Many people would say that the world runs on oil, but does football too? In 2010-2011 Middle East investment in the sports world of football was at its peak. Manchester City had been taken over a couple of years beforehand and the powerhouses of Qatar were in the process of taking over PSG in France. Alongside this, an ex-Hull University student was eyeing up Hull City as they headed into a financial crisis. The, then 70-year-old, Egyptian-British businessman Assem Allam successfully took over the club at the end of 2010 and his reign over Hull City began. The club only cost him a fee of 1 euro to take over with additional debt of 35 million euros and pledging to invest a good amount into the club as the club were relegated to the second division of England.
A lot of controversies surrounded this deal regarding the investment of oil money into England, and in 2013 it got even worse. The new owner Assem Allam announced that he was changing the name of the club from “Hull City” to “Hull Tigers” to turn the football club into a more global brand since the name “city” was too common. This was met with fierce protests, chants, and outrage from Hull fans. The decision eventually made it to the England FA and they rejected the name change, further inspiring anti-oil investment belief in the world of football.
In January of 2022, Allam has finally sold off Hull City to a new owner, a Turkish TV tycoon, after years of protest against the Egyptian-born businessman. Should we allow middle eastern investments to enter the world of football? How much power should a foreign owner have over a sports organization? Should a football club owner be allowed to change his organization as he sees fit without an FA oversight?
Prior to reading this article I have always wondered why so many football teams have sponsors from Arabic companies like Manchester City and Etihad Airways, Real Madrid and Emirates, and so many others. I never put together that all these teams are owned by Oil importers from these countries, which makes more sense now to me after reading this article.
ReplyDeleteI believe that middle eastern investments should be allowed, but should be reviewed more than they have been in the past. Depending on the source of the money and what the money has been invested in the past should play a role in the decision of allowing a club to be purchased or not. I also believe that it is of the owners discretion to do what he wishes with their club, but I also believe that an owner and the fans should be communicating with each other in order to do what is best for the club. Without fans a club is useless and without a club fans have no loyalty.
ReplyDeleteAlthough there is a high degree of controversy surrounding oil money in European Sports, to ban further investment would be messy and unfair in many ways. The fact that there already is such a large extent of money surrounding certain clubs, to prevent other middle eastern investors from joining their peers would give the preexisting organizations an unfair advantage in terms of their wealth. Not many clubs have hundreds of billions of dollars to spend--this is just a reality. Furthermore, if this issue were to be fixed at its core, then the middle eastern club owners who already own teams should also be pushed out. This would get rid of all of the corruption which already plagues European football, and then set the tone for future interested buyers. But, this is messy and not an easy fix.
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