know who who now?

Do like the EFL and the Premier League commission, you know, when they do these background checks and this audit. I mean, there must be a lot to do in the subtle private investigation kind of space, so maybe that's your um. Be your next move, yeah, well Adam, you make a great point. I mean, we're talking about fit and proper directors, whatever you want to call it, how do you verify competency? So Mel Morris was the most perfect owner to walk into the Derby County premises. ridiculously rich, respected in business and he really tried for a few years until he ran out of money until he couldn't pay those bills anymore and this goes, there's a whole list of genuine White Knights, he knows the funny one, he knows the owner , it finances, you know and it's fantastic when it works and these are, you know, often there's a strong family connection and it's brilliant and then they die, their business blows up, they get bored, they get bored.

You're sick of knowing how unfair all of this is and having your funding taken away and then you're left with a club that's just unsustainable, a company that's unsustainable, so you know this is a challenge for football, you know. You talk about vulnerability. Why does this keep happening in football? I think it's probably a really fundamental question about the industry that it's still happening in football because we're talking about very loved, high profile, very screwed up businesses where people get a bit carried away. they know they get the sugar rush they get the but they're not, they're not profitable, they're barely sustainable, most of them are insolvent, so Matt, we hope they're here forever, so exactly, while you can.

Not just shut them down, like most industries, businesses, businesses go up, businesses go down, it's very sad when that happens, but you don't have that, you know, War Wolfs, right? If you're listening in the UK, imagine 2 years ago a world without Warws is an institution, a British institution that went well, but the people are not well, maybe there are some people who are still grieving. Wars, but most people now just go get their stuff elsewhere, you can't, you can't do that with a football club and therefore take a club like Wigan, they had what a lot of people thought they He was kind of the perfect owner, a local guy.

Dave when he cared about his city he cared about his club in which he invested in Wigan Athletic he was also interested in this rugby and, but his problem was what was going to happen when he grew up and in the end, you know, his grandson got involved and he just couldn't, they couldn't sustain the cost and they didn't do it. He wanted to bear the cost, there came a point where the family wanted to leave it behind and unfortunately they made a very poor choice in the sale they made, but it was still approved at the time it seemed right.

At the time, all there was was a business plan that seemed good and that in the end almost bankrupted them, so I think the longevity of the clubs is also another problem, the fact that these clubs have to exist forever and they won't. They will remain under the same owner forever, so even if your club is current, you know what happened to Brighton, for example, when one day Tony Bloom decides he's had enough of Brenford, you know we heard recently that they might being on the market these clubs that we say are so work perfectly, you know, they are quite important clubs now in the sense of English football, so you would hope that they would receive some kind of decent bidders, but there is no guarantee of, as you say the issue, the competition and you We know we've seen that with you, CH, when you looked at Todd B's offer when he came in, you know, your own sports teams in the states backed by Clear Lake Capital, yeah, of course, you see that some people they would have looked and thought they weren't sure if I know a lot about football, but I think most people looked and thought it would probably be the best you could get in that situation where you're basically up for auction and now you've got them. as if they were caricatured.

The cartoons are like absolute amateurs and that just shows all the levels of the game, so we're talking, from Chelsea to Barry, you're talking about different issues, first of all the legality, then the approval, but then the part that nobody can. Really, competition is ever tested, so what's in it? So if you legitimately want to buy a lower league team, is it your honor to take them to the Premier League? I want something for the fans, can we keep something? living dreams please yes I'm not sure ab ab again we have made capsules in this, right?

So um look we've spent a lot of time talking about you know all the bad things and you know and Let's be honest, bad news tends to work out pretty well and we could really go through two or three weeks of this three four five weeks of this I was you know , I have been, I was, I remembered stories that I had forgotten about you. I know I'm not Monto County Russell King Cy and the athletic and what's the name of Mazar's maid and the whole Pakistani cricket scandal that was connected to that really sad story.

You know someone involved in that club committed suicide because of it. You know, he took his own life. It was because they were so horrified by what happened to their club and I think there was a similar situation between Oxford and Oxford United or it was also the city of Oxford. I don't remember one of those clubs, you know really sad stories, you know? Kinda terrible impacts, so, you know, that's all the bad thing, why are people attracted to football? Well, because everything I said at the beginning, you know, it's exciting, people come to this because they know they're competitive, they've been competitive. they have been successful in one area of ​​their life they want they want to be competitive elsewhere they have reached a sort of point in their life where they have a little fun they want something they want to give something back to you I know they are genuinely proud of their area, they used to support this club, it's like you know again, all that kind of um, you know the benefactor, um philanthropy, you know, some of them are trying to burnish their reputation for whatever reason.

There's a lot of reasons to do it and at the lower end we're seeing this huge momentum and interest at the lower end and I think there are a few reasons why our pyramid is very deep and that's very much our USP. You know, we have a lot of clubs with big fan bases, big stories to tell, they like them, they have incredible longevity, these clubs, they don't know it, they're built to last, but believe it or not, they're resilient. I think things like we have to be honest, Ted Lasso, uh, rexam, son, until let this real interest in history die The narrative what do we have that if you like North American soccer North American sport doesn't have what we have Jeopardy promotion downhill Snakes and Ladders is what you know, there's an interesting emotion in On both ends, it's very different to the way North American sport is structured, so it's interesting, there's a horrible thing, I mean, again, we get into a kind of economic structural issue, you know, there's a lot of money floating around, we had interest rates declines during a while private equity, where that money goes, there are interesting returns in sports, sports become an asset class.

I mean, that's a whole other podcast. You know that people are making a lot of money from the sport in North America, so you have all the interest, of course, of the other. side of the world, what is the interest of the gulf? And before that, China, so there's always going to be some amount of money out there that's going to be interested in sports entertainment, that kind of cross-section, whatever it is, and and and people. They care about the sport and when people care about something and are willing to pay for something, there will always be a business case for it and I think the interest at the lower end for me is fascinating because I think people really like the rise. , relegation, the story of the pyramid, they love the idea, the clubs are cheaper there, they are available, there are a lot of them and you can go on a trip if you do it right, so you know, here's some good news from the other day.

I hope this sounds like good news to me and I hope it continues to be good news. The pension fund was buying them now every time at that time people were saying: Wait a minute, why is the Arizona Fire and Police Public Pension Fund buying IPS Town when they were in League One and paying a pretty good price for it? it? a fairly high price for it well, the promotions are well managed there is a good vibe about them they could go up to the Premier League this season wow they just sold 40% of the club they value them 260 million it is a notable figure to pay for ipsu Town and Anar, you know, an incredible increase in this bankroll betof pensions and, by the way, they sold those 40 sent to another American private equity company, which is who they are. clearly looking and going, yeah, I like that bet, so look, you know there's good news out there, you know like Rochdale, fortunately I think they'll end up, you know, with a good local owner, they've been through the mill and they, they , they, those ties have also been kicked by quite a few rogues and scoundrels, so there are good stories out there, okay, let's end it there.

I really appreciate your time, Matt Adam, and I don't either. Forget watching the string of men wanting to buy English football clubs at Athletic right now. Don't forget to type R and review us and Michael.and the team will be back tomorrow for the weekend preview thanks for listening