It is a trend that a few months ago was described by Uefa\u2019s European Club Footballing Landscape report as \u201cbeing fuelled predominantly by United States-based investors\u201d and having \u201cthe potential to pose a material threat to the integrity of European club competitions\u201d. Yet Aleksander Ceferin\u2019s admission that European football\u2019s governing body is considering a rule change after Manchester United\u2019s takeover talks raised issues around potential conflict of interests seemed to indicate it is a threat Ceferin feels the game must embrace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Uefa\u2019s report published in February estimated that 6,500 players from 195 clubs \u2013 a 75% increase in less than three years \u2013 were employed by 27 multi-club investment groups, a third of which are based in the US. It is too early to say whether this is a passing fad, but John Textor \u2013 whose Eagle Football Holdings has shares in Lyon, Crystal Palace, the Brazilian side Botafogo and the Belgian club RWD Molenbeek \u2013 believes the model is here to stay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt\u2019s too easy to write multi-club is bad, Americans are bad and the fans are annoyed, because most of the time it\u2019s only the angry 5% that you hear,\u201d he says. \u201cI feel very good support across the vast majority of fans in our network but you always have people who don\u2019t want to embrace change.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In England, increased restrictions on signing young players after Brexit and tightening financial fair play regulations have meant the trend has intensified since the end of the pandemic. The owners of Chelsea and Newcastle owners have stepped up efforts to create multi-club networks in recent months, with the former\u2019s owners, Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital, close to buying a stake in Strasbourg after lengthy negotiations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Textor, whose Botafogo are on top in Brazil after a blistering start to the season and having celebrated Molenbeek\u2019s promotion to the top flight last month, believes his early successes are a clear illustration of multi-club\u2019s potential.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThere are people who bought clubs because they are generally inquisitive by nature,\u201d he says. \u201cWhether they are in business or sport, they buy, they build and they get bigger. We don\u2019t have a ton of money behind us and we think that collaboration is worth the value of money if you can get these clubs working together.\u201d
Manchester City\u2019s parent company, City Football Group, was the pioneer and has a portfolio of clubs in 13 countries after finalising a 90% takeover of the Brazilian club Bahia at the start of May. Taty Castellanos \u2013 signed by the club now known as Montevideo City Torque a few months after it had been bought by CFG in 2017, then sold on to New York City and Girona \u2013 could end up at the Etihad Stadium next season after his four goals against Real Madrid, but the network has yet to provide a regular first-team squad member for Pep Guardiola. That may be a matter of waiting for a project that began in 2013 and revealed losses of \u00a31.33bn in April, although not everyone has so much time and such deep pockets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
According to Christian Nourry, managing partner at Retexo Intelligence, a football-specialist advisory firm supporting several American investors in club acquisitions, some are rushing in without a coherent plan. \u201cThere isn\u2019t a universal definition of success in this field and this is exactly the trap that I see so many investors falling into,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey decide that their multi-club structure must be everything at once: producing incredible young players, span multiple markets despite inter-club communication being hindered by genuine language barriers, achieve a style of play that transcends all the clubs they own and see every club they own achieve consistently impressive on-pitch results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSo many of these objectives are, at least in the early years of a multi-club project, going to be antithetical to each other. My golden rule with a client in this area is: let\u2019s pick a single initial objective, let\u2019s build a strategy that is hyper-focused on constructing the most optimal multi-club configuration to achieve that objective.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In particular, Textor has focused on investing in clubs with a strong reputation for producing young players and cites the example of Jeffinho \u2013 a 23-year-old Brazilian forward who joined Lyon from Botafogo in January for \u20ac10m \u2013 as an example of how the network can work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThat\u2019s the value of collaboration,\u201d he says. \u201cLyon gave Botafogo a good price for him and now he is thriving in France. Whether you are a football guy or a money person, this global footprint of talent is the real benefit. One team needs a left-back and the other team needs a striker. But the benefits have to go both ways, which isn\u2019t always obvious to fans.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n