Whisper it... But one of Ashley's cronies; Derek Llambias is a SPURS FAN!
Have we got a House of Fraser in Tottenham High Road?
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It is almost an admission of guilt going down that route if you ask me.
Within perspective, that meeting went reasonably well, without anyone losing their heads
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There was a comment on the BBC live feed this morning that summed up the Barcode fans perfectly IMO.
Regarding Steve Bruce, they said "maybe 28 years ago he could have been a good manager, but not now"
So when he was still actively playing for Man Utd he could have been a good manager?
Yeah he's not the greatest manager, but when you've got a squad that has the likes of Joelinton, who scores about 1 goal a year and Jonjo Shelvey in it, what do you expect?
Regarding Steve Bruce, they said "maybe 28 years ago he could have been a good manager, but not now"
So when he was still actively playing for Man Utd he could have been a good manager?
Yeah he's not the greatest manager, but when you've got a squad that has the likes of Joelinton, who scores about 1 goal a year and Jonjo Shelvey in it, what do you expect?
Yep. It’s Branded Sports Direct, but these days it can pretty much be seen as the same thing.
It's the height of irony that this bunch of selfish, self-centred, egoistic Premiership Club Owners suddenly find the balls to stand up and champion fairness when threatened by a new kid on the block that's got more wonga than all of them put together.Inside the ‘incredible’ Premier League meeting – and what it means for Newcastle and beyond
One club executive left Monday’s emergency Premier League meeting and described it as the “most astonishing” they had ever attended. That feeling was shared across the board.
“I’d never seen or heard anything like it in my life… it was incredible,” mused a person present. You get the idea: this wasn’t your standard shareholders’ meeting.
The reason for their incredulity was because they had listened to a verbal statement from Lee Charnley, Newcastle’s managing director and a man very much associated with that club’s now-ended Mike Ashley regime. In it, Charnley threatened legal action against not only the Premier League but also the executives in attendance if a vote was passed to block Newcastle from making lucrative sponsorship deals. It transpired Newcastle had also sent a letter outlining their stance to the Premier League before the meeting but Charnley’s statement was the first other club executives had heard of it.
“Newcastle only sent the letter to the Premier League,” said a source. “Everyone has now seen the letter but nobody knew it existed before the meeting started. We found out from Lee’s statement.”
The 19 other Premier League clubs had already held an extraordinary meeting last week, at which officials tried to explain the decision to sanction Newcastle’s takeover by a Saudi Arabia-linked consortium fronted by Amanda Staveley, a deal that many of the domestic top flight’s members vehemently opposed for multiple reasons.
Tensions were already simmering before Monday’s meeting at Premier League headquarters in Paddington, west London but Charnley’s statement created a siege mentality among those present. It led to 18 clubs voting in favour — Newcastle voted against, Manchester City abstained — of introducing a temporary amendment that bans new commercial opportunities involving pre-existing business relationships going through.
Lee Charnley, right, with then-Newcastle owner Mike Ashley in February 2020 (Photo: Richard Heathcote/Getty Images)
In layman’s terms, this would stop Saudia, Saudi Arabia’s national airline, for example, from immediately becoming Newcastle’s next front-of-shirt sponsors. “Other clubs are worried that, next week, Newcastle’s shirt sponsor will be paid off and a new one will appear, agreeing to pay them £100 million a year,” a source said.
“When Charnley spoke about us all being liable, it split the room,” said one Premier League chairman. “Some of the clubs said they needed to take time to reflect on that. But a lot of other clubs said, ‘No, fuck this. We’re not going to be threatened’.”
Multiple sources indicated that Crystal Palace’s part-owner and chairman, Steve Parish, was the most vociferous and rallied the other clubs to vote against the proposals, especially after being threatened with legal action.
“He basically said, ‘I don’t care about your threats’,” the chairman present continued. “Ultimately, what he (Parish) said carried the room because everyone, bar two clubs, voted in favour.”
Other executives, The Athletic has been told, were keen for the meeting to be paused so that the possibility of being sued could be discussed in more detail before they made a decision. But the vote was passed and contributed to one of the most explosive Premier League meetings in recent history.
“The point of it was to try to scare people into not voting for the resolution,” said one executive. “It actually made people vote in favour, for sure.”
Here, The Athletic explains what happened in the meeting and what it means — for Newcastle and others…
What was said?
“Charnley read a statement from Newcastle saying the new rules would be unlawful, discriminatory and prejudicial,” said a well-placed source. “But incredibly, the statement also said that the new rules would open up the Premier League, the other clubs and directors of other clubs to be liable for that.”
Several club executives, speaking anonymously to The Athletic, criticised Newcastle’s new owners — whether a representative of Saudi’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), which owns 80 per cent of the club, or 10 per cent shareholders PCP Capital Partners and the Reuben brothers — for not attending the meeting and sending Charnley instead.
“They just didn’t turn up, except for Lee, who sat there and read a statement like he was at a German wedding,” a source said.
“Poor old Lee, put in an impossible position, like a puppet,” said another. “Absolutely unbelievable.”
There was disbelief that none of Newcastle’s new buyers were at the meeting, be it in person, like around 80 per cent of attendees, or via Zoom, and widespread sympathy for Charnley.
“We all like Lee,” a well-placed figure reflected. “He’s Mike Ashley’s man and sending your outgoing CEO to make legal threats to the rest of the league is not great.
“If I’d been advising Newcastle, I’d have told them, ‘Vote for this and then wait and see what comes back… make the rules evolve in a way you want further down the line, but don’t threaten people’.”
“They (Newcastle’s new owners) just needed to turn up to the meeting, sit down and talk it through,” said another executive. “There was no need for all of this.”
Executives were surprised to see Newcastle’s new owners, including Amanda Staveley, were not at Monday’s meeting in London (Photo: Owen Humphreys/PA Images via Getty Images)
Although Palace’s Parish led calls for the vote to be held, it is understood Woolwich, Tottenham Hotspur, Everton and Aston Villa were also vehemently in favour of putting a temporary ban on related-party sponsorships in place.
“Everybody is so emotional about it,” an executive said. “(Alan Pace) at Burnley is up in arms. He’s so agitated it’s been allowed to happen.”
Have Newcastle been targeted by rival clubs?
This is certainly how it looks, especially as they are now backed by one of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds and are still in the relegation zone, but club executives will point to the fact that new rules have been a long time coming.
One source, defending Newcastle, admitted that fresh regulations should have already been put in place, as it now looks like a deliberate witch hunt to prevent the Tyneside club from replicating the success Manchester City have achieved over the past decade following their own takeover.
“You bring Newcastle to the table and say, ‘Let’s look at the rules together’,” the Premier League executive explained. “The rule amendments are right, but there’s no need to make it an anti-Newcastle statement.”
They also referred, by way of example, to USM Holdings, the company owned by Everton owner Farhad Moshiri’s business partner Alisher Usmanov, agreeing a reported £12 million-a-year deal re-name Finch Farm — that club’s training ground — as USM Finch Farm. The firm has also concluded a £30 million deal to gain an exclusive option of sponsoring Everton’s new stadium, even though it is still under construction.
Everton have secured planning permission for a new stadium at Liverpool’s Bramley-Moore Dock (Photo: Everton Football Club)
Manchester City, bought by the Abu Dhabi United Group in 2008 and since transformed into one of the top clubs both domestically and in Europe, remained neutral throughout the meeting. Chelsea and Liverpool also stayed relatively silent.
It is understood Liverpool do fully support the proposals, even if they are not the ones driving them, but have become more careful about what they say at Premier League meetings after being burned before.
Manchester United, like arch-rivals Liverpool, are not leading the calls for change but did vote in favour of new regulations being put in place.
Newcastle’s hierarchy were involved in talks of their own on Monday, with Staveley travelling down to London to meet other members of the new board.
This was planned already and not a reaction to the outcome of the Premier League meeting. However, it is understood Staveley was up until the early hours of Tuesday, digesting what had happened.
What happens next?
The Premier League is setting up a working group, which will be populated by representatives from clubs who put themselves forward, to create long-lasting measures. The expectation is that they will report back in three weeks to discuss the potential solution they have come up with.
One executive on the call praised Jon Varney, Brentford’s chief executive, who is believed to have made several intelligent suggestions about what can be done. Manchester United’s Richard Arnold is also being viewed as someone incredibly knowledgeable about commercial deals, although it was his club’s head of legal who attended Monday’s meeting.
“Jon is commercially savvy,” the source said. “Rather than getting carried away with the politics, he actually understands commercial contracts.
“In reality, most of us don’t know the ins and outs of what we can and can’t do commercially, as it’s not our job. But there a few people, like Richard Arnold and Jon Varney, who do know, because it is their job, and they haven’t had to worry about the football side of the club.”
How will this impact Newcastle and the other clubs in the future?
There are relatively few clubs in the Premier League who rely on major related-party contracts, which is why Newcastle’s confrontational letter claimed that rules forbidding or restricting deals of that nature would be discriminatory. Newcastle feel that new regulations are specifically targeting a very small group of clubs and owners.
Manchester City have been accused of earning heavily from related-party deals in the past. Reflecting on their abstention, one director told The Athletic: “It’s not that City will be massively affected immediately. They just don’t like the direction of travel.”
For now, the 18 clubs voting in favour have imposed a three-week moratorium on related-party sponsorship — a direct result of the fear that Newcastle would try to act quickly by arranging and announcing major new sponsors before all loopholes were closed.
A draft version of new rules controlling related parties should be completed by the end of that three-week period, ready for debate and amendments.
Manchester City play at the City of Manchester Stadium, known as the Etihad under sponsorship terms (Photo: Simon Stacpoole/Offside/Offside via Getty Images)
It was a warning, as a well-placed executive put it, that Newcastle’s owners “can’t just waltz in and do what City did” after the club was taken over 13 years ago. The view of the 18 clubs is that almost all of their own commercial revenue is generated through conventional means. They argue that a system whereby owners can use related parties to secure vastly inflated and unrealistic income is unfair and in need of reform.
The aim is to establish regulations that not only limit related-party contracts but also require them to be approved by the Premier League before they are finalised, rather than fought over retrospectively. Clubs would be forbidden from taking the money and then arguing about it later.
Close attention would be paid to market value and inflated deals would be blocked. Industry sources estimate that Newcastle’s shirt deal is worth in the region of £5 million annually. A related company trying to pay three or four times as much would be forced to explain how and why that higher valuation had been reached — and most likely see the agreement rejected.
Premier League sources have told The Athletic that the rules will be broad and wide-reaching. They could cover any of the firms that the PIF, for example, has invested in — even the likes of entertainment giant Disney.
“If Disney offers £4 million a year to sponsor the shirt, no one’s going to complain,” said one. “It’s a fair deal. But if they offer £20 million, they could well be classed as a related party — simply because it’s not a realistic market value. That’s the point.
“I don’t think anyone seriously thinks Disney would do that, but there might be other related companies, less well known, who could be used to pay well over the odds.”
What other consequences might there be?
There is a strong possibility this saga will spell the end of Gary Hoffman’s time as Premier League chairman.
Some Premier League clubs were already concerned about Hoffman’s leadership before the Newcastle takeover. One director spoken to by The Athletic remarked that the Project Big Picture and European Super League fiascos “wouldn’t have happened under (former executive chairman Richard) Scudamore”. Many who sit in the Premier League’s fortnightly meetings share that view.
The Athletic has been told that the “final straw” for Hoffman was the Premier League announcing the Newcastle takeover to its member clubs via a curt email, with little explanation. The other clubs’ expectation was that they would at least have received a phone call outlining the reasons for approving the deal and the Premier League’s sudden change in stance. Again, that had been Scudamore’s style.
Rival clubs were unhappy that it was made to look as if all 19 had given the takeover the green light. In fact, they had not been consulted about it. The previous Premier League meeting did not even have the mooted Saudi buyout of Newcastle as an agenda item. The first many of them knew about the sale going through was when they read about it via the media.
One director said he believed Hoffman would be ousted, and the Premier League’s failure to warn clubs of Newcastle’s impending legal threat will not help his popularity or the strength of his position.
The clubs think the job of Premier League chairman should be one of the most coveted in the country — and that better leadership would allow its chief executive Richard Masters to be more productive. Confidence in Masters appears to be intact.
I fully support their stand, but I find it hilarious that they've suddenly grown a conscience, the selfish little gits.
Well they were blackmailed
Just read that Fonseca is being lined up for them. Assuming that’s not for beheading, got a bad feeling about it.
The beheading will be for Steve Bruce pre match. Sky will have exclusive coverage of this wonderful moment for the city of Newcastle. "And it's live!".
Some questions I ponder and don’t conclude an answer…..
How come the Saudi’s don’t want to invest in their own domestic football ?
How come the Saudi’s are investing in a product that is based where it is and is as compromised as it is, with their money they could have bought or invested in Barcelona for example, why Newcastle ?
How does the outrage from this deal compare to the outrage from the Saudi’s other 60 billion + of purchased U.K. assets ?
Why is the real reality of this problem ignored? That being that it is a culture that is the mirror image of what we (pretend) to be in the west ?
It would seem to me that our liberals all think that the politics of the region are not influenced by Wahhabism (corrected) so they can enact change, through cosy chats and flags. Delusional.
How on Earth dim wits like Gary Neville conclude that the Saudi government can be influenced by (insincere) domestic liberalism, above a 1500+ year religious dogma is beyond me.
How come the Saudi’s don’t want to invest in their own domestic football ?
How come the Saudi’s are investing in a product that is based where it is and is as compromised as it is, with their money they could have bought or invested in Barcelona for example, why Newcastle ?
How does the outrage from this deal compare to the outrage from the Saudi’s other 60 billion + of purchased U.K. assets ?
Why is the real reality of this problem ignored? That being that it is a culture that is the mirror image of what we (pretend) to be in the west ?
It would seem to me that our liberals all think that the politics of the region are not influenced by Wahhabism (corrected) so they can enact change, through cosy chats and flags. Delusional.
How on Earth dim wits like Gary Neville conclude that the Saudi government can be influenced by (insincere) domestic liberalism, above a 1500+ year religious dogma is beyond me.
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At some point the media will ask people who actually know something about Saudi Arabia to put this into some kind of context and we won't have to listen to Gary Neville, who should pipe down on pretty much everything.
What makes me laugh about Bruce and his whinging, is that he was free to leave his job at any point.
He could have walked away. He'd have got another job on the merrigoround.
But no coaches leave. They don't resign. they all want the sack and their payout.
Yeah, their fans were fickle and blamed him for the club being overly tight. But no one forced him to take the job and stay in it.
He could have walked away. He'd have got another job on the merrigoround.
But no coaches leave. They don't resign. they all want the sack and their payout.
Yeah, their fans were fickle and blamed him for the club being overly tight. But no one forced him to take the job and stay in it.
This is way off...... The only people throwing out such rhetoric are either Newcastle fans or people on the football or Saudi gravy-train.
I don't think it would be easy to buy Real or Barca (even though Barca is a dumpster fire right now). So the EPL is an easier and better investment than other leagues. Think it is as simple as that.
My bro works in SA and he says there is a real shift towards more tolerance, mainly due to the new guy we are loving to hate right now. So, I'd take everything we hear with a pinch of pure sodium. They are still basically 50s Britain, but it won't take 50 years to catch up.
Was butchering journalists common in 50s Britain? ......I wasn’t born so I may be missing something.
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It's Wahhabism rather than Sunni Islam that is the issue with KSA.