Football: Dirty business or conspiracy theories?
The last few years more and more consortiums and filthy rich businessmen are showing huge interest in buying major football teams. (Manchester United, Chelsea, Liverpool, Corinthians, West Ham,...)
Pure fans are delighted because the new owners are promising to invest vast amounts of money into the teams. So great players will arrive and the teams will win trophy after trophy…
But are these businessmen really interested in football and trophies or it’s because football today is BIG business?
Are there any links between various consortiums and businessmen? Would it be possible one person to be owner of more than one teams?
The most controversial case of a consortium’s involvement in football is the case of M.S.I. (Media Sports Investment). In 2004 they signed a deal with Brazilian side Corinthians, that granted the company a large degree of control of the club, in exchange for large investments. Soon after, the team started buying top clas players such as: Carlos Tevez, Javier Mascherano, Marcelo Mattos, Gustavo Nery, Roger, Seba Dominguez, etc. In 2005 M.S.I. was behind an attempt by Kia Joorabchian to take over West Ham. The plans were abandoned later that year. Then in August 2006 Corinthian’s 2 biggest stars, Tevez & Mascherano signed for West Ham, but details of the transfer weren’t disclosed but it’s believed that M.S.I have secured lucrative sell-on clauses. Rumours have it that M.S.I. have links with Russian billionaire Boris Berezovsky and also that Roman Abramovich has a 15% stake!
Someone might wonder… if these rumours were true, surely UEFA would have intervened by now. Well, unfortunately that’s not the case since, as things stand today, UEFA can only intervene if an individual or club own more than 51% of two clubs! So in theory, Mr. Abramovich and every Mr. Abramovich can end up owning dozens of teams, fix results, launder money by selling players between his teams and who knows what else…
Pure fans are delighted because the new owners are promising to invest vast amounts of money into the teams. So great players will arrive and the teams will win trophy after trophy…
But are these businessmen really interested in football and trophies or it’s because football today is BIG business?
Are there any links between various consortiums and businessmen? Would it be possible one person to be owner of more than one teams?
The most controversial case of a consortium’s involvement in football is the case of M.S.I. (Media Sports Investment). In 2004 they signed a deal with Brazilian side Corinthians, that granted the company a large degree of control of the club, in exchange for large investments. Soon after, the team started buying top clas players such as: Carlos Tevez, Javier Mascherano, Marcelo Mattos, Gustavo Nery, Roger, Seba Dominguez, etc. In 2005 M.S.I. was behind an attempt by Kia Joorabchian to take over West Ham. The plans were abandoned later that year. Then in August 2006 Corinthian’s 2 biggest stars, Tevez & Mascherano signed for West Ham, but details of the transfer weren’t disclosed but it’s believed that M.S.I have secured lucrative sell-on clauses. Rumours have it that M.S.I. have links with Russian billionaire Boris Berezovsky and also that Roman Abramovich has a 15% stake!
Someone might wonder… if these rumours were true, surely UEFA would have intervened by now. Well, unfortunately that’s not the case since, as things stand today, UEFA can only intervene if an individual or club own more than 51% of two clubs! So in theory, Mr. Abramovich and every Mr. Abramovich can end up owning dozens of teams, fix results, launder money by selling players between his teams and who knows what else…
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